Feeling comfortable with your shirt off

This past Memorial Day weekend, I took to the outdoors at the park along the Hudson to enjoy the sunshine and hot summertime weather with my boyfriend. It seemed that all around us were guys with their shirts off showcasing this gloriously gorgeous muscle. Yes, there were guys who weren't muscled to perfection, but for some reason I tend to never see those guys. They usually just fade into the background. I tend to just see the pecs and the washboard abs and the biceps, etc.

It made me feel silly taking my shirt off. I felt like my midsection was pudgy and not worked out, that my muscles were small and insignificant -- and I had just been to the gym only a few hours earlier! I wondered why I couldn't have a great body to run around and play shirtless frisbee with? Why couldn't I have a body that someone from across the park that I don't know will covet and wish they had?!

Now I realize that often times I expect results to happen too quickly and expect those results to be amazingly profound. It makes me long for the apparent ease of these guys whose bodies just sprout muscles without any effort at all. I wish for a genetic make up that would enable my muscles to grow faster, or, better yet, for a genetic make up would have given me a body that was nicer from birth. I'll be at the gym and see these guys with beautiful bodies lifting the same weight as me and they are barely putting any effort into their workouts. Lifting weight and garnering results just comes easily to them. Like people who can play sports better than others, or people who can draw better, or play piano better or sing. It just comes naturally to them. It's been genetically gifted to them. All men are not created equal.

I was born with hip bones that are bigger than my waist, giving me an obnoxious pear-shape (not the coveted V-shape that all guys want) and I've also got protruding bones in my chest so my chest cavity comes out instead of in, therefore making it even more impossible for my heavage to look good. Those are the two biggest flaws I find with my body. And prior to working out I asked doctors if it would be possible to have some sort of plastic surgery where they break the bones in my hips and chest in order to reposition them so my body will look like I want it to. I can't confirm it, but I'm pretty my mother spoke to the doctor and fed him the lines that it was impossible to do. Obviously with enough money anything is possible. Just look at plastic surgery queen Heidi Montag. I was just an insecure teenager grappling with body issues, trying to figure out how to fix the things I don't like about my physique.

Apparently, I would have to adhere to the serenity prayer: "...accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference." If only it were so easy!

So, many many years ago, I began the task of trying to change my body. I was 24 when I decided to start working out with a mission to grow muscle on my skinny frame. But I wasn't as serious about it as I should have been and it's taken me twelve long years of trying and refining and learning and persisting to get to where I am.

And where am I exactly? I hadn't feel like I had made any progress when I was in the park over the weekend. But that evening I went back and looked at old pictures and came across one from my trip to Puerto Rico about three years ago. I looked at myself shirtless on the beach and noticed something: I had actually made progress with my working out. I couldn't believe it! Could my eyes be deceiving me? Did I really see a body I used to have but no longer do? Yes. It was true. I had increased my muscle size.

Now it wasn't a miraculous transformation. I didn't go from this puny skinny guy to professional bodybuilder status. But I had made some slight improvements. I had changed my physique. I am STILL changing my physique. It is an on-going process. A very long, very arduous, very time-consuming process. I am still attempting to make my body change into something worthy of a Men's Health cover model.

So if you're looking to feel comfortable taking off your shirt in the park, or feel okay wearing that bikini on the beach, or not feel awkward being in bed with a new lover or not feel embarrassed to just walk into a room full of people please know you are not alone. There are plenty of people, myself included, who are still insecure about the way they look. And though I don't feel I have a body to brag about, I am still giving it my all. I try. It's the only thing I can do. It is a day-to-day effort. It is not something that will change overnight. But when I see that my chest is a little fuller or my stomach a little flatter or my shoulders a bit rounder I feel good knowing that I made that change. I put in the hard work and put in the time and I am reaping the results. It feels pretty good to know that. Results may not come easy, but they feel oh-so-good when they finally come. You just have to make sure you don't give up. Next stop? Shirtless frisbee in the park.