The Body Test

Tough Truth:
Hiding how you look won’t make him fall in love with you.
Lead with your beautiful body—let it filter out the wrong men.

Women who aren’t body confident often make one terrible mistake:

They assume their love life would get better if they were more attractive.

They blame everything on their body—their poor body that can’t argue back.

Some women even come to believe that, because their body is the problem, erasing it is the key to success in love.

They meet men online. They fall in love over chat. They avoid sending pictures—or send inaccurate ones.

Will months of heartfelt chats and emails and voice calls make a man fall so hard for you that he doesn’t care what you look like?

No.

Because you are more than a mind and heart and fingers that type.

You are a body.

Your body contains a wealth of subtle information about how you think and where you come from and how you spend your time and how you feel about yourself.

Men want to know so much more than how your body looks—they want to see you move and smile and laugh. They want to breathe you in and feel the warmth of your skin. They want to see how their body responds to your body—whether being in your presence is energizing or comforting or awkward. They want to hold you and find out how you fit in their arms.

So don’t delay.

Get “The Body Test” over with as soon as possible.

Meet this man in person as soon as you can arrange it. Notice how your body responds to his body. Notice how his body seems to be responding to your body.

And only then let your heart start to dream.

I don’t want to shame anyone who prefers to avoid putting pictures of themselves online, or feels most confident when the other person has no idea what they look like.

I just want to point out that this puts you at increased risk of heartache.

Imagine how it might feel to lead with your looks instead.

Toss your head back, gird your loins, and send him that full-body pic.

Write: “I want to send you a photo because I love how I look. If you don’t feel the same, let’s not waste time.”

You may find that your looks are more of an advantage than you think.

OkCupid founder Christian Rudder analyzed the data and found that women whose looks are polarizing—meaning many men find them unattractive but a select few love their type—get more attention than ordinary-looking women.

We also know that women who feel good in their bodies are consistently more successful than women who want to hide their bodies (even if they’re quite attractive).

So stop hiding.
Lead with how you look.
Your body is who you are—and there’s no need to apologize.