Onto a more lighthearted topic: bodies and hair.
Most guys say they like the natural look. But what do they mean by that?
Natural is not modifying what nature gave you right? Taking that as our baseline, here's some details for your consideration.
Body hair is natural. Acne is natural. Freckles are natural. Blemishes and scars are natural.
It wasn't until the 1920's that razor companies started to target women as a demographic, popularizing the beauty standard of women being as hairless as possible. They told women that they needed to shave their underarms and legs. But that is not a natural state. There is nothing unhygenic about underarm hair or leg hair. People will still try to make you feel ashamed of it. They can go suck an egg. If you are happy being as hairy as Chewbacca, let no one stand in your way. If you are happy getting rid of your body hair and being as smooth as a dolphin, let no one stand in your way. IT'S YOUR BODY. IT'S BEAUTIFUL.
I shave various and sundry parts of me for personal reasons. I do a LOT of working out and training. I use tape on my wrists and ankles so if I don't shave, I rip it out. My dad had to do the same when he played football for the Argonauts.
Some people find it more sexy to have natural body hair. Women can love a man with chest hair. Men can love women with fuzzy legs. Vice versa, some people really like the feel of freshly shaved body parts. It's a tactile thing. Nothing to be ashamed of at all.
In fact, your body is nothing to be ashamed of. I am 5'7 and 185 pounds. If I do a BMI, that claims I'm obese. Because that is a faulty measure. I've got less than 24% body fat, so I count as an 'athlete' to the body fat ratio scale. Do I have extra jiggle to my wiggle? YEP. Do I sometimes struggle with body image? Yep. Should I have to feel that way? NO.
Neither should you. If you are not so tall, not so slender and not so toned so what? Are you healthy? THAT'S what matters. Are you naturally willowy and can eat a football team into surrender but never gain a pound? As long as you're healthy you're all good.
Men folks, you guys don't have as many obvious pressures to conform to beauty, but there is still a LOT of pressure on you too. Sorry you endure so much and have very little support in your corner. But you don't ahve to be jacked up and have a six pack to be attractive. You are beautiful as you are too. BE HEALTHY.
Your body loves you from the moment you are born until the moment you die. Even when you get sick and the body goes wrong (like cancer or autoammune disease), your body loves you. In the lingering moment before death, your body releases DMT. This is the same chemical that makes you dream. EVERY ANIMAL ON THE PLANET has this chemical. It is not released as a survival mechanism. Your body chooses to release that drug because it believes your fate is too grim for your brain to comprehend. So you dream. You dream that everything will be fine and nothing had happened at all. Your body is telling you that you're not going to make it this time and offers you the comfort of dreams and memory (you cannot create faces in a dream, only remember them). Your body does this because it loves you. You have never met anyone like your body, it has been with you everyday. Your scars, blemishes, everything on your skin is the journal your body kept of your life. Your eyelashes wipe the tears from your eyes when you're sad and your belly dances with butterflies when you are happy.
Is your body perfect by current beauty standards? No, not a single human being on the planet has ALL the criteria we're told is desireable. But is your body perfect? Yes. This isn't a gender thing, because sometimes the gender expressed need to be altered. That is a different thing entirely, like when you say popcorn when you meant to say corn on the cob. The expression is wrong, even if the language is right.
What I'm trying to say is that you are worth love regardless of your appearance AND because of it. I've met many ugly people. I can't tell you what they look like but I can describe HOW they are for you.
