I'll give you a personal example. Though it may be long, I promise there is a good point to it all. I had a baby with a complete asshole when I was 25. The relationship barely lasted through my pregnancy. Before this whole thing, I was able to date a lot of physically attractive guys...guys that were "my type". (Of course, there were intellectual reasons I liked them as well, but I always had a "type" of guy I would go out with.) After I had my son, my priorities really changed and I realized that I was allowing myself to overlook a lot of serious personality flaws in my mates because of their attractiveness and what I perceived as what I wanted out of a relationship. Anyway, when my son was about 3 1/2 I met a great man. I mean, wonderful. Previous to meeting him, I had decided what I wanted in a mate and what I could accept (what flaws I was willing to deal with) and I decided to stick to my standards. I did this mostly because I felt I owed it to my son to seriously vet the person who would become his father, for all intents and purposes...I digress. Back to the wonderful guy. He is caring and compassionate, incredibly funny, witty, intellectual. He's responsible and fun. BUT he's not what I would ordinarily be physically attracted to. So for a long time, I put him off and attempted getting to know a few other guys. And I had an epiphany! I realized that if I found the "perfect guy" who was mentally and physically everything I wanted I would be head over heals and have no reservations about the relationship. Well, then I thought about what if something happened to change that perfect guy's physical appearance? Would I stop loving him? OF COURSE NOT! So I realized that the man who had been patiently waiting for me was the perfect guy for me. He had all of the "must haves" from my list. I looked at the things I considered flaws: not my "type", likes country music (blah), other random things. If a person's heart is good and he has the qualities in a person that you search for, consider if he were attractive (no smelly beard), would you still have reservations about the relationship? What if after being attractive something happened and changed his physical appearance? Would you still love him? Are the flaws things you could overlook because the inside contains so many wonderful things? For me I could overlook the things I initially couldn't see past. I'm the luckiest person for this. My husband is wonderful. He treats me like a princess and loves my son as his own. When it comes down to it, physical things are temporary. The inside is what really counts.

Give yourself the chance to look at his inside and see if you can accept his outside as the imperfect package he comes in. If you can accept the annoying things because the good things are good, don't deny yourself the opportunity for good love because of a small thing.

You never know, you may find one day the smell of his beard is a wonderful thing because its part of him.