I have experienced unhealthy relationships with food and exercise like many girls and women today. There was a time when I used to view workouts only as a gruelling chore that I had to do to lose weight or keep in shape. I would buy into the diet culture's myths - that I always had to push myself to do the most strenuous workout I could manage, that a workout session should be at least thirty minutes long no matter what, et cetera. Working out under such a condition not only put me in a bad place psychologically but also prevented me from appreciating the multifaceted benefits of physical exercise to their fullest.
In an odd plot twist of the Covid19 time, it is only this year that I learned what it means to work out regularly out of a genuine desire to do so rather than an unhealthy sense of compulsion. Having been freed from a large chunk of thought/behavioural patterns concocted by the societal beauty standard and diet culture, I've finally begun to appreciate working out as it is, embracing its perks that go way beyond managing physical appearance. This social media graphic project emerged from my wish that more people - people who are still struggling with a destructive relationship with exercise - would eventually be able to feel what I feel today.
