The 3 Pillars of (Physical) Male Attractiveness

What I wish someone had told me ten years ago.

Let me be clear. Physical attractiveness covers a broad spectrum, and I’ve certainly met enough people to know that it’s not as cut and dry as Hollywood wants us to believe.

As they say, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” and it certainly comes in all shapes, sizes, and colors.

Now that that’s out of the way. Congratulations on going the extra mile to work on your own outward aesthetic. Chances are you are on your own self-improvement journey, and I commend you for that. My only hope is that I can share some of my own experience to help guide you in your’s.

Through enough trial and error, I’ve come to realize that, among the endless fashion, grooming and style advice that exists for men, there are just three essential pillars to physical attractiveness. These are fairly universal and, at the very least, will appeal to the majority of people regardless of background.

I have listed them down below in order of importance and difficulty, from most important and most challenging to least important and least challenging.

These are things which I wish I had known when I was much younger that definitely would have saved me valuable time, money, energy, and stress.

1. Skincare

Your skin is the largest organ of your body and is the first part of you someone sees. It is the first and most important pillar because of its sizable influence on your overall appearance and aesthetic.

Having clear skin is invaluable if you want to improve your appearance.

As important as skincare is, managing it is equally as difficult. Some men are born with perfect skin. They’ve never used facial wash in their life nor have ever even touched moisturizer.

Sadly, it’s not quite the same for the rest of us. I, myself, struggled with acne for the majority of my life and continue to use acne medication today.

Having clear skin (that is, free from acne and marks) sets the precedent for how your other styling choices are perceived.

Engage me in this experiment. Imagine a man in his mid 20s. He has long hair, long enough to reach the tip of his shoulders and a fair amount of stubble, like he hasn’t shaved in a week. With this description, I’d say that I described a pretty rugged looking guy which may certainly be someone’s type.

Now imagine the same description — long hair, unshaved stubble, but this time with a lot of acne. All of a sudden the beard and hair aren’t perceived as rugged but rather unkempt and maybe even dirty. This simple experiment was meant to show the value skin plays in affecting your other style choices.

Take it from someone who grew up with severe acne and still struggles with it. Figuring out the right skincare routine and visiting the dermatologist regularly is not easy and is often frustrating.

I can speak from experience however, that the struggle is worth it. By improving your skin, you drastically increase your styling options and lay the ground work for other aesthetic choices. The confidence boost isn’t too bad either.

2. Muscle

Muscle does more than just provide mobility to our bodies. It provides shape and definition, both of which strongly translate to how you look both with and without a shirt on. As with skin, having muscle on your frame plays a big part in other, more nuanced aspects of your aesthetic, making it our second essential pillar.

Regardless if you’re thin or chunky, all bodies look better with some muscle. You don’t need to be jacked or ripped. Just have some muscle.

I, for one, spent most of my life being skinny-fat. Some of you may ask what that is. It means I had skinny arms and scrawny shoulders that made me look thin when I had a shirt on, but also had love handles and a belly that made me look fat when I took my shirt off.

I used to google styles for less than ideal body types like mine and would often be advised to pile on with layers. I live in the Philippines. If you understood how hot and humid it is here, you would know anything over one layer is asking for heat exhaustion.

I first set foot in the gym when I was nineteen, lifting random weights and pretty much just pretending to know what I was doing. Over time however, my body began to change.

I started seeing muscles in places I hadn’t before, and my posture was getting better. The weather became less of a problem too because I began cutting down on my body fat.

When you add muscle to any frame it gives it form and structure. You will soon notice that your clothes start to fit better. The back and armholes of your shirts start to get tighter, and your clothes will have a nice taper down your torso and waist.

As an added benefit, you begin standing taller, both as a side effect of having stronger back muscles and gaining more confidence in your own body.

By gaining muscle, you drastically increase your options in the mall as well as we will talk about later. No longer did you have to shop in one specific store for one specific fit of shirt.

You can now look great while feeling great even with the cheapest fast fashion items from Uniqlo or H&M (not sponsored), and if you live in unfavorable weather like me, you can now get by, looking great, with just one layer or even zero layers if you so choose.

3. Clothing

Clothing is the last pillar, and I would argue the least important. It should definitely be your last concern.

When people first begin their self improvement journey, they often start by wanting to shop. I can’t blame them because I did the same thing, and shopping is so much easier than improving your skin or physique, both of which are quite challenging.

I, however, learned the hard way that that’s just not how it goes. When you go to the mall, you’ll be hard-pressed to find things that fit you well.

Colorful and more creative clothing doesn’t pair too well without clear skin, leaving you with the more plain options.

Likewise, most shirts won’t fit quite right when you haven’t done at least some work on your physique. More often than not you’ll end up wasting money and feeling a tad disheartened. I speak from my own experience.

Picking clothes should be fun and should be the cherry on top of your journey. Everyone has their own style and should see what works best for them.

That said, the few notes I would have on clothing are just two things.

• Find clothes that fit you right. It doesn’t matter what brand, fabric, or design you pick, if it doesn’t fit right, It will never look good on you.
• Bring a friend whose fashion sense you trust — Ideally female. Getting an opposite sex perspective is invaluable when shopping.

Believe me, if you have clear skin and a decent amount of muscle on you, the mall’s your oyster. Most, if not everything, will instantly look amazing on you.

Last notes

There are a host of other things to talk about like hygiene, hair styles, eyebrows etc., but what I’ve found is that establishing the three basic pillars is often more than enough to dramatically improve someone’s appearance.

Though improving on these isn’t a simple task, it definitely should not be arduous.

Careful research, consistency, and patience are the key ingredients. No one finds the exact skincare routine in a week, transforms their body in a month, or grows a fashion sense in a couple of days.

You will buy products that don’t sit well with your skin; you will be the weakest guy in the gym for a while; and you will definitely buy a weird flannel shirt you thought was cool but just looks bad on you — not that I would know.

It takes time.

What we have now is a framework and three pillars to lessen our frustration and provide some direction.

Trust me when I say, you are all already crazy attractive. Sometimes it just takes a little extra effort to show that to the rest of the world. Cheers.