How to Understand Your Body for Better Outfits

What's good? Today I'm going to share with you a step-by-step guide to understanding your body. So in my last fashion video, I talked about how different fabrics and styles and cuts can look different on different body types, and I got a lot, a lot of requests to make a video about how you can understand your body type or proportions. So that's what we're gonna go over today. If you find this video useful in any way, be sure to give it a like and subscribe if you haven't already. Now, before we get into this video, let's start with a little disclaimer, okay? I am not a mental health professional, but I am very aware of how prevalent body dysmorphia is in the age of social media. If at any part during this video or process, you start to have any negative thoughts or feelings about yourself, take a break. Turn this video off and come back to it another time in the future. Learning about your body should not be a negative experience. The whole point of this video is to help you all understand why certain fabrics or styles or cuts might look awkward on you so that you can make the necessary changes to make your clothing work for you and not the other way around. We should never fit our bodies into clothes. Clothes should fit to us. I know that for me personally, I started having way more confidence after I started learning more about my body because I was able to start choosing clothes that looked and felt better. This should be a positive experience. If you ever find yourself feeling any differently, it's okay to revisit this topic at another time. The first step to understanding your body is to take photos. Now, when you're taking photos of your body, it would really help to wear clothing or undergarments that are fit but not too constricting. For example, you don't wanna wear a sports bra because while it's fit, it will compress your bust too much. It would be better to wear something like this, for example, fit enough to see your body shape without distorting or compressing your body. I recommend taking photos with a tripod because they're easily adjustable to get to the perfect height. It does not need to be expensive. I just use this cheap one. I think I got this from Amazon. If I can find a similar one, I'll leave it in the description box down below. And you're gonna wanna place your camera or your phone at chest level, at least like six feet away from you. And one of the biggest reasons why I recommend using a tripod as opposed to asking someone to take your photos is because your phone or your camera needs to be flat and leveled. If the camera is tilted in any direction, it's going to distort your body shape. And the reason why you want the camera at chest height is because if the camera is too high or too low, it will also distort your body shape. And that's why you see so many TikToks recommending you to take photos from a lower angle if you want to appear taller. And those types of photos are fine for your Instagram, but what we're trying to do here today is to get an objective understanding of our bodies so that we can create the best outfits for them. Now, take photos from the front, back, and both sides with a neutral posture. Now, a lot of you might have something called anterior pelvic tilt. It's something that I still kind of have. I'm still working on it. But basically, this occurs when your pelvis is rotated forward, which forces your spine to curve. And this is very, very common for people who sit for excessive amounts of time. So if you work in an office or you're sitting at a desk all day, you probably have it. Now, eventually, you're gonna want to address this for the sake of your mobility and your overall health. And I'll actually link some quick exercises that you can do down below. But for now, for this exercise, when you're taking your photos, try to see if you can just tilt your pelvis back so you have a more neutral posture. An anterior pelvic tilt can distort our perception of our bodies. It can make our stomachs look like they stick out way more than they actually do. And the curved spine can alter the way clothes fall on our bodies. So in general, you want to work towards correcting this for the sake of your posture and your mobility and your general health. But for the sake of this process, if you can just try to tilt your pelvis back and try to correct your posture just for the photo, that would be great. Okay, so I feel like the most obvious element that most people know about their bodies is how tall they are. It is the most obvious one, but I don't think that it is the most important one. And it's not really as straightforward as we think. And let me explain why. Look at this picture of Alessandra Ambrosio and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. Now, Alessandra is listed by her agency as 5'10", and Rosie is listed by her agency as 5'9". Now, even though Rosie is allegedly one inch shorter, she actually kind of looks taller. And this is because Alessandra has a longer torso and shorter legs, and you can actually see how differently this T-shirt fits on Rosie versus how it fits on Alessandra. Now, when you look at Alessandra's street style, you can see that she looks a lot more balanced when she wears high-waisted pants versus when she wears low-rise pants. And this is why, in my opinion, height is not really the most important element to understand about your body. Proportion is. Another quick disclaimer, throughout this whole video, I am going to be using a lot of models as examples, and this is just because there are so many pictures of them online. This is literally what they do for a living. So I have a lot bigger of a selection of photos to illustrate the point that I'm trying to make. For those of you who are on the shorter side, have you ever looked up a video that was like best outfits for petite women, and then you try on those recommendations and they didn't really work? That's because your height is not really that important. Your body proportions are what matter more. So if the person that you're watching is the same height as you, but they have wildly different proportions, their outfits are not gonna look the same on you, even if you're the same height. On the flip side, if you're short, but you're watching a tall person, but she has the same proportions as you, her outfits are probably gonna look more harmonious on you than the other girl's outfits, even if she's taller than you. Now, you might have to get your pants tailored or buy the short version of the same pants, but the overall outfit formula is probably gonna look better on you than the shorter girl with wildly different proportions than you. All of this just to say, proportion is more important than just height alone. Which brings us to step three, how to discover your body proportions. Now, I just spent like the past 10 million minutes talking about how important body proportions are, and you're probably sitting there like, okay girl, well, how do we find it? Before we get into this, let's have a little chat. There is nothing good or bad or right or wrong about our bodies, they just are. Discovering all of the different elements of your body should be empowering, not demoralizing. So when we say things like long torso or short torso, or big head or small head, broad shoulders or narrow shoulders, these are neither negative nor positive descriptors. They just are. So with that being said, let's take a look at the photos we just took. Now, take a look at your frame. What stands out to you the most? For me, it's definitely the fact that my shoulders are wider than my hips. Now, a lot of people can interpret this to mean that you have broad shoulders, but this is not always the case. Compared to the overall structure of my body, my shoulders look quite proportionate despite being wider than my hips. But if you look at Lisa of BLACKPINK, for example, you can see that her shoulders also extend beyond her hips, but her shoulders are much more broad compared to her overall frame. So she or her stylist is going to have to accommodate the width of her broader shoulders to create a more balanced silhouette. Now, in my opinion, she looks so good when she wears oversized clothes because the kind of broadness of her shoulders creates structure underneath to give the looser clothes more shape. Now, for me, on the other hand, if I wear something that's too oversized, it can make me look like I'm drowning because my shoulders don't have that same structure underneath. Now, is that going to stop me from wearing oversized clothing? Obviously not. I'm wearing oversized clothing today, but it does make me want to be more mindful about how big or how oversized something can look on me before it starts to look like I'm drowning. So looking at individual body parts isn't really the most helpful because you really have to look at your body overall. Proportion is all about how everything looks in context. So if you just look at my legs, these are just legs. But when you see the full picture, it's like, ah, yes, these legs are longer in proportion to the torso. And this is how we can use proportion to balance out an outfit. So how can you tell if you actually have broad shoulders or if your shoulders are just wider than your hips? And there are a few things that you can think about. So if you put on a fitted shirt, do you often feel kind of constricted around your shoulder area? Does it feel too tight? Does your shoulder area feel uncomfortable? If yes, then you might have broad shoulders. Another thing to think about is shoulder straps on your tops. So if you wear a spaghetti strap top, do the straps often fall off your shoulder? If yes, then your shoulders might not be as broad as you think they are. And here's something similar. If you wear shoulder bags, do they often fall off your shoulders? If yes, then your shoulders might not be as broad as you think they are. For me, shoulder bags actually fall off quite often. Not all the time, but often. Whereas when you look at this picture of Lisa, girl, that bag ain't going anywhere anytime soon. Now, to clarify, just because I don't consider my shoulders to be broad, that doesn't necessarily mean that they're narrow. I think that they're pretty proportionate to the overall structure of my body. They are just wider than my hips. Okay, so now that you've figured out, you know, your whole shoulder situation, take out a notebook or a piece of paper, open the Notes app on your phone, and write down how you feel about learning that about yourself. Fashion isn't just about how you look, it's also about how you feel. And I would actually say that's more important. If you feel confident, you will look confident. If you feel constricted in your clothing or uncomfortable in your clothing, you will look constricted or uncomfortable. So just write down what you learned about your shoulders and how you feel about it. For me, I would probably write something like, I just found out that while my shoulders are wider than my hips, they aren't as broad as I thought they were. My hips are just narrow. Now I understand why some jackets make me look like I'm drowning. I probably hate boat neck necklines so much because my shoulders don't have the structure to support them. Now, obviously, this is going to be very different from the conclusions that you come to because everyone's bodies are different. But just write down what you learned and how you feel about it. This will help us fully understand our bodies and help us rationalize the fashion choices that we make in the future. Next, we can look at the relationship between your bust, hips, and waist. Take a look at your pictures and again, ask yourself, is there anything that stands out? Are your hips the widest part of your torso? If so, all of the bottoms that you buy have to accommodate wider hips. Do you have a defined waistline or is your torso pretty straight? Different styles of tops are going to work better on certain waistlines than others. Do you have a wide or full bustline? Do you have a full bust? If so, all of your tops are gonna have to accommodate your bust. Now, for me, my torso is pretty straight. Now, my waistline has slight definition but it's not enough to really matter. I don't have to make any accommodations for it. Again, you will all come to very different conclusions but whatever that is, write it down and also write down how you feel about this realization. Next, we're gonna get into the relationship between your torso and your legs. Now, learning about this specific ratio transformed my outfits completely and you probably realized that if you watched my last video and the reason why they transformed my outfits in this way is because my proportions are not very balanced. So, when I altered my outfits to accommodate this very obvious imbalance, everything changed. Now, for some of you, this might not be the most important conclusion that you come to today because you have balanced proportions. So, don't feel like you have to have like this aha moment like I did. Like you might watch this entire portion of the video and be like, what is the big deal? Different clothing styles and different lengths of clothing can look wildly different on different body proportions. Like I explained in my last video, some people have a short torso and long legs, some people have a longer torso with short legs and some people are more balanced. Now, there are a few ways that we can figure this out if it's not immediately obvious from your photos. The first method is what I like to call the double hand method. So, what you're gonna do is you're gonna take both of your hands, you're gonna press your fingers together, you're gonna put one hand on top of the other and you're gonna put the hand that's on top right below your bust. Now, if either of your hands completely covers your belly button, then you probably have a short torso. If your belly button is right at the bottom of your hand, you are probably more balanced and if your belly button is below your bottom hand, then you probably have a long torso. Now, as you can see here, my belly button is entirely covered by my hand, whereas for my mom, her belly button is lower than her hand. I have a short torso and my mom has a long torso. Now, this isn't a foolproof method for a myriad of different reasons, but I do think that it is a pretty good starting point. But to determine this, you can also ask yourself a few questions. When you tuck in your shirts, do they tend to bunch up around the waist? If yes, then this is a sign of a short torso. If they tend to untuck throughout the day, then this is a sign of a long torso. If you have literally no problem at all with tucked in shirts, then you're probably more balanced. Congratulations. Here's another question to ask yourself. When you wear rompers, do they tend to bunch up at your waist? If yes, then you probably have a short torso. If you're wearing a romper and you feel uncomfortable in like the groin area or you feel like your body is really stretching that romper out, you probably have a long torso. Now, I feel like if you have either a short or a long torso, you probably kind of already know this in your mind, like subconsciously, you just haven't verbalized it or you haven't like put a name to it. And if you're more proportionate or balanced, then you're probably very confused by this section of the video. Regardless, understanding your proportions is key to creating a good outfit. Once you've figured out the relationship between your torso and your legs, write it down and write down how you feel about it. Next, let's talk about body fat distribution. Now, this might be a touchy subject for a lot of people, but it is absolutely part of the conversation. For me, terms like skinny or plus size can absolutely obviously point you in a certain direction, but they can be a bit meaningless because there are so much body variation within these labels. Like obviously, objectively, like plus size means something, skinny like means something, but I think what's more important is your body fat distribution because your body fat distribution can actually completely change the way that certain clothes look on you. For example, I am what society would very clearly deem skinny or thin. I'm literally a size zero or a dress size two, but because my torso is very short and I have very narrow hips, most of my body fat gets distributed around my midsection. Now, if I had a longer torso and I had wider hips, my body fat would be distributed more to those areas, but I don't have wide hips or a long torso. I have narrow hips and a short torso. Your waist to hip ratio and the length of your torso can actually determine where your body stores more fat. A general tip to remember is the longer the part of the human body, the leaner it's going to appear. So that's why my arms and my legs look so skinny. It's because they're just really long. My torso, on the other hand, is very short, so there's not much room for the fat to go. Again, there's nothing good or bad about this. That's just the way it is. Now, Haley Bieber is a really great example of someone who also has pretty narrow hips and a short torso with longer legs. Now, I'm sure this girl works out regularly. She does her little workout. She does her little Pilates. She cares about the food that she puts into her body, you know, just basic model things. But when you compare Haley's torso to Kendall Jenner, who has a much longer torso, you can see that Kendall's torso appears to be more lean just because there is a lot more space for the fat to go. Now, Haley and Kendall's body fat percentage is probably around the same, but that number percentage doesn't really mean anything in terms of how their bodies look in similar clothing. And this is gonna be the same for the plus-size girlies. Have you ever watched a plus-size outfit ideas video and you tried to recreate the outfits and they just didn't work out? It might be because the person that you just watched has a different body fat distribution. Most working plus-size models that you see in magazines or on websites have an hourglass body shape, so their body fat naturally gets distributed more in the hips and the bust, creating that more hourglass shape. Now, body fat distribution is mainly determined by genetics. Your genetics determine where your body stores fat. This is not something that we can really change. But regardless of if you're thin or plus-size, mainstream Western media has a very obvious bias towards a certain silhouette. And because of that, they're more likely to hire models with that silhouette. And that's why in the media, you always see some body types way more than others, whether they're thin or plus-size. They're just given more visibility. But that lack of representation in the media doesn't make our bodies bad or wrong. They're just different. There is so much body variation out there in the world in real life. I think that this is really, really important to understand, especially if you're someone who tends to compare yourself to others. It doesn't matter how much I work out. My torso is never going to look like this because I just have a short torso. Now, for all my short torso folks out there, the quicker you accept this, the happier you're gonna be. And again, there's nothing good or bad about this. It just is. Once I accepted that my body was just built different than these models, I became way more confident because my body then became a superpower instead of something that I was ashamed of. Because now I'm able to accentuate my favorite parts of my body by building the right outfits precisely because I have a better understanding of my body. Look, at the end of the day, fashion is an art. And while art can have scientific elements, art is also very subjective. Personal style should be built around the basis of how you feel. If you watched this entire video and you feel more comfortable not following these recommendations, then that's exactly what you should do. I'm just here to provide the tools, okay? You can choose to use them or not. My mission here is really to just encourage people to learn how to be more comfortable with who they are. I found so much confidence in myself through fashion. Fashion can be very powerful. Will you use it for good? That's all I have for you today, folks. If you learned anything from this video, please give it a like and let me know in the comments down below. Subscribe if you haven't already. And I'll catch you guys next time. Peace!