Summary: Today we were joined by Krista Scott-Dixon, who shared her wisdom, advice, and expertise regarding food, body image issues, and fitness, especially as it relates to women’s issues and gender. Discussions got pretty theory-heavy, but it was all excellent, relevant stuff if you’re involved in body or physique transformation in any way.<br> <br> --------------------<br> ♦ABOUT KRISTA ♦<br> --------------------<br> <br> Krista is Program Developer and Coaching Coordinator for Precision Nutrition. She also has a PhD in Women’s Studies, and taught at York University until 2008, when she left academia altogether. She is published both inside and outside of academia; for instance, you can read lots of really good stuff over at stumptuous.com, where you can find articles with titles like, “Stop being a dick to yourself,” and “F*** exercise, try this instead.”<br> <br> You can also check out her book Consumed: A Memoir, which chronicles a peanut butter binge, but also addresses body image, dieting, Krista’s choice to leave academia, and more.<br> <br> --------------------------<br> ♦ POWER AND BEAUTY ♦<br> --------------------------<br> <br> What began our discussion going was a quotation from Krista’s book, Consumed:<br> <br> --------------------------------------------------------<br> Because here is the big lie: that beauty brings power. The truth is that beauty attracts power, but only as the smell of week-old squirrel carcass invariably attracts the family dog, who rolls in it and then covered in the stink, consumes it with its canine teeth and front-facing eyes before forgetting about its ex-squirrelly existence.<br> <br> Real power is hidden. The less you need to display it, the more you have.<br> <br> [...]<br> <br> So you think you are winning by doing power’s bidding. By getting beautiful. By steeling your buns and raspberry-swirling your lips.<br> <br> But the illusory “choice” that real power offers us, like a bone to a begging dog, is still bullshit.<br> --------------------------------------------------------<br> <br> <br> <br> ------------------------------------<br> ♦ “EMPOWERMENT” IN FITNESS ♦<br> ------------------------------------<br> <br> Once you realize that the choice between Coke or Pepsi isn’t really much of a choice, you can realize you’re in a story, and that is itself a form of power.<br> <br> If you want to find where the power is, take a look at who’s making the money and who’s cleaning the toilets.<br> <br> Sometimes “taking control” of your body is marketed as a form of empowerment, but in many ways, it can be an exact opposite kind of situation, where you actually relinquish control: you lose touch with hunger, with what satisfaction is, with having “full energy” is.<br> <br> In terms of self-connection, Krista really likes George Beinhorn’s book, The Joyful Athlete.<br> <br> One of the dangers is that these things really do feel empowering at first, and they give us access to stories we can tell ourselves about ourselves (e.g., “I am a badass,” “I am super committed,” etc.) but it’s only much further on that you realize what’s really going on, and the toll its taking.<br> <br> In Scott’s parlance, ask the question: really, deep down, what is fitness doing for my life, and what is it doing to my life?<br> <br> --------------------------------------------------------<br> ♦ DISORDERED EATING AND UNHEALTHY THINKING ♦<br> --------------------------------------------------------<br> <br> How do you move past it? Part of it is accepting that there is some kind of secondary gain, somewhere.<br> <br> This doesn’t happen in an instant; it’s a process.<br> <br> You don’t diet your way out of it. More nutritional knowledge doesn’t help, and it often makes it worse.<br> <br> Look for instances where your story doesn’t allow you to be a whole,
