I was talking to my friend about this just the other day (and forgive me, but it’s a topic I have often wondered about, doing what I do for a living); isn’t it weird that when you feel you look your worst (jet-lagged, ill, hot and bothered, no make up, mosquito-bitten), that’s when you get the most attention from men in the streets (and, er, from waiters…), whereas when you put the effort in, feeling you have really dressed up and look pretty good, that’s when absolutely no one notices?

I’ve also found many times that images which are favourites in my modelling portfolio were taken when I (secretly) know that I wasn’t feeling my best or most attractive. There seems to be very little rhyme or reason to this.

I think it’s quite a liberating thing; that my level of physical attractiveness seems completely unrelated to how I happen to feel about myself from one moment to the next. It’s quite freeing. I’m a big believer in pleasing yourself and not worrying what others think of you, but at the same time, it’s nice to realise that however you assess yourself anyway is probably completely unrelated to how another person would assess you in that moment. Even with the disgusting amount of self-awareness I unavoidably have through modelling for a job, I often get it completely wrong, and people see things in me that I don’t necessarily see, while I see things in other women and men that they would have no idea about.

I’ve written before in other places about my view that it is almost impossible to find someone who is not completely beautiful for whatever reason or in whatever ways, and this fact makes me find my job quite hilarious; really I feel anyone could do it, half the time, though I know that I am skilled in knowing how to move/emote for the camera.

Physical beauty is present in absolutely everyone, constantly, yet simultaneously so much in the eye of the beholder. That takes so much pressure off. (Assuming you have ever felt the pressure to look good, and most people have, let’s be honest.)

Over and out; just had to get that out of my system.