as a competitive swimmer starting an early elementary school my perception of my body or my body image was shaped by my physical abilities and experiences my high school that had changed at age 15 after years of swim meets and daily practices doing something I loved and was good at I quit I didn't quit because I hated swimming I quit because I hated the way I looked in my swimsuit so for years I hid myself and I tried relentlessly to fix myself but despite all my best efforts I never felt truly swimsuit worthy what I didn't realize at the time is that my body was never the problem the problem was my body image so when I sat in a classroom my freshman year of college and learned for the first time about the ways women's bodies are objectified and distorted in media it shook me and it woke me up to a lot of the ways I had suffered and held myself back because my self-worth and my body image were completely defined by my appearance an appearance that never did and never quite could live up to those cultural ideals understanding this problem of negative body image and how to fix it became my academic and personal passion and I guess I shouldn't have been surprised when my college roommate discovered that same passion because we not only shared a tiny dorm room we also shared all of our DNA my twin sister Lexi and I have been working together to promote positive body image since 2009 when we started our PhDs and founded the nonprofit Beauty redefined our approach to body image is a bit different than most because we are working to redefine not just the look of beauty but its meaning and value in our lives over the last 15 years or so lots of well-meaning people and companies have worked to improve women's body image by pushing the message that all women are beautiful flaws in all this is a really nice message but it isn't fixing the problem that's because girls and women aren't only suffering because of the unattainable ways beauty is being defined they are suffering because they are being defined by beauty they are bodies first and people second so rather than working to make sure more women's bodies are viewed as valuable we are focused on making sure women are valued as more than bodies to view our work is founded on the premise the positive body image isn't believing your body looks good it's knowing your body is good regardless of how it looks we have to be able to see more in ourselves and everyone else only then can we move on and be able to be more more than objects more than beautiful more than a body we can start this process by learning to see the invisible shame that is a normal part of most of our lives and that starts with body fixation whether you feel like a perfect 10 or a troll if you're constantly thinking about your appearance you're falling into this trap called self objectification even if you've never heard of this concept before it's going to sound completely familiar to most girls and women and increasingly more boys and men it feels like a mental task list that Badgers you as you move throughout your day if left to its own devices mine sounds something like this okay adjust your shirt adjust your skirt oh I see those people are looking at me so I'm gonna give him my best angles make sure I suck it in Oh chin up I feel that double chin creeping in now I have to readjust my shirt readjust my skirt and continue this process until you die self-objectification is the process of monitoring your body from an outsider's perspective picturing what you look like all day even when no one is looking at you studies show if girls and women are in a state of self objectification they perform worse on math and reading comprehension tests they can't throw a softball as hard or run as far or lift as heavy of weights as they can when they are not self-conscious of their bodies if even a small part of your mental energy is constantly dedicated to your looks you are at a disadvantage and this problem of self objectification goes hand-in-hand with negative body image about 3/4 of the women in our dissertation studies felt very negatively toward their bodies and almost all of them were also self objectifying this was especially clear in the way they answered the first question I asked how do you feel about your body one woman said I feel like I'm too fat or not skinny enough for the world today I feel like I'm not good enough for my husband because of my body another woman said it's never looked how I wanted it to there are cellulite scars veins things I try hard to keep hidden as you can hear these women are describing their feelings about their own bodies as if they are outside viewers looking at themselves it is incredibly difficult to feel good about your body if you were judging it solely based on appearance especially over time and especially considering these unattainable ideals we're up against but some women do feel good about their bodies and we need to figure out how even when you feel positively towards your body if you are thinking about it in terms of appearance that's likely to change over time so we need to understand how we can move on and not only redefine beauty for ourselves in ways that are better for our health but redefine health for ourselves in ways that have nothing to do with beauty too many of us are judging our own fitness in ways that have a lot to do with how we look and very little to do with our actual health but studies show a person's level of physical activity is actually a much better indicator of their health and fitness than their body mass index their weight their size and any other external measurement if we really understood this health and fitness could become something so much more achievable and even empowering we would be able to focus on how we feel what our bodies can do and our internal vitals and health rather than getting so hung up on whether we have six-pack abs or can fit into those old jeans in the back of our closets we don't care about this is definitely a huge paradigm shift for most people but I like to simplify it and summarize it using my favorite beauty redefined mantra my body is an instrument not an ornament but like once we can see more in ourselves than ornaments to be looked at we can move on to being more in our body obsessed culture this is hard but some women do feel good about their bodies regardless of how they look so again how is this possible our work at beauty redefined is based on what we found by asking that question when we looked at the women who felt good about their bodies we found they often had one thing in common they also described very painful experiences that had either created or magnified their body shame at some point this pointed us to a hopeful process and a theoretical model called body image resilience through this process some women grow stronger and love their bodies more not just in spite of the pain they experience but because of what they learn through that pain this is possible because those painful experiences can work as disruptions to our body image pushing us out of our comfort zones that might be filled with self objectification and shame I say comfort zone because those things are normal for too many of us but they are anything but comfortable a body image disruption changes that because it changes the way you perceive and relate to your own body so whether you're disruption is being made fun of being sexually assaulted having a baby or putting on a swimsuit we all respond in some way to deal with the shame that those things stir up our research identified three possible paths people take in response to a body image disruption the first path sinks us deeper into shame through harmful coping mechanisms like self-harm disordered eating and abuse of alcohol or drugs a 13 year old girl shared her example with me of initially sinking into this first path she said I used to cut myself well my last time doing that was yesterday but I did it because I was bullied everyday about my looks I was told that no one would ever like me because of the way I looked just like this heartbreaking example if you're a response to a disruption numbs you but ultimately leaves you worse off than before it fits into this first and worst response path the second path keeps us clinging to those uncomfortable comfort zones through hiding and fixing hiding by avoiding events situations and activities where you don't want to be looked at and fixing by trying to change your appearance in some way to cope with shame whether that's through a liquid only detox or liposuction even after I quit swimming and spent years fixing my supposed flaws or hiding them successfully I still never felt any better about my body that's because this second path doesn't allow you to fight against body shame it simply helps you adapt to it by dressing it up or locking it away to deal with later since shame and body fixation are such normal parts of so many of our comfort zones it's likely that we don't even realize when we are reacting to those issues so sinking deeper into shame and clinging to our comfort zones are probably just our defaults and not deliberate choices but no matter how many times you have found yourself on one of these two paths it is always possible to recognize your disruptions and respond to them in a better way for some of you listening to me speak right now could be a body image disruption because my words might be shining a light on the shame you've grown numb to or the self objectification you've never lived without that's what happened for that 13-year old girl I mentioned just a moment ago in the midst of her long detour on that first path with self-harm she reluctantly attended a beauty redefined event where we spoke about how to develop body image resilience and she wrote to us afterward saying I thought you would say you guys are all so beautiful and then go home but you helped me see that I'm worth so much more than how I look to other people like you guys said I can either use my experiences to make me or break me and I'm going to use them to make me a stronger more compassionate person I am so much more than what is on the outside I'm going to work on believing that and she did get to work on believing that she started practicing the strategies we recommended in that event and she stopped cutting herself she sent us excited updates at 24 days and then 45 days with no self-harm and then months and now years later saying it had been very difficult but she was receiving professional help and working to help others with similar pain by posting uplifting quotes around her school as soon as she was able to see the self objectification that had been stinking her deeper into shame she was able to see more in herself and then fights to be more that day she chose a better path the third path and started rising with body image resilience it took me years of clinging to my own comfort zone refusing to swim before I was able to find that better path all through high school and college just being invited to go swimming had become a regular body image disruption in my life one I always responded to by hiding and fixing so at age 21 when my friends and my boyfriend invited me to go swim at a lake on a perfect summer day I responded to that little disruption the same way I always did without even thinking about it I automatically fired off all my best excuses to hide while I mentally made plans to fix myself so I could go next time but that day those standard excuses rang hollow to even me they almost felt like self betrayal because I realized that despite what I was hearing myself say out loud I really did want to go in that moment I caught my first glimpse of the way I had been drowning in body shame even as I had avoided the water for years I stood there in my bathroom alone and I did some serious self-reflection and I decided I was going to face my disruption in a new way head-on I quietly worked up the courage to put on a swimsuit and I tried so hard to not care that everyone could see me as I hesitantly waded into that Lake but that care that exhausting self-objectification washed away the moment I immerse myself in the water as I swam my first few strokes in years I was overwhelmed with this familiar feeling that I was powerful I was capable I was able to see how I had been on this endless loop of trying to fix my body that never needed to be fixed and in order to do something I never stopped being able to do I was still a swimmer and any fear I had about how I looked that day disappeared because I was finally experiencing my body as an instrument for my youth rather than an ornament to be looked at I had tried for so long to qualify to swim without shame but it was only when I could see my shame and choose to swim against it that I was able to find that better path the third path to the brave new world of body image resilience that path has become my passion and in the ten years since that experience earning a PhD with my twin sister along the way I've worked to help others understand and tap into their own power to face body image disruptions and come out stronger for it developing body image resilience is a continuous ongoing process but the crucial first step is what we are already doing right now we're learning to see more we have to be able to see more in our media and cultural messages that objectify and distort our views of beauty health and individual worth only then can we see more in everyone around us and especially in ourselves when we can see more we can be more more than objects more than beautiful more than a body see more by redefining beauty for yourself be more by refusing to be defined by beauty thank you [Applause]