When other people's judgments become our own.

Most of us can recognize when someone else is being judgmental. Maybe it’s a comment about someone’s body. A look of disapproval when someone orders dessert. A social media post suggesting that thinner is always healthier, or that certain foods are “good” while others are “bad.”

We call this weight stigma.

But something interesting happens when we live around these messages long enough. Eventually, we stop needing other people to say them. We start saying them to ourselves. Psychologists call this internalized weight bias—the process of taking society’s messages about weight and treating them as personal truths.

It often sounds like:

“I should have more willpower.”

“I can’t trust myself around food.”

“If I were more disciplined, my body would be different.”

“I don’t deserve to feel good about myself until I change.”

The tricky part is that these thoughts can feel like facts. But many of them aren't true and didn’t originate with us. They were learned.

Maybe you were a child growing up hearing that certain bodies are unhealthy, lazy, or undesirable? Maybe you've been exposed to years of diet advertisements, "health" advice, family conversations, movies, and social media reinforcing the same message. If so, you might have learned to view yourself through that lens—not because it’s true, but because it’s how you've been taught to think.

This is how weight stigma moves from the outside world into our inner world. And once it gets inside, it can influence how we eat, exercise, care for ourselves, our health, and even how worthy and confident we feel.

What I find most interesting is that internalized bias often survives even if the original source is no longer there. Nobody has to criticize or spread weight stigma to us anymore. We do it for them.

The good news is that anything learned can also be unlearned. If you feel that you've taken in ideas about food, weight, or yourself, that aren't healthy for you, you can change how you think. Start next time you notice yourself making a harsh judgment about your body, your eating, or yourself. Pause and ask: “Whose voice is this?” Is this truly my belief? Or is this a message I’ve heard so many times that it now sounds like my own?

You don’t have to argue with the thought. You don’t have to replace it with a positive affirmation. Simply becoming curious creates space. And in that space, something important can happen: You can begin separating your beliefs from what you’ve been taught to believe about yourself.

A Simple Practice

If you'd like to move in this direction, simply start to notice self-critical thoughts related to food, eating, weight, or your body.

Write them down as you notice them. Then ask yourself:

1. Where might I have learned this?

2. Who benefits when I believe it?

3. What changes if I hold this thought a little more lightly?
   

You don’t need to change your thinking all at once. The goal is simply to become aware of which beliefs are truly yours—and which may have been borrowed from a culture that often confuses body size with worth and health.