.

“Guide to loving your body: 

1. Get naked and take a good long look at your body. Trace your stretch marks, feel your hip bones poking out, place your hand over your tummy and take a fistful of yourself in. Appreciate your scars and pimples, your uneven,large,or nonexistent breasts. Take pride in your un/shaven, un/cut, fantastically odd private bits. Hold up a mirror to yourself and study your body. Love it.

2. Be Ugly, reclaim words that are used to put you down and shut you up and scream right back at these fascist beauty standard reinforcing scumbags. Give them the finger and tell them to kiss your fat/skinny/somewhere in between ass ‘cause you ain’t got time to waste with their body hating bullshit. and remember, you don’t owe prettiness to anyone. Validate yourself by accepting yourself.

3. Wear clothes that don’t fit, that are too big or too small and show all your “problem areas” that cosmo insists you hide and walk down the street like the fucking fabulous queen you are. Sashay the hate away.

4. Do what YOU want with YOUR body. Shave or don’t, wear makeup or don’t, whatever choice you make is yours to make, and anyone who shames you for your decision can keep it moving. This also means respecting the choices of others, even if they differ from your own.

5. Surround yourself with loving and supportive people. Rid of the toxic bullshit in your life if possible, and immerse yourself in a community that embraces body positivity and diversity. 

”

How to Live Well

Post written by Leo Babauta.

You need very little to be happy. Some simple plant food, modest shelter, a couple changes of clothes, a good book, a notebook, some meaningful work, and some loved ones.

Want little, and you are not poor. You can have a lot of money and possessions, but if you always want more, you are poorer than the guy who has little and wants nothing.

Focus on the present. Stop worrying about the future and holding onto the past. How much of your day is spent thinking about things other than where you are and what you’re doing, physically, at this moment? How often are we living as opposed to stuck thinking about other things? Live now and you live fully.

Be happy with what you have and where you are. Too often we want to be somewhere else, doing something else, with other people than whoever we’re with right now, getting things other than what we already have. But where we are is great! Who we’re with (including just ourselves) is already perfect. What we have is enough. What we’re doing already is amazing.

Be grateful for the small pleasures in life. Berries, a square of dark chocolate, tea — simple pleasures that are so much better than rich desserts, sugary drinks, fried foods if you learn to enjoy them fully. A good book borrowed from the library, a walk with a loved one in the park, the fine exertion of a short hard workout, the crazy things your child says, the smile of a stranger, walking barefoot on grass, a moment of quiet as the morning wakens and the world still rests. These little pleasures are living well, without needing much.

Be driven by joy and not fear. People are driven by the fear of missing out, or the fear of change, or the fear of losing something. These are not good reasons to do things. Instead, do things because they give you or others joy. Let your work be driven not because you need to support a lifestyle and are afraid of changing it, but by the joy of doing something creative, meaningful, valuable.

Practice compassion. Compassion for others creates loving, rewarding relationships. Compassion for yourself means forgiving yourself for past mistakes, treating yourself well (including eating well and exercising), loving yourself as you are.

Forget about productivity and numbers. They matter not at all. If you are driven to do things to reach certain numbers (goals), you have probably lost sight of what’s important. If you are striving to be productive, you are filling your days with things just to be productive, which is a waste of a day. This day is a gift, and shouldn’t be crammed with every possible thing — spend time enjoying it and what you’re doing.

“Go all the way with it. Do not back off. For once, go all the goddamn way with what matters.”

—	Ernest Hemingway, from The Complete Short Stories

How To Change Your Life

By Leo Babauta

Start with a simple statement: what do you want to be?

Are you hoping to someday be a writer, a musician, a designer, a programmer, a polyglot, a carpenter, a manga artist, an entrepreneur, an expert at something?

How do you get there? Do you write your intention on a piece of paper, and put it in a bottle and launch it to sea, hoping it will manifest? No. The universe isn’t going to make this happen. You are.

Do you set yourself a big goal to complete by the end of the year, or in three months? Sure, but that doesn’t get the job done. In fact, if you think back on most examples in your life, setting big long-term goals probably doesn’t work very often. How many times has this strategy been successful?

I’m going to lay down the law here, based on many many experiments I’ve done in the last 7 years: nothing will change unless you make a daily change.

I’ve tried weekly action steps, things that I do every other day, big bold monthly goals, lots of other permutations. None of them work except daily changes.

If you’re not willing to make it a daily change, you don’t really want to change your life in this way. You only like the idea of learning to draw/speak Japanese/play guitar/program in php/etc. You don’t really want to do it.

So make a daily change. Let’s dig into how it’s done!

How to Turn an Aspiration Into a Daily Change

Let’s name a few aspirations:

• lose weight
• write a book
• stop procrastinating
• fall in love
• be happy
• travel the world
• drink more water
• learn Spanish
• save money
• take more pictures
• read more books

How do you turn those lofty ideas into daily changes? Think about what you could do every day that would make the change happen, or at least get you closer to the goal. Sometimes that’s not always easy, but let’s look at some ideas:

• lose weight – start walking every day, for 10 minutes at first, then 15 after a week, then 20 … once you are walking for 30-40 minutes a day, make another change — drink water instead of soda.
• write a book – write for 10 minutes a day.
• stop procrastinating – I can already hear the ironic (and original!) jokes about how people will deal with procrastination later (har!). Anyway, a daily action: set a Most Important Task each morning, then work on it for 10 minutes before opening your browser/mobile device.
• fall in love – go somewhere each day and meet/social with new people. Or do daily things that make you a fascinating person.
• be happy – do something each day to make the world better, to help people.
• travel the world – save money (see next item). Or start selling your stuff, so you can carry your belongings on a backpack and start hitchhiking.
• save money – start cutting out smaller expenses. Start cooking and eating at home. Sell your car and bike/walk/take the train. Start looking for a smaller home. Do free stuff instead of buying things.
• drink more water – drink water when you wake up, then every time you take a break (once an hour).
• learn Spanish – study Spanish sentences in Anki and listen to Pimsleur tapes 10 minutes a day.
• take more pictures – take pictures at lunch (but dear jeebus, not of your lunch) and post them to your blog.
• read more books – read every morning and before you go to bed.

You get the idea. Not all of these are perfect ideas, but you could come up with something that works better for you. Point is, do it daily.

How to Implement Daily Changes

This method is fairly simple, and if you really implement it, nearly foolproof:

1. One Change at a Time. You can break this rule, but don’t be surprised if you fail. Do one change for a month before considering a second. Only add another change if you were successful at the first.
2. Start Small. OK, I’ve said this two bajillion times. No one ever does it, though. Start with 10 minutes or less. Five minutes is better if it’s a hard change. If you fail at that, drop it to 2 minutes.
3. Do it at the same time each day. OK, not literally at the same minute, like at 6:00 a.m., but after the same trigger in your daily routine — after you drink your first cup of coffee in the morning, after you arrive at work, after you get home, after you brush your teeth, shower, eat breakfast, wake up, eat lunch, turn on your computer, first see your wife each day.
4. Make a huge commitment to someone. Or multiple people. Make sure it’s someone whose opinion you respect. For example, I made a commitment to studying/coding PHP at least 10 minutes each day to my friend Tynan. I’ve made commitments to my wife, to other friends, to readers of this blog, to readers of a newspaper on Guam, to my kids, and more.
5. Be accountable. Taking my programming example with Tynan … each day I have to update a Google spreadsheet each day showing how many minutes I programmed/studied each day, and he can (and does) check that shared spreadsheet. The tool you use doesn’t matter — you can post to Facebook or Twitter, email someone, mark it on a calendar, report in person. Just make sure you’re accountable each day, not each month. And make sure the person is checking. If they don’t check on you, you need to find a new accountability partner or group.
6. Have consequences. The most important consequence for doing or not doing the daily habit is that if you don’t, the people will respect you less, and if you do, they’ll respect you more. If your accountability system isn’t set up this way, find another way to do it. You might need to change who you’re accountable to. But you can add other fun consequences: one friend made a promise to Facebook friends that he’d donate $50 to Mitt Romney’s campaign (this was last year) each time he didn’t follow through on a commitment. I’ve made a promise to eat whale sushi (I won’t fail, because eating a whale is repugnant to me, like eating a cow or a child). I’ve promised to sing a Japanese song in front of strangers if I failed. The consequences can also be positive — a big reward each week if you don’t miss a day, for example. Make the consequences bigger if you miss two straight days, and huge if you miss three.
7. Enjoy the change. If you don’t do this, you might as well find another change to make. If the daily action feels tedious and chore-like, then you are doing it wrong. Find a way to enjoy it, or you won’t stick to it long. Or find some other change you enjoy more.

That’s it. Seven pretty simple steps, and you’ve got a changed life. None of these steps is impossible — in fact, you can put them into action today.

What daily change will you make today?

1. Either don’t initiate any hugs or handshakes, or initiate all of them. Part of being awkward is devastatingly bad timing and hesitance when extending a hand or arms to greet someone. Nothing is more embarrassing than trying to play off being snubbed, so don’t even put yourself in that position. If you can’t firmly decide to either go in for the fist bumps, high fives, embraces etc. — don’t bother! Extending a hand and having it return to yourself untouched is easily in life’s ten most embarrassing moments.

2. Always keep your phone on you. An awkward person with a cell phone in a social environment is the equivalent of MacGyver having a Swiss Army knife in a bind. You’re instantly resourceful. It allows us the ability to occupy ourselves using various apps and games or pretending to be texting. This serves as a brilliant coping mechanism to deal with being in an uncomfortable setting.

3. Be early. If you’ve ever shown up to an event late, you’re aware of how difficult it can be to ingratiate yourself into the festivities. Everyone seems to already be acquainted with each other and you struggle to take part in conversations. If you arrive early, there’s nobody there who you haven’t met — thus, you’re in a position to be the most popular person in the joint.

4. Ask questions. Some aren’t great at conversing; others become particularly nervous speaking to certain individuals. A helpful way to avoid babbling, stumbling over your words, and coming off as a tense person is to put the pressure on others. Let them talk. All you do is listen, and generate a response — in the form of a question. They describe their nostalgic stories of fishing with their father as a child for 10 minutes, then you ask “How large was the biggest fish you ever caught?” Boom — another 10 minutes of conversation generated. Eventually you’ll grow more comfortable and feel compelled to discuss yourself as well.

5. If you can’t recognize the temperature, avoid playing the role of weatherman. If you’re uncertain about the type of sense of humor those you’re interacting with have, don’t tell jokes. Oftentimes attempts at wittiness around the wrong people come off as uncalled for or inappropriate. Know or have a good idea of the mood and feel of your surroundings before practicing your standup routine.

6. Don’t think about screw-ups. Emphasize your attention on the positive aspects of your experience. While it can be difficult to make it through a social event when certain things have gone wrong, or you’ve embarrassed yourself — focus on what’s gone right. Be progressive. Encouraging yourself and recognizing that you’ve done well in some areas will go a long way.

7. Worry less about others’ opinions. Obviously that’s easier said than done, but you’ve got to. Even if that means having a drink or two to loosen up, you must force yourself to refrain from caring. If we’re worried in advance about what he or she will think of us, we’ll try to live up to their expectations (which are probably incredibly high, if they were created by our self-conscious minds). It’ll be straining and that rarely ever works out well. Keep it natural and authentic. Although there is one thing you can force…

8. Be extraordinarily friendly. Smile. Smile some more. Then follow that up with a little more smiling. Seriously, people thoroughly enjoy being around a flat out nice, happy person. That’s why Will Smith and Ellen DeGeneres are so appealing. Even if you start out imitating happiness, eventually it can turn into the real thing. Sometimes pretending like you know what you’re doing leads to somehow, actually knowing what you’re doing. It’s the same with emulating joy. Fake it ‘til it’s real.

9. Don’t try to ease the awkward silences. When something uncomfortable or rude is said — whether it’s by yourself or another person — silence may occur. When nobody is laughing at a punch line, or has no response to a slightly offensive comment, don’t even attempt to fill that void. Doing so can, and probably will result in some excruciating discomfort. There truly are some instances where silence is golden — especially if it’s somebody else who’s responsible for the awkward quietness. However, if you initiated the anxiousness, just wait a few seconds and a new topic will arise.

10. Get out of the house! It’s a lot easier to say something bold over Facebook chat than it is in person. As a result, our generation has spawned a massive amount of awkwardness. Many don’t feel comfortable functioning in public, or holding a conversation that’s not behind a keyboard. The only way to get used to social environments is repetition. The more you talk to people face-to-face, the easier it’ll get. As an occasionally anxious person, I assure you that this can be done if you have confidence… or shots of tequila. That always helps.

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10 Ways To Be Less Awkward - CHRISTOPHER HUDSPETH