Synchronistically, I read a post on Facebook about how a woman is always being asked how she stays looking so young and she had no answer to that, no beauty treatment or dietary suggestions. I could relate to that. This was immediately followed by yet another man telling me I looked young for my age.
Answers to both came to me:
1) Integrity within a person shows in the body keeping it's integrity. The body is an expression/extension of the spirit, soul, etc.
2) Telling a woman she looks young for her age is an insult on so many levels, these men cannot even imagine. If one wants to express a strong impression of a woman's appearance in relation to her chronological age, one could say "You make your age look amazing/desirable/good".
So why is it an insult? To say one looks "young" is to say one looks like society's 'ideal'; immature, unaware of one's self, ungrounded in one's self, looking to be acceptable, primped, worked on, manipulated, painted....and for those of us enjoying our maturity, groundedness, self awareness, wisdom........we have no desire to be young again. Secondly, "for your age" denotes a certain liability for being that age: "you look good despite this thing which is undesirable" . This denotes the presence of undesirability, no matter how much "good looking" exists. When maturity comes with age, age is an absolute asset in a companion and lover, a friend and mother.
To tell a woman she makes an age desirable/look good is to tell her you see her integrity, her desirability, her increased value. You attribute to her the "super power", the ability, to thrive and glean from life everything of value, making her perceptive, discerning and thus more than capable. You see her creating value in something that naturally occurs and could be so much worse. She is setting a higher standard, being a ground-breaker, a rebel by simply being true to her.
When one can see and fully grasp all that, then their compliment holds value.
