Work of Audrey Kawasaki

I was thinking more of the book I read on seduction while I was standing around waiting for my friend to get groceries and this occured to me,

Confidence is not the assurance and reliance in the abilities of the self nor the satisfaction of placing higher value of the self over others, but that of forgetting the self and looking into the lives of others.

That's the confidence I want. I want to be able to think beyond myself and perceive the needs of others. But it's difficult because we are all growing up in a culture that tells you to be self scrutinizing and brutally critical of the smallest flaws. This may sound smug, but in all honesty, I'm quite happy with the body I was given. It's not fit for the runway or 'perfect' in terms of societal, heroine addict definitions, but it's good.

I was bored the other day, at my intern job, so I started reading this article in the British Vogue, "What's Sexy Now?" and I quote from the following excerpt written by a male:

Ask most men what is sexy about women, and talk will turn quickly to the carnal. Before anything else, before wit and intelligence, style and substance, before bravery and warmth and generosity and sensitivity and taste, even before rock'n'roll, men will talk about bodies: about flesh, curves breasts and thights and bottoms, full lips, legs that go up to here, hips that sway this way and that. We like bulges and crevices... Ask men what's sexy about what women wear, and the results are- usually, not always- equally predictable. Most men like clothes that enhance sex appeal in what women often think are disappointingly obvious... Men like words like "pert" and "pneumatic" and "available"...
Women think of glamour as having indefinable qualities: poise, sophistication, elegance, chic...
Have you ever noticed how women's greatest style icons, from Audrey Hepburn to Sofia coppola, improbably elfin, kicky little things- are not generally lusted after by men, while women who seem barely able to dress themslves, from Marilyn Monroe to Scarlett Johansson, are slavered over, fantasized about, pedestalled?

True true- all sad and despairing, but true. It's one of those things in which I will never be interested in doing- being sexy in the obvious definitions of the male diction.

It's not that I don't want to, despite what girls like to say about how they despise it when guys check them out, they're all secretly pleased that men are finding them attractive. In the end, it all comes down to vanity- perhaps not for the sake of pleasure of male viewing, but for validating their own selves through their physical image. Anyway, it's not because I'm ashamed of my body, it's just not an aesthetic that I'm really interested in. I once had to go to a friend's birthday party which was held at a club and I was told that I looked 'prim and proper'.

It's just one of those funny things about life. Many ignorant people who regard the world as black and white, perceive the fashion industry to impose their standards of beauty upon the masses. However the fashion industry has always thrived on the ugly and the awkward. People just follow. So who really does dress to impress? The one who stands in an outfit that looks more editorial than trendy, or the girl who dresses like everyone else?

I don't have anything to prove to anyone. Some girls do it to show others what ample cleavage they have, and others to somehow fit in

Hmm I recall having more of a point than this.. somehow reflecting confidence back into this magazine article but my brains are scrambled and after meandering about really random things, I can't recall why I blogged about this in the first place. hehe. In the end, I just dislike being boxed in and labeled a certain way of dress.