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Old 09-20-2013, 09:23 AM
 
Location: Oakland, CA
28,226 posts, read 36,784,942 times
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It doesn't play into my day to day life. I don't consider myself unattractive or super-attractive.

I'll never be able to understand why people react to me the way they do: perceived attractiveness, personality or something else.
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Old 09-20-2013, 10:17 AM
 
634 posts, read 894,640 times
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First of all, since the advent of computerized touch-ups I would never for a minute believe anybody on the cover and within a magazine really woke up looking like that in real life. And I am starting to doubt many of the "selfies" leaked by celebrities too. It's just, well, not real! It's a shame that women and many men now think less of themselves because of this. And I can only imagine what it does to our children, my cousin's college-age kids all have some kind of eating disorder, the son included.

On topic: back in my jock days (a long time ago for those of us on the plus side of 40) I suppose I thought I was good looking because I played a lot of sports and stayed in shape but I still didn't consider myself one of those guys that could get any girl, I didn't "drop outta the sky" from heaven. I was athletic and blessed with a lean body that stayed that way regardless of what I ate, but it ended there, the girls weren't lining up at my door no matter how many goals or touchdowns I made. As I've aged though I do think I've gotten better looking in a "regular guy" sorta way, the type of dude that can come over and fix the clogged sink which seems to impress some people the way flexing my muscles did 25 years ago.

My point to this very personal tidbit is that I think my feelings about myself evolved as I aged and in your case it did too and that's great! Each one of us is a unique gift to be given. And beauty really is in the eye of the beholder. I once fell in love with somebody's "lazy eye", another it was a dimple. Oftentimes it's the whole package, a combination of many things on multiple levels that included the physical and otherwise.

But to conclude, and maybe it's different for guys, I don't really give my level of attractiveness a lot of thought until called for: dating or going out in public, when I want to look my best for the world.

Last edited by Garethe; 09-20-2013 at 10:29 AM.. Reason: clarity
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Old 09-20-2013, 11:53 AM
 
Location: Czech Republic
2,358 posts, read 7,072,203 times
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I considered myself attractive before I had my children. I always managed to make loads of heads turn especially since I don't really look like most people in my country.
Now, I can say that it went down a little because I am not slim any more. Not that I am fat, but definitely not like before that I could wear almost anything and all would look good on me and of course my face got a little bigger
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Old 09-20-2013, 12:28 PM
 
2,547 posts, read 4,219,271 times
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I've wondered about the same question myself. I'm 30 too and I still feel like I completely don't have an objective view of what I really look like. I've spent my childhood and teens feeling ugly, like you, and looking back objectively I wasn't attractive or pretty. My looks improved a lot with some effort by my mid-twenties and now that many girls my age who were naturally pretty when they were young have let themselves go, I feel that I look better than many women my age instead of worse. But I still can't evaluate my looks objectively - sometimes I look in the mirror and think I look great, others I think I'm ugly and wonder how my husband finds me attractive. I try my best to stay thin because I feel that my facial features are not attractive and it's only the rest that can make up for it - being thin, dressing well, makeup and hair. I was bullied all through childhood so I think that really hit my self-esteem. Sometimes I wish I could get inside other peoples' heads and see myself through their eyes to find out how others see my looks. Don't ask why it matters to me I know it shouldn't and it's silly and immature and shallow, but it's important to me for some reason.
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Old 09-20-2013, 12:42 PM
 
Location: The D-M-V area
13,691 posts, read 18,406,067 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SophieLL View Post
This might sound dumb (it probably is), but do you think is there a way one can know their worth in terms of looks?

How can you help a person know exactly how their looks are? (i do have a friend that worries me with her low self esteem, when she is really pretty, and i recognize myself in her too), do you know exactly how attractive you are? if you do, how so? cause im clueless about it being oblivious about my real looks for 30 years
Nobody, but NOBODY should wrap their self worth around something so superficial as how they look. When you do that you reduce your self worth.

Physical beauty is subjective, temporary, meaningless.

It is truly an unbalanced manner of perception. How beautiful are you? Compared to who? I'm attractive, but how attractive am I really? C'mon. Someone else's opinion of how you look should NEVER be a measurement of your self worth.
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Old 09-20-2013, 12:55 PM
 
Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina
5,886 posts, read 10,501,711 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilCookie View Post
I've wondered about the same question myself. I'm 30 too and I still feel like I completely don't have an objective view of what I really look like. I've spent my childhood and teens feeling ugly, like you, and looking back objectively I wasn't attractive or pretty. My looks improved a lot with some effort by my mid-twenties and now that many girls my age who were naturally pretty when they were young have let themselves go, I feel that I look better than many women my age instead of worse. But I still can't evaluate my looks objectively - sometimes I look in the mirror and think I look great, others I think I'm ugly and wonder how my husband finds me attractive. I try my best to stay thin because I feel that my facial features are not attractive and it's only the rest that can make up for it - being thin, dressing well, makeup and hair. I was bullied all through childhood so I think that really hit my self-esteem. Sometimes I wish I could get inside other peoples' heads and see myself through their eyes to find out how others see my looks. Don't ask why it matters to me I know it shouldn't and it's silly and immature and shallow, but it's important to me for some reason.
i was bullied through primary school and high school too, and i guess i always wanted to be pretty just to "prove them" but i never could cause i felt ugly all the time, i guess we got burned and now those things are important for us.
If one of those people saw me, theyll probably think im fat and ugly now, but i do think im pretty and thats what important, not what other, meaningless people, think.
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Old 09-20-2013, 02:49 PM
 
2,547 posts, read 4,219,271 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SophieLL View Post
i was bullied through primary school and high school too, and i guess i always wanted to be pretty just to "prove them" but i never could cause i felt ugly all the time, i guess we got burned and now those things are important for us.
If one of those people saw me, theyll probably think im fat and ugly now, but i do think im pretty and thats what important, not what other, meaningless people, think.
Looking back, I realize now my looks had nothing to do with being bullied - while I wasn't a beauty, I was a perfectly average looking kid, and the bullying started back in kindergarten when I was actually still a very cute little girl. It had everything to do with me being painfully shy and socially awkward and a physically uncoordinated bookworm who lived inside her fantasy make-believe world. Yet somehow by the time I was a tween I internalized it as being about my looks, thinking that if I was beautiful, boys would at least like me and then I'd be popular or at least not bullied. Don't know if that's true or not, but the fact remains that I'm now always acutely aware of my appearance and have a fear of looking ugly or worse than others, and take great pride in being put together and looking good and it's become so high up on my priority list even though I'm happily settled with a husband and child. Can't explain why it's that way.
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Old 09-20-2013, 05:07 PM
 
Location: Bay Area, CA
97 posts, read 101,661 times
Reputation: 216
I go to 11
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Old 09-20-2013, 06:20 PM
 
Location: Southern Illinois
10,364 posts, read 20,755,761 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rh71 View Post
I honestly cannot tell if a guy is good looking or not, including myself. I would guess that an actor is a 9+ and my wife would ask if I'm kidding. Never was able to accurately judge. Unless a guy is obviously model material, they're all the same to me.
I've always wondered whether men were being sincere about this or whether they're just afraid of appearing gay, b/c most women are perfectly aware of how other women look, gay or not.
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Old 09-20-2013, 06:27 PM
 
Location: Long Island
9,531 posts, read 15,838,163 times
Reputation: 5948
Quote:
Originally Posted by stepka View Post
I've always wondered whether men were being sincere about this or whether they're just afraid of appearing gay, b/c most women are perfectly aware of how other women look, gay or not.
That's not the first time I've heard that. I am in my 30s and couldn't care less what anyone thought of me anymore. I honestly can't tell what makes a man good looking other than maybe a solid jawline (I guess that's what they call chiseled) like an Ashton Kutcher (?) or Brad Pitt. Models seem to have that feature. But if you were to ask me to compare a 5 vs. a 7 or 8, I couldn't tell you. Unless they were short and obese of course.
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