When I’m feeling down about my body, all of my flaws get exaggerated. My love handles are protruding. My butt is overly dimpled. My thighs look like blubber repositories. I don’t feel very much like loving or caring for my body when I get into this mindset – I just want to ignore my flaws and eat chocolate, rather than involving myself in the proper care and feeding of my body through exercise and vegetables.

But within a week of getting off my butt and beginning an exercise program, my body, though not yet sculpted or changed by my efforts, looks drastically different in the mirror. My hips have been whittled. My backside is firm. My thighs are strong and toned.

What’s changed? Obviously it’s psychological – unless you’ve just had a baby, bodies don’t change dramatically in seven little days.

Efficacy, a political science term often used to express the amount of involvement and influence a person feels they have in their own governing, can also be applied to internal body politics. In polisci (which I studied as an undergrad), efficacy is an indicator of how positively a citizen views their government and how likely they are to participate. It’s one of the most analyzed concepts in political science, and it’s often seen as the key to understanding voting behavior.

The connection between your mind and your body is well-established: exercise is an excellent way to deal with stress, and some low-impact forms of exercise (such as yoga) can relax the muscles in your arms and between your ears. Efficacy is just another facet of that connection. When you work hard on something, even if it’s just for a short period of time, you’re much more likely to view the object of that work positively. Even if your outward presentation hasn’t changed, you’ve still changed your perspective of your body. Perhaps you’re no longer burdened with something so much as you are blessed with it.

As women, we are not trained to love our body, but to instead be critical of it. We’re told that our stomachs are not suited to swimsuits, our arms not suited to sheath dresses, our bodies untoned and unworthy. With higher body efficacy, I learned that my body was worth more than I was told, and learned respect for myself and the possibilities of my body. Just as a lap around the track seems much easier after a week, so do the challenges my extra pounds present. The daunting body parts that have loomed over my are still there, but I notice new, wonderful things about your body. The hips I’d derided as “saddlebags” and notice that you’ve got a great waist-hip ratio. Or my mirror bypasses the extra flab on your arms and look at my lovely collarbones.

Bodily efficacy have helped me accept the limitations of your body. I often go into a weight-loss program hoping to lose huge amounts of weight and show them all how hot I really am as a size four. But as I change my body for the better, I realize that I’m not going to be a size four – but I’m no less sexy or beautiful because of it. Appreciating your own input into your body can help you to see that your body maybe is supposed to be a size twelve, and that a 34-inch waist is as beautiful as any 24-inch waist.

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