Physical Appearence

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I feel somewhat Aspie - ish but am not diagnosed.
I have said before on WP that I don't have any obsessions - yet for most of my life I've been very obsessed with 'looks' - I mean peoples physical appearance. I don't like much about my own appearance and long to feel beautiful - no not feel beautiful - BE beautiful.

I just can't stop thinking about this subject. I can't stop wanting to re-model myself. I am probably being totally shallow but I keep thinking that I would have been a much more confident, happy person if I where attractive. I guess I just feel very uncomfortable in my skin.

I wonder if I had a choice of being given a great sociable personality OR a beautiful face (but I could only have one or the other) which I would go for?!

I have been having a little think on this and believe I may go with the beautiful face - because I can still find all kinds of things wrong with sociable people and I don't want to be them - but with a beautiful face I would still be quite, honest, unintrusive little old me - even though I feel that I don't fit in very well

I would love to hear from others what they would change if they could

all my life i have noticed a correlation between exceptional physical beauty, and unkindness. the people who have been the nicest to me would, by objective standards be strictly average or plain, whereas the folk who did me the most dirt were generally beautiful like classic statuary. i don't claim to know the why of this, but this is the way things have turned out for me in my life.

I suspect its a type of Empathy impairment - if you've been so attractive all your life that everybody kisses your @ss and gives you whatever you want, you become incapable of identifying with the challenges and discomforts that others experience, so anyone with a problem just seems like a big whiny baby.

I was reading up on astrology earlier, and the author of my book was saying that "the worst people have the best charts."

I've always been funny about my appearance. I don't feel attractive. I used to mistake my aspie tendencies turning everyone away from me in disgust for extreme ugliness. Now I know that I'm more personally repellent than physically offensive, I feel so much better about myself

I believe that the nicest people are the ones who have been hurt the worse. It's easier to be hurt when your appearance or other things can be made fun of. However I think it's still possible that if you are hurt too much you can become insensitive as well, people are complicated lol.

I know what you are talking about. I wonder how these people get through life if they suddenly became deformed or disfigured? It would be fun to be a fly on the wall when they remove the bandages and then look into a mirror seeing a different unattractive face starring back at them.

I avoid having my picture taken, don't look at mirrors and absolutely despise the sound of my own voice.
For some odd reason, I find it extremely fascinating seeing pictures of other people looking in the mirror.

I'd go for personality. Simply because you can't be attractive to everyone; even with Hollywood stars, some people find a certain look ugly and if that you end up working for someone who doesn't like the look (or worse, likes it and harrasses you for it) then it gets awkward. And if you're a woman, other females will see you as a threat and make your life difficult.

Personality on the other hand will last a lot longer than looks and probably get you further in the long run. Also, you're more likely to like yourself.

this reminds me of that great old twilight zone episode "The Masks" about this rich old geezer who invites all his yuppie children over one last time because he knows he is about to croak any time, and it is mardi gras and so he tells his kids that they indeed will inherit his riches but only on the condition that they wear his mardi gras party masks until the stroke of midnight. they reluctantly agree to this, and each mask supposedly reflects the real personality of the wearer the geezer gave it to. grotesque masks caricaturizing garishness, ostentation, greed, cruelty and the like. sure enough, the old geezer dies and the kids, at midnight's bell, remove the masks, only to be horrified when they see each other's grotesque inner selves reflected on the permanent imprint each mask left upon its wearer.

I liked reading that. I love those inner/outer reversal things, and masks fascinate me. Also makes me think of Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Grey.

And Todesking, Chuck Palahniuk's Invisible Monsters has a character who is a fashion model who is disfigured by a gunshot. I've not read it, so I can't vouch for the quality of the book, but it sounds interesting.

where is the beauty coming from, if someone is unkind?

i would call that vanity.

i knew a girl who was incredibly vain who was bit in the face (and not terribly disfigured, but slightly scarred) by a dog. i thought it was probably the best thing that could have happened to her.

Hey there. I am fanatically obsessed with appearance too. Half the time it's what depresses me. I want to lose weight, get that massage thing done, lazer hair removal, perfect hair colour with eyebrows to match, perfect skin and body. Its unhealthy and out of control.

I know where to draw the line though, I would never have surgery to change my face. I hate my body shape and envy models with no stomach shapely hips and decent boobs.

I dont want pics taken because if it catches me on the wrong angle I'll be depressed about it for hours.

Some people think im being stupid, but its an extreme obsession. I don't have the time or money to do what I would want to either.

The best thing to do is try and find meaning in your life. I am in the process of trying to do this now. Hopefully it can shed some reality on the whole appearance obsession.

My experiences have been much like this as well. However the ones I consider average aren't exactly not pretty, just not wearing heavy makeup with their hair all up. It's really the same with guys as well, there are many jerks who look well kempt with their hair done in a very up style as well as their expensive thug clothes. It's funny but most of what I see as beauty is not exclusive to those who look good but aren't so made up.

Really? Most of the people who were horrible to me looked f*cking awful.

Yes there are those kind of people too.

I think many of my experiences have been mostly in beauty salons, malls, and most of what I'd consider uptown. I get the same kind of treatment in some poor sections as well which is close to where I live. I guess we need to be careful about our generalizations in some of our limited experiences.

i wonder if this sort of thought is at the root of teenage girls with ASDs (undiagnosed) developing eating disorders. i know they turn calorie counting and weight control into an obsession / special interest, but i wonder specifically if the root of it is the feeling that somehow they don't "measure up" to "normal" girls and think perfecting their appearance will fix it. although i never was obsessive to this degree i can relate to the thought process that might lead there. i have always felt like a defective woman.

btw hale_bopp, i have seen a few of your videos and you are very pretty as you are. i hope you can accept that and change your focus to something that makes you happier.