Reveal the Body You Were Born to Shine In

Hello beautiful!

My husband and I are on the train leaving Paris – always a sad moment! But France now brings me so much joy!

If you’ve read through the Nice Series, you know that my first foray to France was in the middle of – and hugely aggravated – my terrible relationship with my body.

I was overweight.

I was more out of shape than I had ever been.

I was embarrassed to leave the house, and depressed whenever I got dressed.

I couldn’t control my appetite, and while I thought each binge would bring me relief, I only felt worse afterward.

I was in a downward spiral and only picking up steam.

I hated living in my body, and no matter how many times or ways I tried to change my ‘mindset’ or my body image, to be content with this new version of myself, it didn’t work.

I was miserable.

And honestly, I had started to doubt that there was any way out.

The trouble had started a few years earlier. I was stressed in school, and because I wasn’t yet eating in a way that allowed me to manage my appetite, my yogurt dessert each evening was becoming more like an endless yogurt sundae.

I didn’t know how else to amuse myself, find escape or excitement, or comfort myself after a long day.

Then my mother became seriously ill, and I became her primary caregiver. The emotional distress of bathing and feeding her in what we thought were her final days was more than I could bear, and again I turned to food.

I didn’t know how to relieve stress and despair without overeating.

When – Praise the Lord – she made a miraculous recovery and pulled out of her illness, I was left with my own battle-scarred body, and in Nice the following summer I lost hope and control.

Now 50 pounds heavier, I had a decision to make: either accept this new level of unfitness as my new norm, or begin the slow fight back to the wellness I had.

Well, as it turned out, I did neither.

Instead, by fighting the battle on two fronts – both the inside and the outside – I achieved a level of total wellness I had never had before – and had never thought was possible.

Because here’s the thing: when I was slim and fit previously, I was still tremendously legalistic, insecure, and fear-and-guilt-driven with my body.

When I wanted chocolate, I ate celery, and that led to a longing for chocolate that exploded into a binge days or even weeks later, depending on how long I could ‘last.’

It wasn’t until I actually dealt with some of my underlying beliefs about – of all things – God, and how He designed the world, that my body and I became a total A-team, working together instead of against each other, and loving every second of it!

As I spent more time focusing on how the body was handled in the Word, I was blown away by how important our self-care is, both in how we think about our bodies and in how we actively care for them.

And this is where many of the teachings and perspectives out there fall short:

They focus all attention on outer care and getting fit, or they focus only on the importance of coming to love your body in all of its beautiful imperfection.

And if they do at all balance these two (very connected!) areas, they don’t bring in God.

But as I studied and refined my relationship with God and my body, I realized that any way of taking care of my body that didn’t keep God and His design and love for my body at the forefront of my goals and habits, not only would probably not last, but would never be deeply peace-giving and easy.

How could it? How could I hope to create a dreamy relationship with my body, inside and out, without staying fully connected to the One who created it, inside and out?

The problem is, healing and deepening our relationship with God involves a lot of different pieces!

We have to learn who He really is, what His true character is, and why and how we can depend on Him. We have to unearth our ‘subconscious theology’ – the beliefs underneath the surface, deep in our hearts, that we may be living out of without even knowing it.

Beliefs like,

‘God doesn’t really love me.’

‘I’m not good enough for God’s love.’

‘God will eventually desert me like everyone else.’

‘God doesn’t really have my best interests in mind.’

Unknotting these deep beliefs takes not only learning the truth, but rewiring the neural pathways in our brains (no kidding!) that are firmly convinced of these untrue ‘truths.’ This takes repeated affirmations, healing prayer, and meditation on the Word.

Then, of course, we haven’t even touched the big changes we have to make in our relationship with our own body! How do we even begin to address the deep wounds dealt by a culture that teaches us that we have no worth unless we look a certain way, or weigh a certain weight?

Is there any truth in such a culture? If not, how do we recover from and continue to live in the midst of lies?

Working for 12 years as a model and 3 years in the ministry field made one thing very clear to me: I am NOT alone in my concerns, pains, struggles, and attempts to sort through this mess of living in and loving my body in a Godly way in a broken world.

Are you with me?

But I couldn’t find anyone who was teaching on this topic from all of the involved angles, and via all of the means required to create deep and lasting transformation.

So, I set out to teach on it myself, sharing my experiences and my studies of health from the scientific and medical perspective in undergrad (at Johns Hopkins – a nerdville where I fit right in!), then from the cultural and media (especially social media – whew!) perspective in grad school (at Georgetown, a slightly more chic nerdville), and from the Biblical and theological perspective after years in the Word and in ministry.

I had discovered something – a really big something, actually! – and it had released me from years of struggling, being angry at myself and at the world, and feeling like I was never going to figure this ‘be happy and healthy’ thing out.

Now there’s no dread, no guilt – only excitement! – when I think about or move through my body care routines.

It’s like this tremendous weight has been lifted from my shoulders – because from here on out, it’s all love – all happy, healthy, holy body love!

I can so remember when I used to stress about whether I was always going to have to be paranoid about my weight, or what others thought of me, or whether I would have ‘what it took’ to care for my body for a lifetime.

Where was I going to find the discipline? The time? The ‘right answer’ to what to eat, when to eat, how to workout, etc etc etc?

Those days are GONE, and I’m deliciously happy to announce that they will not be coming back!

What about you, lovely?

What side of the body care and love fence do you feel like you’re on?

Are you looking over the side, longing for the intoxicating feeling of stretching out on fresh green grass, knowing that you will never hate or mistreat your body again? Or are you even starting to wonder if feeling that good is just an impossible illusion?

Or are you totally there – loving every glance in the mirror, on bloated days as much as right after the gym, eating only with delight and peace and only out of hunger, able to savor a green juice as much as a decadent pure indulgence (and yes, those exist!), knowing your body is flourishing at its ideal weight, and reflecting all the beauty and power you have within, as well as a close and radiant relationship with the God who created your body?

If you’ve hit your stride, inside and out, and you know your body is at its maximum wellness from every angle, bravo, beautiful! I’d love to know how I can keep supporting you!

If you know, though – or hope! – that things could be better, and would love a game-plan that fully incorporates your faith, then I am so thrilled to be able to share with you an absolute project of my heart: The Body Stewardship eCourse.

If you’re unfamiliar with ecourses, let me let you in on why they are the best thing ever!

I signed up for my first course almost a year ago, and immediately knew that this was going to be one of the most powerful ways to teach, deliver, learn and receive content in the information age.

An ecourse is an online website (usually; some are still delivered just via emails) that you sign up to have access to – access that never goes away!

So unlike a membership site (or a gym membership) there is no renewal, just a one-time sign up.

Inside, through a combination of videos, worksheets, checklists, recordings, printables, teaching content, and even some live coaching sessions, teachers are able to deliver their expertise through a medium that:

1) is always accessible to the learner, at any time and on any internet-connected device,

2) allows the reader to go through all of the content at their pace, over and over again, and in total privacy,

3) allows the teacher to deliver more content in more forms than would be otherwise possible, even in multiple in-person sessions.

Most of these courses are about 6 weeks – or thematic ‘modules’ – worth of content.

With Body Stewardship, I barely squeezed everything into 10 modules!

I’ve laid them out like this:

MODULE 1: Free Your Vision

We start by learning how to get in touch with – maybe for the first time – the kind of relationship we want to have with our bodies, and the kind of wellness routine we think sounds like a fantasy! I’ll teach you how to dream big in spite of past disappointments, and then how to use the balance of inspiration and structure to work within the bounds of your life to create the changes you want. It’s time to dream again!

MODULE 2: Know Your Hero

Got your big dreams? Now we move into finding out what makes them all so possible, and so peaceful: the true nature of God. This is where we dig up our unconscious theology, find out where it’s sabotaging us, and throw it out until our thoughts and deep beliefs line up with what is true in the Word. I’ll also show you how to develop a close personal friendship with the Lord, that will make all changes feel (and be!) empowered by a good and trusted Friend.

MODULE 3: The Word on Our Bodies

Now that we know the nature of God and are feeling all snuggled up and friendly with Him, it’s time to find out what His Word really says about our bodies. This stuff will blow your mind! It certainly did mine! From tabernacles and temples (all those exact cubit widths!) to blood shed, ownership, and the anti-Christ, we are getting deep into Scripture to give you a whole new perspective on the importance and beauty of your body.

MODULE 4: A Cultural War

Time to lift our heads up from Scripture and look out at the messy world around us. You may think mostly of the media and popular culture when I say culture, but believe me, there is way more to culture than that! We’ll be walking through the influences of your family culture, your peer culture, and even church culture to see how our thoughts and experiences about our bodies have been misled, and how we can not only get them back on track, but be leaders in these cultures for much more love and positive change.

MODULE 5: Saboteurs: Shame

This is a biggie! And yet very few people relate it to all of our body insecurities. It started all the way back with original sin, but it doesn’t have to last a day longer in your life, lovely! Christ truly has taken our shame away, but living that out – especially when it comes to how we feel about our bodies – can be a difficult task! I will walk you through the steps to completely release this shame in your life, and be fully in love with and confident in your body now, even as you continue to work to make it its healthiest!

MODULE 6: Saboteurs: Blocking Love and Pleasure

This is another area very few people address – largely because it’s a tricky one to grasp. We talk about love so much it’s become almost overlooked. Rarely do we stop to consider what’s behind it all and whether we have really embraced how much we need it, and how much we may not be receiving or experiencing it. Pleasure, too, is tricky: there is Biblical pleasure (simply the best!) and there are all the twists and perversions of the world that can trip us up. Yet without Godly love and pleasure, we are going to feel a deep longing and craving in our lives that even a longer quiet time can’t fill. I’ll teach you how to receive love, and how to embrace pleasure in the right ways that will only bring you health and joy – no guilt, regret, or sugar crashes included!

MODULE 7: Daily Practices – Nutrition

This is where the rubber really hits the road. Sound nutrition principles are key, and while you may think you can rattle them off by memory, some of what you think is healthy may need to be tweaked! Plus, what’s the point of knowing what’s healthy if it’s so unappealing that you’ll never do it? I’ll share and walk you through the system for making the foods you love the healthy lifestyle you’ll stick to for good. Sound impossible? Believe me, beautiful, it is very possible!

MODULE 8: Daily Practices – Movement

It may not be nearly as important as nutrition when it comes to health, but the right kind – and amount – of movement is key when it comes to creating a body that you love living in – and even a routine that you love living out! But with so much advice as to how, when, and how much to work out, how do you have any idea what to do, let alone what you’ll stick to? I’ll chop through the major trends in fitness today and give it to you straight from the models’ mouths: what to do if you’re primarily interested in having a lean and strong physique that feels as fabulous as it looks.

MODULE 9: Daily Practices – Rest and Stress Relief

Now that you know how to move your body, it’s time to learn how to let it not move and take a break! Rest is a dirty word in our society, but honoring the Sabbath is one of the Ten Commandments and it’s about time we took this baby seriously! Rest is more than just not moving, of course, and it needs to be a part of each day of the week. But with crazed schedules and expectations, how do we get rest and lower our stress in a way that fuels our life instead of setting us back? I’ll show you how to fight for sleep, declare yourself worthy of rest, and release the mental and emotional stresses in your life – as well as the physical – in a way that adds to your health, instead of detracting from it!

MODULE 10: Setting Up Your Dream Wellness Life

At last! We get to pull it all together and make this amazing wellness life a reality for you! This is where we get down to business and talk logistics. I will walk you through each area of your life for a cleanse and rebuild: your environment, your influences, your thoughts, your pantry, your closet – you name it! Then we will develop a schedule that combines that structure and inspiration we talked about at the beginning, giving you a daily and weekly routine that will work for you and that you will love!

Whew!

Needless to say, as I was developing this course I became even more passionate about the content, and convinced that it is so important for God’s gorgeous girls to hear all of this.

So… I put the entire project on hold. (?!)

…To bring in a designer to make the course look as gorgeous as its content deserves!

I want this to be a place that you will love to go frequently, for the pleasure and relaxation of the aesthetic appeal as well as the rush of knowing you are working on making great changes in your life.

It should be as gorgeous as you are! 🙂

And now, it (almost 😉 ) is! Check it out now at BodyStewardship.com.

Here’s to you, waking up in a body you love, every.single.day! <3

Love and Freedom,

Jackie