You’d think that trying to learn how to be handsome is pointless unless you’re already kind of conventionally attractive. But when you really think about it, handsomeness isn’t just about having the right face shape or features. These things don’t need to be the be-all and end-all of handsomeness, especially when there are other things you can do to become more attractive to women.
As you may know, being handsome enables you to increase the quality and quantity of women that you’ll meet. Additionally, the halo effect is real - by becoming more physically handsome, your life becomes substantially easier and less conflict-prone than if you present yourself as an undesirable man.
To help clarify what it takes to become handsome, there are two aspects: Becoming immediately more handsome in the short-term and becoming handsome in the long term.
In this article, we’ll take a look at how to be handsome, with plenty of tips and pointers to guide your path towards a better life.
The Long-Lasting Way to Be Handsome
Everyone wants a shortcut to be handsome, but the truth is that that it takes work to become handsome and maintain that state of being. In fact, a large part of being handsome involves projecting your ability as a man to handle difficult circumstances, organize your world for positive outcomes, and cultivate an “aura” of capability.
Let’s take a look at specific ways to appear more conventionally attractive that take more effort and consistency over the long haul.
Long-term hygiene
Hygiene is a cumulative process of making the right decisions. From a social standpoint, having flawless hygiene shows that you’re a healthy man that’s capable of presenting the best version of himself and not eliciting disgust.
If you choose to forgo regular hygiene, you’ll exhibit worsening effects on your appearance.
Here are a few examples:
- You choose to not brush your teeth or visit the dentist regularly, so your teeth become stained and your breath smells foul.
- You don’t shower or bathe on a consistent basis, so your skin starts to develop rashes, pimples, and a generally unhealthy look.
- You avoid haircuts and shaving, so you appear slovenly and look more chaotic
Avoiding hygiene gets worse for your social standing, as people immediately make judgments about you and relegate you to a lower class and an unkempt person. Even missing one day has a detrimental effect - after all, think of running into a person with bad breath. Would you want to be around that person?
Lift weights
No single activity does more for your overall attractiveness than lifting weights. Whether you’re looking to put on mass for a larger frame or to achieve a leaner look, lifting weights is the easy answer to how to be handsome.
Of course, lifting weights requires a significant time investment and consistency. Men need to perform heavy exercise on a regular basis - 5 days a week for continual growth with 2 days of recovery interspersed.
Because of this difficulty, becoming more attractive to women by weightlifting can give you a significant advantage over less athletic men.
The health benefits and endorphins also have a cascading effect, where you’ll be less stressed, sleep better (see below), and exude a more masculine appearance. Science, sexual selection, and aesthetics back this last point up. It’s no surprise that the preferred shoulder-to-hip ratio (The V-taper) is in accordance to the “golden ratio”.
Surgery
One of the most difficult ways to become more handsome may include surgery. If you have crooked teeth, asymmetrical moles, or other aesthetic flaws, undergoing invasive and noninvasive surgery may help you fix these issues. It may be a cheat code and have some personal ethical issues, but poor genetics or injuries can be circumvented by going under the knife.
Removal of moles and facial blemishes are relatively common types of surgery, as are corrective braces and hair removal. These are relatively common surgeries, but there are other types that require substantially more money and time spent recovering:
- If you’ve lost a significant amount of weight, you may need to surgically remove excessive skin.
- A rhinoplasty may enhance your nose
- Leg extension surgery can increase your height
- Chin implants give your face a more symmetrical look
- Hair transplants fix bald spots and thinning hair
Diet and exercise
Diet and exercise are extremely important to being handsome. And you can tell a lot about a person simply from what’s in their shopping cart and how active they are each day. Very few male models are eating Doritos and laying on the couch all day, whereas few obese people are eating a diet rich in organic foods and hitting the gym.
What you put into your body and how you expend that energy works in tandem. For instance, you can have the best diet, but if you don’t exercise you become fat. Vice versa, if you eat fast food and junk food, exercise will at best make you maintain your current physique.
Here’s how to be handsome by following the correct diet and exercise protocols:
- Fasting has a number of health benefits. Whether you choose intermittent fasting, multi-day fasts, water fasts, and so forth, the science is clear that cutting out food can bring your body into alignment.
- Incorporate exercise into your daily habits. For example, a walk to the grocery store instead of driving gets in needed caloric burn, but also can add some muscle exertion when hauling a backpack full of groceries.
- Make it a habit to always eat the healthiest thing on a menu when you’re out at restaurants. Sometimes you may not have a choice, but choosing the less harmful food can keep your diet in check.
- Choose better foods, especially organic foods. It may cost slightly more, but organic food tends to taste better and make you feel better
Elocution lessons
A man’s voice is directly related to being more handsome and commanding overall. Deeper voices attract more women, however, you may be surprised how your voice is conditioned to be higher pitched, lower volume, and therefore more submissive in many social interactions.
As an illustration, see if your voice constricts before speaking with a new person or if you feel the need to cough beforehand. If so, chances are that you’re exhibiting low-value traits that women subconsciously notice.
Also, you may notice how your voice gets higher when you’re around women. This type of behavior has many reasons, but it comes off as non-threatening and helps women lower their guard. But it doesn’t help you command respect.
Luckily, having a deeper voice is achievable with practice. Whether you choose to learn from YouTube videos or through an elocution teacher, simply stretching the range of your voice and speaking from your diaphragm gives you a more commanding presence typically associated with masculinity.
Clothes
The clothes make the man.
Your choice of clothing reveals a lot about your financial status, your self-confidence, your occupation, your aesthetic sense, and even your creativity. Considering women are more fashion-conscious, they take note of the quality of clothes that a man wears. And while these assumptions may be wrong, any disparity tends to minimize your efforts to look more handsome.
This is a valid explanation why women and men chose to wear lululemon (active), L.L. Bean (outdoorsy), Supreme (trendy zeitgeist), Fjallraven (high-dollar traveler), and other brands as a form of social signaling that’s broadcast to others. And it’s also why these aforementioned brands charge the prices that they do.
While you can find some great deals at thrift stores or online, try to buy clothes that are as close to new as possible. Signs of wear are fine for clothes that are comfortable, but tattered clothes tend to degrade your overall appearance.
If your budget allows, get your clothing tailored to fit your body type. Even incremental differences in how your clothing emphasizes your body’s features mean that you always look great.
Social proof
Our perceptions are fairly malleable. Being surrounded by high-value people - especially desirable women - is a key trait associated with attractive men.
Being with other women shows that others approve of you, making women more curious about some qualities about you they may not be aware of. After all, if an attractive woman is with you, there must be some reason why she has chosen to spend her time with you.
Look older
Once women are in college and of legal age to pursue relationships with men, they typically chase men who have made a dent in the world. Excluding young outliers, women choose older men to provide for them and not be stuck in the limitations of their peer group. It’s not surprising to learn how women can date 20-year-olds to 50-year-olds without feeling social stigmas, even if they do so opportunistically. Plus, there are plenty of women with daddy issues and will look to an older man to fulfill that role as a surrogate.
Looking older helps you look less like a guy in pajamas in his dorm room and more like a man who owns his own house and business. Choosing appropriate attire, having a developed physique, sporting a conservative haircut, and other steps are your keys to exploiting womens’ preference for men older than them.
Be a Gatsby
If you’ve ever read The Great Gatsby, you understand that the titular character made a massive transformation in his life in order to be accepted into the social elite.
Part of Gatsby’s allure was to project wealth and status effortlessly while also having an air of mystery. Acquiring wealth is beyond the scope of this article, and status is correlated with wealth, but creating an air of mystery is directly related to how you comport yourself in public.
Creating an air of mystery goes beyond aesthetics. You need to practice silence and restraint, making occasional ambiguous remarks, being purposely inconsistent, and appearing eccentric to create an air of mystery. This mystery leads to others building fantasies about who you really are as they try to interpret what you say and do.
Avoid drugs
Drug use may give you a “bad boy” edge but over the long-term cause massive health and lifestyle issues. While there may be an attractive element to smoking or drinking to women who partake in these activities, many women view men less favorably if they have displayed habitual drug use.
Smoking can cause your teeth to become stained yellow, breathing and respiratory issues, lifeless skin, and other unattractive aspects - plus you smell like smoke!
Alcohol also has a number of detriments, including bloating, puffiness in the face, dark circles around the eyes, high anxiety, and health complications that are noticeable to most women.
How to Look Handsome Right Now
Now that you understand the long-term ways to be more handsome, what can you do right now to boost your sexual marketplace value as well as be treated better in nearly social interaction?
The following are some specific ways someone can instantly look more attractive.
Daily hygiene and grooming
Practicing daily hygiene and grooming rituals help keep you attractive. It also shows others that you care about how you present yourself - a crucial factor in attracting women.
For daily hygiene, here’s what you can do:
- Brush your teeth after each meal, before sleeping, and first thing in the morning.
- Use mouthwash to eliminate bad breath
- Gargle with salt water or other cleansers to remove tonsilloliths and food debris lodged in your throat.
- Clean your ears with a q-tip
Related to hygiene, grooming should also be a daily activity, including:
- Shaving any stubble and sculpting your facial hair
- Plucking any eyebrow or ear hairs with a tweezer
- Combing and styling your hair, including facial and head hair
- Using cologne and/or deodorant to create a pleasant smell that enhances your natural pheromones
- Applying moisturizer to eliminate dry skin
- Using soap or facial cleansers to prevent pimples and blackheads
- Use a lip balm to prevent chapped lips, particularly in the winter
Also, it’s smart to carry a kit of hygiene essentials with you in your car or backpack if you’re looking to be handsome all day. Make sure to pack a mirror so you can check up on your appearance as needed.
Get more sleep
Sleep is highly correlated to a healthier physical appearance and more energy. Very few women are attracted to a man who looks like he doesn’t get enough sleep, including a lethargic speech pattern, dark circles under your eyes, and a lifeless aura that can’t be hidden.
Try to get 8 hours of sleep per night without interruption. If you need to, taking a nap can refresh you after a particularly demanding day of work or errands to reinvigorate yourself.
Change all of your clothes
Always wear fresh clothing. You can become nose blind to lingering odors from clothing that you’ve worn. Throughout the course of the day, your clothing accumulates bacteria, pet dander, bodily fluids, chemicals, smoke, expired deodorant, and other odors that form a less desirable musk.
Freshening up by changing your clothes is a smart move, especially before encountering women throughout the day. Change your socks, underwear, and any other clothes that are next to your body, as well as consider stripping outer layers if you’ve been sweating or exposed to poor smells. If you’re in a pinch and can’t change your clothing a subtle spritz of cologne can mask foul odors temporarily.
On a side note, many women prefer the smell of a man that comes from sweat (via pheromones), so if you just exercised, you can wear that clothing for an hour or so before you start to smell rank due to bacteria growth.
Getting pumped
It’s common for those who lift weights to boost their muscles by doing light exercise before going out in public to attract women. Referred to as “getting pumped”, lifting light weights and performing stretches for your entire body accumulates blood and water to support the increased metabolic needs. This swelling of the muscles then constricts the surrounding veins, giving your body a more puffed-up and “pumped” look that is desirable to women. It’s a short-term way to look handsome, especially before a date.
Now that you understand how to look handsome, it’s time to take action and put in the work. You’ll notice immediate results that will substantially improve your results, and over time, may create a whole new world of dating within reach.