Country music star Shania Twain is reclaiming her confidence in her body through her music and the artwork for her upcoming album, "Queen of Me."
Twain, 57, told TODAY's Hoda Kotb on Jan. 5 she did a photo shoot for part of the album artwork completely nude.
"It was really scary. I don't really love my body," she said on TODAY. "I don't love looking at myself in the mirror with the lights on or looking in the mirror at all at my body. So I said I'm going to face that fear. I'm going to go into that photo shoot."
She explained she wanted to "put fashion aside," even though she was "petrified."
"I'm so glad I did that," she told Hoda. "Once I flipped that switch and dove into it ... I committed 100%, and I wasn't thinking about what anybody thought. I didn't think about who was in the room. This is about me. This is my moment to really embrace myself in vulnerable moments."
"It had to be vulnerable, where I felt that I was facing a fear of being judged, or being maybe even laughed at, at being embarrassed," Twain continued. "But it was only empowering. It was really fabulous."
Twain said she believes it's "so essential" to prioritize your self-confidence as you age.
"Our skin starts to melt and all kinds of things happen to us," she laughed. "I was shy about wearing a bikini at the beach when I was younger, and I'm thinking, 'That was ridiculous. I've got to stop this nonsense and start wearing a bikini to the beach.' Now, even though I'm not my 20-year-old self, I've just got to get over that stuff."
Part of Twain's motivation to pose nude for her new album was the trauma she faced in childhood.
"Doing the nude photography is really about saying listen, I was abused when I was a kid. ... This cringey, horrible wanting to escape being in my own skin — I'm just in this mode now where, no, no no, I'm happy in my own skin."
"It's the only skin I have," she added. "I don't have a choice. Otherwise, I'm going to hate myself for the rest of my life. So it's time to start loving myself in my own skin and really embracing that and not be embarrassed or shy of it and this is who I am."
Twain also opened up in an interview with People in December about her struggles with body positivity in the past, and how her newfound self-love inspired her to shoot the cover for her new single, "Waking Up Dreaming," topless.
"I think the best fashion is confidence, and whatever you wear — if you’re wearing it with that, it’s fashionable. I am a woman in my late 50s, and I don’t need to hide behind the clothes," Twain told People. "I can’t even tell you how good it felt to do nude shooting. I was just so unashamed of my new body, as a woman that is well into my menopause. I’m not even emotional about it; I just feel OK about it. It’s really liberating."
The singer explained that after filming her first music video for "What Made You Say That" without a bra in 1993, she started to feel differently about her body.
"From the very beginning — the very first video — I was ditching the bra," Twain said. "But, I was a lot firmer then, so as I grew older, I started feeling a different pressure of, 'Well, your breasts are not as plump as they used to be. Your skin is not as tight as it used to be. Maybe you should start covering it up a little bit more.'"
Twain previously shared with The Sunday Times that she struggled with her body image as a child, and even attempted to try to flatten her breasts to avoid abuse from her stepfather.
"My father made me feel self-conscious. It was almost dirty to wear shorts or not be entirely covered up. As my body was maturing and I was becoming a teenager, all of a sudden I was getting real curves. I mean, I’m a curvy person. I have boobs, and they bounce when I walk," she said.
"So when that started happening, I started strapping myself down: I was wearing two bras; I was wearing tight, tight spandex things under my sweatshirts, that were way oversized; I was dressing like a boy. I didn’t feel good about becoming a woman. I was embarrassed by it. I was hiding my curves. I was rejecting it," she continued.
The "That Don't Impress Me Much" singer described the experience as "shameful."
"I was rejecting what I was growing into, which was very natural," she said. "How shameful is that? And not shameful of me, but shameful of that pressure. It was terrible."
Twain told People she eventually "hit this wall" and decided to love her body.
"I ... was like, whoa, my confidence is regressing. My courage is dulling. Why am I allowing this? Frig that. I am not regressing. I am embracing my body as it changes, as I should have from my childhood to my teens, as I should be from my taut, 20s and 30-year-old self, to my menopausal body," she said. "I’m not going to be shy about it. I want to be courageous about it, and I want to share that courage in the artwork that I am directing."
