Shania Twain posed nude to embrace aging: ‘It’s time to start loving yourself in your own skin’

Shania Twain says it was "really scary" and "empowering" to step in front of a camera nude for her latest album's artwork.

The 57-year-old country star spoke with Hoda Kotb for the Making Space podcast, as well as for a couple of segments of TODAY on Monday. In their multiple conversations, Twain shared how she's chosen to go bold and be bare in celebration of her new music in Queen of Me.

"I did a whole shoot as part of the album artwork where I’m completely nude and it was really scary. But it was sort of like, I don’t really love my body, 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, 'Listen I’m gonna face that fear,'" she told Kotb.

The singer explained that it was "a real leap of faith" and a test to her own courage to do so.

"If I look at myself from head to toe in the mirror I see my faults … I’m just tired of that lack of freedom. I wanna be more relaxed and comfortable in my own skin," she said. "When you’re naked, now you’re relying entirely on your own love of yourself and respect for yourself."

Twain said that she was "petrified" while heading into the shoot but walked away with more self-confidence.

"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 a vulnerable moment. It had to be vulnerable where I felt that I was facing a fear of being judged or being maybe even laughed at, being embarrassed. But it was only empowering," she said, "it was really fabulous."

It also allowed her to claim a new perspective on her body while aging.

"[I] can’t slow the process of aging. That is out of my control so I need to start enjoying aging and enjoying all that comes with that," she told Kotb and Hager on air, adding on the podcast, "I’m only gonna get more saggy, right?"

She also confirmed that the route of plastic surgery isn't one she's planning to take.

"I’ve come to a point where no, I’m not gonna do it. And maybe that was probably part of what pushed me to go, ok, it’s time to start loving yourself in your own skin because sure I’ve got lots of friends who have had very successful surgeries but I’ve also seen others that aren’t so successful. And then I think well what if I’m one of those that doesn’t heal very well, then I’m gonna hate that about myself. And then I’m gonna regret doing it," Twain told Kotb. "So it’s my perception of things that has to change, it’s the way I see things that has to change instead of changing who I am and what I look like."

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