THERE IS NO STANDARD

I was thinking about beauty standards.

About how often we talk about what’s attractive and what isn’t, as if there’s some objective line we’re all measuring against.

And the truth is, I don’t believe there is one.

There are patterns.
There are trends.
There are things we’ve been taught to recognize and repeat.

But there isn’t a universal standard that determines whether someone is actually attractive.

Attractiveness is real.
But it’s not fixed.

It’s not something you either have or don’t have.

It’s something that comes from how a person relates to themselves.

How they hold what they have.
How they move in it.
How they feel about being seen.

I’ve made a personal decision to orient myself toward loving what I see.

Not perfectly.
Not all the time.

There are parts of me that are easy to love.
And there are parts of me that I still feel resistance toward.

That’s just the truth.

But what I’ve come to understand is this:

Even when I don’t love what I’m seeing, I still want to be loving toward myself.

I don’t have to force myself into liking every detail.
I don’t have to pretend that everything feels good.

But I also don’t abandon myself there.

I don’t turn against myself because something feels off.

I stay on my own side.

That matters more than whether I like what I see in any given moment.

Because the relationship I have with myself is what people actually feel.

Not just my appearance.
Not just the surface.

But the way I exist inside of it.

When I shifted that, everything else started to move differently.

I stopped trying to rank people.

I stopped trying to measure myself against something invisible.

Attraction became less about comparison and more about presence.

About how someone inhabits themselves.

About how I inhabit myself.

So no, I don’t believe in a universal standard.

But I do believe in orientation.

I believe in choosing to relate to myself with care.
With attention.
With a kind of loyalty.

Even when it’s not easy.

Especially then.

That’s the only standard I’m working with.

 

Forever,

Legs