An indispensable resource for women of all ages, this is a guide to help us better connect to ourselves, to value ourselves, to love ourselves, and ultimately, to be ourselves."—Chelsea Clinton

Medical professionals sometimes show me concern, but there is no follow-up care or support. I cannot access any mental health services other than the one-off chats in the emergency department. It sometimes feels like they don’t want to “reward” me by showing me attention. I have been told by a psychiatrist that they cannot make it too comfortable for me to go to the emergency department or they are “enabling” me. I am made to feel that I am responsible for bad behaviour and not worth treating. According to models of objectification, viewing someone as a body induces de-mentalization, stripping away their psychological traits. Here evidence is presented for an alternative account, where a body focus does not diminish the attribution of all mental capacities but, instead, leads perceivers to infer a different kind of mind. Drawing on the distinction in mind perception between agency and experience, it is found that focusing on someone's body reduces perceptions of agency (self-control and action) but increases perceptions of experience (emotion and sensation). These effects were found when comparing targets represented by both revealing versus nonrevealing pictures (Experiments 1, 3, and 4) or by simply directing attention toward physical characteristics (Experiment 2). The effect of a body focus on mind perception also influenced moral intuitions, with those represented as a body seen to be less morally responsible (i.e., lesser moral agents) but more sensitive to harm (i.e., greater moral patients; Experiments 5 and 6). These effects suggest that a body focus does not cause objectification per se but, instead, leads to a redistribution of perceived mind.I totally agree that clothes can be hard to find in certain shapes and sizes. I am one of those sizes, but when I look around, most people are hard to fit no matter what their size. But the history of clothing sizes and why they are what they are is another story that the authors didn't study that much. Self-objectification is at the root of negative body image because it puts all the focus on how our bodies look rather than how we feel or what we can do. It prevents us from seeing ourselves as God sees us: as children of our Heavenly Parents with inherent, unchangeable value. Improving Body Image My husband and I have been married for more than 20 years and I was obsessed with my weight for the first half of our marriage, and was thin as well. Eventually, I reached a point emotionally where I couldn’t diet even one more time and I started gaining weight. The bigger I got, the more obsessed with his own weight and body my husband became. For the past five years he has gotten into body building a bit and has gotten increasingly restrictive with his diet. He makes little side comments to me in judgement of my food, health and fatness. I’m the only fat person in the house, so he definitely gets his point across to me through the things he says about others and the things he says to the kids around me. This makes him sound really bad but he is wonderful in many other ways. This is just a tough area for both of us as he feels very right in this area.”

This book does an amazing job with science and metaphor to disrupt the objectification of women and our bodies, and instead embrace a new paradigm of thinking about our bodies as instruments, not ornaments. Instead of fighting for more women’s bodies to be viewed as valuable, let’s fight for women to be valued as more than bodies to view.I did agree with the idea that men should school their thoughts to not see women as objects. I will take it a step further: teach women not to see men as objects. I cannot tell you how many times I have been part of or overheard a conversation of a bunch of ladies admiring a male's physique in an objectifying way. If we are going to be fair, it has to be fair. For many women who have reached out to us over the years, learning to see themselves as more than a body is complicated by having partners who knowingly and unknowingly see them as bodies first and people second. Here are three examples shared with us by women we will keep anonymous. At home, girls are taught to cross their legs in public and take up as little physical space as possible. They are taught that being beautiful is much more valuable than being smart and strong. Magazines preach the gospel of constant diet and exercise to achieve ‘bikini bodies’ that are meant to lounge poolside and be gazed upon. It is a true testament to the misogyny of our culture that women are encouraged to whittle away their bodies and maintain postures that make them as unobtrusive as possible.” So how do we fight against the all-out war against us and our bodies? Physical activity. Physical activity is shown to lead to body satisfaction when girls develop an appreciation of what their bodies can do, rather than how they appear to others. When women exercise to increase their fitness, rather than to improve physical appearance, they are more likely to feel positively toward their bodies. So, exercise! Play sports! Use your body as an instrument to experience life, and enjoy fantastic health benefits like increased cardiovascular health, improved blood sugar, lowered cholesterol, healthy blood pressure, and countless other internal health benefits in the process. The Harvard Women’s Rugby team encourages you to consider their sport as a route to positive body image. Here’s why: Chapter 5 was probably my favorite, but the whole book was spot on. This is such an important book. A few of my favorite moments: I am 100% behind the message, but I suppose I was hoping for more of a how-to or workbook-style lesson, rather than what felt like a collection of the authors’ stories about how they missed out on various swimsuit-requiring events, until they decided not to miss out anymore.

Despite Chelsea Clinton’s front cover assertion that this book is “for women of all ages,” its message is very clearly targeted to women in their teens, 20s and 30s. That’s whose comments and posts are quoted by the authors, and that’s the demographic who, for the most part, are posting selfies on social media and chatting about their journeys to a ‘better bod’. Because of this book and the anger it stirred, I finally threw away my scale. It felt so liberating. I’m committing now to stopping that diet talk with friends and family. I’m raising my girls to believe their bodies are instruments, not ornaments. I’m deciding to trust my body. I’m striving to be fully present, not half present and half evaluating how I might be appearing to other people. I’m choosing to invest my time and energy in my family, my spirituality, creating a homey home, reading, and writing. The chapters were quite long and that made the readability less than ideal for me, I wish there had been 12 chapters instead of 6. However, this is most definitely 5 star in terms of content and the quality of the research and writing.As you work to see yourself as more than a collection of parts to be viewed, fixed, ogled, and rejected, you realize how imperative it is that your partner sees and values you for more, too. In past or present relationships, you might have felt the sting of objectification in your interactions — maybe in the way you were viewed and treated by your partner, but maybe also in the ways you have viewed and treated your partner.