Confidence
isn’t equal.
I spent years noticing the parts of my body I wanted to change — while being completely comfortable with others.
For most of my life, I’ve had insecurities about my body.
Like a lot of people, I could look in the mirror and immediately find the things I wanted to change.
My weight. My shape. The angle. The lighting. Whether I looked better yesterday than I did today.
That’s the strange thing.
Even when I wasn’t particularly confident about my body as a whole, there were parts of myself I never questioned.
Parts I was comfortable with.
Parts I genuinely liked.
There’s something strangely difficult about saying that out loud.
We’re far more comfortable hearing somebody list everything they dislike about themselves than hearing them simply say:
“There is something about my body that I genuinely love.”
But there is.
And there always has been.
Looking back at this photograph nearly fifteen years later, the thing that interests me most isn’t really the nudity.
It’s the contradiction.
I could be insecure and confident at exactly the same time.
Maybe that’s much closer to how body confidence actually works.
We talk about self-acceptance as though there’s some final moment where you stand in front of a mirror, approve of absolutely everything, and the job is finished.
I don’t think that moment exists.
You stop criticising one thing.
You learn to appreciate another.
You become less afraid of being seen.
You stop automatically hiding.
You realise your body was never a project waiting to be finished.
Eventually, all those little pieces begin to resemble confidence.
Not perfection.
Not loving every photograph.
Not pretending insecurity disappeared.
Just becoming increasingly comfortable in the body that has carried you through your life.