Why Your New Year’s Fitness Resolution is Hurting Your Body Image

If you did a quick Google search right now for the most common New Year’s Resolutions, you would find that “lose weight” and “exercise more” consistently rank among the top few resolutions.

All over social media, you’ll find fitness and wellness influencers touting various programs and diet plans to get a “Better Bikini Body,” “Lose X amount of lbs in 3 weeks,” or to join their “Detox for the New Year" challenge.

And on the one hand, this might not seem that problematic. After all, you don’t tend to hear about too much fitness hurting anyone…right?

But, if you struggle with negative body image, obsessive/compulsive tendencies, and/or an eating disorder, then your relationship with fitness might be hurting you more than it’s helping you.

Every year, one of the biggest mistakes I see women make is setting fitness resolutions based solely on aesthetics, believing that if their body looked a certain way, they’d finally feel better about themselves.

This mindset often leads to restrictive diets and unsustainable exercise routines that may yield quick results—but in the long run, they damage both your physical and mental health.

The reality is that chasing an aesthetic goal only fuels negative body image, while perpetuating unhealthy habits like disordered eating and over-exercising.

And despite what those fitness influencers would have you believe, true self-worth and confidence don’t come from flat abs or the ‘perfect’ body.

If you’re hoping that your New Year’s diet or exercise resolution will finally lead to body love, I want you to ask yourself: Has it ever worked before?

How many times have you tried a crash diet, quick fix, or some complicated, unsustainable routine only to end up feeling the same way, or even worse, by the end of January?

The truth is, chasing an aesthetic goal fuels negative body image and perpetuates unhealthy habits like disordered eating and over-exercising.

And despite what those fitness influencers would have you believe, true self-worth and confidence doesn’t come from flat abs or having the “perfect body.” It comes from feeling good in your body and good about who you are.

So if you want to stop this cycle and get healthy the right way, here are 3 fitness-related new year’s resolutions that will help your body image instead of damage it.

Tip #1: Exercise to Feel Good Rather than to “Look Good”

When it comes to body image, the motivation behind your fitness routine matters.

Instead of basing your exercise routine around aesthetic goals, I want you to think about the underlying feeling that you’re really searching for.

For example, if you want nothing more than flat abs, what is it that you think having flat abs will give you? Do you think you’ll feel beautiful or sexy? Is it about confidence? Is it about self-worth?

Or if you want your legs to look a certain way, what feeling would that give you? Would you feel stronger and more powerful? Would you feel like you’d be more attractive (and worthy of love) if you had the legs of your dreams?

What’s the feeling behind the aesthetic goal?

Setting feeling-based goals rather than appearance-based goals is one powerful way to improve your relationship with fitness and your body image.

Tap into that amazing feeling of accomplishment when you see your body do something that it couldn’t do before, like lift a little heavier or run a little faster or hold a yoga pose for a little longer. Or what about that endorphin rush that just helps you feel like you’re on top of the world?

Focus on exercising to feel good in your body rather than what it looks like.

Tip #2: Make Movement Fun, Not Punishment

In order to have a sustainable relationship with exercise, movement has to be both fun and somewhat challenging. There is a big difference between a hard, gritty workout and one that just feels like punishment.

This is where I want you to focus on finding your fitness “Sweet Spot”; that perfect blend of a workout that you look forward to that also challenges you.

Whenever I work with women on this 1:1 they often realize that they’ve been way too focused on a type of exercise they hate, but they’ve stayed committed “for the results.”

• Maybe you’ve been a devoted gym rat but you feel a sigh of relief at the thought of attending a barre class.

• Maybe you used to do yoga religiously but now circuit training sounds kind of exciting.

• Maybe you used to follow app-based workouts but the idea of an unstructured plan where you pick a new workout everyday feels like more fun.

Whatever it is for you, give yourself permission to change up your routine until you find something that fits the “Sweet Spot” criteria and keep in mind that different seasons of life might call for different workouts.

For example, I used to love barre and running for many years until that joy wore out and I found weight lifting more enjoyable. Then, during a very stressful season of my life, I found low impact cycling classes and pilates to be more supportive to my nervous system and to fit the “Sweet Spot” criteria.

It’s okay to let your fitness preferences change!

I firmly believe that exercise is a vital part of our mental and physical wellbeing, but there has to be some balance there in order to keep the habit sustainable and actually provide the emotional benefits we’re looking for just as much as the physical.

The bottom line: You cannot have a positive relationship with your body if you continue to slog it out in a workout routine that you secretly f*cking hate, which leads us to our last tip...

Tip #3: Let Your Body Take the Lead

Your body is a great source of information and wisdom in this life—if you know how to listen to it. And exercise can be a really powerful way to help you do that.

When you listen to your body’s cues and take action based off of what it’s telling you rather than what your mind says, you will find yourself having a completely different relationship with exercise and your body itself.

Listen to the cues your body gives you and go from there.

• If you never miss an early morning workout but you’re not getting enough sleep and your body starts begging you for rest, listen

• If you’re starting to feel sick or tired, scale back or take some time off.

• If you keep going with a fitness routine you really don’t enjoy, it’s time to change it up, take a break, or both.

I know that for those who struggle with compulsive exercise the difficulty isn’t getting to the gym: It’s the guilt that comes with skipping a workout, shortening a workout, or taking a rest day.

The hard part is that voice in your mind that says, “But if I take a day off, won’t I just become lazy and never want to workout again?”

Here’s what I want you to know: If you have a tendency to overdo things, then letting your body take the lead and resting when it wants rest isn’t going to turn you into a couch potato. I promise.

In fact, it’s quite the opposite.

Getting the rest you need is going to help you create a more sustainable relationship with exercise, one where you have more energy and are less likely to face injury and illness due to over-training.

Now it’s time to ask yourself, which of these tips are you going to implement? Which one do you need the most right now? Which one are you drawn to?

Here’s to the year where you finally learn what it takes to love your body. I’m rooting for you!