A biography for Jonathan Van Nesshasn’t been written yet.
“I had to fight, a lot of years, to be really proud of the person I see in the mirror and really love this person.”
“I'm obsessed with gymnastics. It's like my football. And I like to watch women's gymnastics a little bit more than men's because I live for balance beam.”
“I was the first male cheerleader of my high school; it's very hard to embarrass me - you have to do a lot.”
“You want to be more hairy, that's beautiful. You want to be more clean-shaven, that's great.”
“So often, grooming is meant to make you feel better about yourself, and a lot of times, we use it to make ourselves feel worse.”
“I used to be pretty hard on myself, like, if I didn't like a haircut I did on someone, I would think about it a lot and second-guess myself. But after therapy and a lot of work, I know how to dust myself off a lot faster, and those things don't knock me down as much as they used to.”
“I was a chubby kid who got made fun of a lot, and I got fit in high school, and I stayed fit in my 20s, until my dad died.”
“To me, self-care isn't really shallow. Showing up for yourself, putting on a little moisturizer, can inspire so many different parts of your life.”
“I think, for a lot of people, men or women, it's easy to have things not affect you because, it doesn't affect you. So to be a better ally, you have to look at it as if it's someone you know instead of this abstract person you've never met.”
“When you're willing to be vulnerable, you can surprise yourself at how strong you can be.”
“God, I miss TLC.”
“I was someone who wore bright purple sweatsuits with tall Doc Martens boots. I would iron Hanson decals on my sweatshirt. I was extremely flamboyant as a child.”
“Loneliness is, like, when you wish someone else was there, and solitude is when you enjoy being alone. I don't always wanna be alone, but I definitely like pockets of solitude to recharge and come back to myself. I think that's so important for everyone.”
“If I could only have one grooming tool, it would be floss. I don't want to have broken Cheetos in my teeth. To protect myself from the sun, I can find shade under a tree. To moisturize my skin, I could get really sweaty and then just rub it on myself. But how are you going to clean between your teeth without floss?”
“Kristi Yamaguchi stole my heart in 1992, and I've never been the same since.”
“I wish I was a gorgeous mixologist, but that was not my god-given strength.”
“Self-care is the non-negotiable. That's the thing that you have to do. And beauty is the thing that can be the benefit of the self-care. Beauty is not the point. Beauty is just a cute side-effect from self-care.”
“My podcast 'Getting Curious' keeps me really busy, which I love.”
“I was really, really, really feminine and really into cheerleading and really into figure skating and really into gymnastics. Really into everything that other boys weren't.”
“I'm the youngest of three boys. Both of the older two are very heterosexual, football-watching, married, child-rearing, cornfed Midwestern guys.”