Keep Fit to Stay Healthy, Not Trendy

Dr. FUNG Shuk Man, Amy, Ph.D.

Deputy Director, Clinical Health Psychology Centre

Honorary Consultant in Clinical Psychology

Clinical Psychologist

Health Psychologist

As chubbiness was once in fashion, the concept of “beauty” keeps changing throughout the human history. Today everyone talks about keeping fit and sees beauty as having a slim, well-proportioned body. The buzzword is “stay slim, stay trendy”.

Staying Fit and the Bandwagon Effect

In our slimness-obsessed culture, we are inundated non-stop with images of slender celebrities, who are often featured in the advertisements of slimming products as paragons of beauty. Together “the Mediterranean diet”, “ketogenic diet”, “16:8 intermittent fasting”, all being touted as the “holy grails” to a perfect body, slimming promotions are omnipresent on newspaper, magazines, television and other electronic media. And they all keep pounding home the same message: “to live is to be slim”.

Slimming Trend and Its Impact on Women’s Self-Perception

No more a mere physical attribute, nowadays the word “slimness” represents anything good and positive, such as good health and great success. As slim people are always disciplined, enthusiastic, sociable and popular, being fat is perceived as a failure of one’s own making due to laziness, lack of discipline and other personal flaws. As the culture keeps pushing such lines as “slim equals beautiful”, “your weight is your worth” and other related stereotypes, the road to slimness has now become Sisyphean with self-dissatisfaction and unrealistic expectations. It is destined to serve no meaningful purpose and solve no problem in life.

Amidst a fat-shaming culture, some fat people may see themselves as less worthy than others. This negative self-understanding engenders self-blame, and just like a vicious cycle, makes it difficult for victims to deal with real problems.

The other side of “slim equals beautiful” is “fat means ugly”. To some women, their figures have become a source of ridicule and prejudice. With low self-worth, some of them devote themselves to keeping fit, sometimes at all costs, as the only way to build up self-confidence and win the hearts of males in a the-slim-take-all world.

Obsessed with weight issues, young females are often busy adding up their calorie intake and weigh themselves day in and day out. While they feel more in control, elated and confident with every pound lost, a small weight gain (or a slight deviation from a social norm for slimness, if it indeed exists) can make them feel agitated, regretful and anxious for a quick fix such as skipping sugary or oily food, excessive exercise, visits to beauty parlors, or even seeking medical treatments.  

We all want to look good, and for health reasons should definitely lose some weight with proper methods. But it does not mean blindly following the slimming trend for others’ recognition. Most slimming advertisements merely focus on “how much” and “how fast” without considering individual differences in physical condition, let alone telling you the medical definitions of obesity and overweight. Without correct values, some may fall prey to unfounded claims and end up suffering from malnutrition. Any success (if any) is also destined to be short lived, as the lost weight always bounces back when unhealthy methods like extremely low-calorie diet is used. Even more serious is that, according to research, these practices are closely associated with the onset of bulimia and may even exacerbate the condition.

So what can we do with the social norms regarding body shape? Also how should we see our own body? Before embarking on the sliminess journey, try to view your body in an objective light.

Body Image and Body Image Distress/Dissatisfaction

In the absence of a consensus definition, the word “body image” can refer, in simple terms, to a collection of how we and others perceive, judge, think and feel about our physicality. It has a complex relationship with our life experiences, memories, learning and self-understanding, and is often under the influence of social trends and mainstream cultures.

Body image not only constitutes the very core of the self. As a major part of self-esteem, it also affects us in many ways, as people with a negative body image are more prone to the influences of bad experiences, shyness, social anxiety, depression, eating habits or sex dissatisfaction.

Most people feel dissatisfied with their bodies. While men try hard not to look too skinny, women are concerned about being too fat. Problems with body image are most common in young females, who tend to see keeping fit as a lifelong career. Some of them may have been worrying about their weight and look since the primary school years. In the pursuit of an ideal body, they keep a close eye on what and how much they eat, and even resort to frequent dieting, vigorous exercise or some unhealthy methods. Looking up to female high achievers (who can only be slim), young working women see one’s appearance as a key factor for career success and therefore strive for a slim body at all costs. And for some wives, staying fit after and despite childbirth seems to be only way to maintain their marriage.  

With self-confidence, you should be able to stay fit and keep your weight under control. A distorted body image may occur if you blindly follow others and become obsessed with being slim all the time. Sometimes the distortion is so severe that some young women may resort to hell-style workout, extreme dieting, self-induced vomiting, rigorous sleep restrictions or even pills, laxatives and diuretics of unknown ingredients, and end up with wasted effort, financial loss and severe eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia.  

Just like learning a new skill, it takes time and practice to build up a good, positive body image and resist the slimming trend. Here are some tips that may help:

1. Learn to think positively and see yourself in a positive light. Try to appreciate yourself and what you have, however minor it may be. They are all worthy of praise and help promote positive self-perception.

2. Learn to accept the imperfect you. Try to appreciate our strengths AND limitations. Instead of magnifying our shortcomings or wallowing in self-pity, seek improvement. Though you may not like yourself, at least make an attempt to accept yourself.

3. There is no single standard for beauty. Each of us is unique in his or her own way, and beauty is more than just physical appearance (as what all beauty contests say); your thoughts, characters, interactions with others, efforts and achievements also count.

4. Being fat is no obstacle to beauty as long as you are healthy and rich in soul. It is not uncommon for fat people to succeed in, for example, the entertainment industry, as they are loved for talents, self-confidence and refusal to follow the mainstream. Try to accept your body and choose your life path without caring too much about what others think. Build up your self-confidence not on your look but on your thoughts and achievements. Stay relaxed.

5. Try not to dampen your self-confidence with negative thoughts or unrealistic assumptions, e.g. “I can’t lose weight. Therefore, I am a loser”. You may stress yourself out and resort to overacting if you expect too much from yourself. Beware of and correct any negative thoughts as soon as they arise. Try not to regain self-confidence or self-satisfaction through weight control, or you may end up being a slave to your weight. In the absence of any medical condition, try to have a balanced diet, exercise moderately and learn to accept yourself.

6. Beware of those factors that may affect your eating habits, e.g. extreme dieting may backfire; uncontrollable binge eating may occur due to negative moods (such as anxiety, sadness or loneliness) or stress. Eating disorders may arise if these conditions stay unchecked. You can’t deal with life pressure by eating or losing weight.

7. Learn to see through the slimming advertisements and promotion for all the exaggerated claims and marketing tricks. Verify before taking action.

8. If you have decided to start your slimness journey, try not to get tricked by thinking thoroughly about what you truly need.

9. Have a balanced diet and set up a healthy eating habit. Eat less, more often. Exercise moderately and be cheerful all the time. Stay relaxed during your slimming journey, for you may gain weight while under too much stress.

10. Lose weight in a healthy and care-free way. Set up an easy goal and rate your result with some objective criteria such as the Body Mass Index (“BMI”).

Body Mass Index and Fitness Standard

In view of cultural differences, the very concept of fitness should be viewed from a health perspective. You can work out the ideal weight and think about losing weight with the following formula provided by the Department of Health.

Calculating Ideal Weight

Weight (kg)：Height (m)

Ideal Weight for Male ＝（Height－80）× 0.7 kg

Ideal Weight for Female ＝（Height－70）× 0.6 kg

*Normal Weight：within ±10％ of the ideal weight

*Overweight：10% more than the ideal weight

*Obese：20% more than the ideal weight

Adopted all over the world, BMI is a measure that uses one’s height and weight to work out if one is too fat or too thin, i.e. BMI = kg/m²

According to the World Health Organisation, the following BMI categories apply to people in the Asia-Pacific region:

Obese：BMI≧25 (kg/m²)

Overweight：BMI 23.0-24.9 (kg/m²) 

Ideal：BMI 18.5-22.9 (kg/m²)

For an adult of 70kg and 1.75m, the BMI is 22.9 and within the ideal range.