Loving Your Belly 101
by Deb Lemire

The Woman's Belly Book is a wonderful introduction to the often uncharted territory of loving your body and loving yourself.

It may sound odd to characterize "loving yourself" as uncharted territory, but for many women the idea that they could love their bodies is something that has never occurred to them.

Throughout the book Lisa uses the analogy of uncovering an earthen bowl that is sealed up and filled with treasure. She gently takes your hand and leads you down a path toward the recognition that your belly is the center of your self, the home to your "soul-power," the source of your wisdom and creativity. You must love your belly because "whatever happens to the center happens to the whole."

A couple of weeks ago I sat in my studio in my home with three friends and we decided to go through Lisa's book and see what we thought about it. The four of us have some common ground, but we all had very different bellies and very different relationships with our bellies.

None of us were new to the concept of learning to love ourselves. We were all familiar with, had attended or even facilitated workshops or classes that were designed to help women overcome the social conditioning of self-hate.

Even though much of the beginning of the book was information we were familiar with, we found ourselves talking about memories and feelings it stirred up, often getting sidetracked to tell a story or laugh about something we had remembered.

We talked about the scars on our bellies, some unavoidable and some at the hands of lazy doctors; how one believed, when she was young, that her grandma's belly button came untied and that is why she died; and how carrying shame about our bellies affected our lives on many different levels.

We recognized ourselves as we read through many of the personal thoughts that are shared throughout the book from women who participated in workshops with Lisa. We laughed so hard we could not breathe as we tried out the Belly Laugh exercise.

Lisa's training as a yoga instructor and her struggle with an eating disorder gives her a unique insight to understanding the body, spirit and mind connection. The book is filled with practical methodology and sage advice.

Now, there have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of books written with a "how to love yourself" theme. Many of them don't really mean it. They are just soldiers in the diet industry's army. And we all know the diet industry thrives on making sure we hate ourselves enough to participate in it.

But this book is different. Not just because you truly believe that Lisa understands where body hatred comes from; not just because the book takes a practical "how-to guide" approach; not just because at times it is sprinkled with nuggets of profound wisdom.

This book is different because you will come to understand as Lisa has, that "Woman's belly and the power it contains are necessary to our survival, both as individuals and as a tribe. What's necessary to our survival is sacred."

Our survival as a species depends on women's bellies. Not just because of our capacity to bear children, but because of our procreative powers to heal the world into which our children are born.

So gather the women you know. Spend a couple weeks or so with the book. Meet over it. Talk about it. Explore it. Laugh with it. Remind yourself of the time when women and their bellies were sacred.

As women come together and begin to fully realize their power, as we allow ourselves to love our bellies and rise to our full potential, we will reveal our treasure within, and the world will change.

Deb Lemire is Artistic Director of Queen Bee Productions, producing staged works that advocate for women. Offerings include the Secret Life of Flowers workshop series designed to educate and explore the truth about body image conditioning, menstrual cycle conditioning, and relational aspects in womanhood.

[An excerpt of this review appeared in the October 2004 issue of epitome.]