Are you more or less attractive in your head than in real life?

[Anonymous]

Im super cute in my head. Just adorable. In real life, they say i have a lot of confidence

[Anonymous]

I have a skewed sense but it runs both directions. I sometimes *really* misjudge how good a haircut/outfit/lip color looks on me. The best lesson I've learned as I've gotten older is to avoid most trends -- I get suckered in by advertising and don't really see how it actually looks on me.

But I also sometimes have very low self esteem that will get applied to my looks unnecessarily when I'm realistically probably above average looking, especially for my age. I'm mid-40s but very fit and almost no wrinkles thanks to being naturally pale and therefore religiously wearing sunscreen and hats my whole life.

Also I'm one of those people who can look really amazing in photos but has a tendency to get self-conscious, pull an awkward face, and ruin it. So every other photo of me is either terrible or great. It screws with my head -- I get overconfident when I see a good photo of myself and then my confidence is dashed when I see an awkward photo. The reality is in the middle but all I can see is the photo in front of me and I struggle to have a sense of my looks beyond that.

It's like I don't really know what I look like.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s quite the opposite for me. My mom still tells me that I don’t know or appreciate my beauty. Friends tell me I’m a beautiful woman. I don’t dislike myself but the reality is that I’m invisible to men.

The problem is that men as a group have to be stimulated in very specific ways to pay attention to women. This is not true individually but if you want to be a woman who gets a lot of attention from men you need certain features and to emphasize them a certain way.

I am slim with a small chest and a small butt, decent bone structure, nice eyes but thinn-ish lips, and I have to put effort into my hair for it to look good.

When I dress how I want with the amount of makeup I prefer and put the effort I want to put into my hair (close to none), men who don't know me don't pay attention to me at all. But if I wear fitted clothes that emphasize my thinness and how fit I am and then do generic "hot girl" hair and makeup (hair long and worn down, blown out and makeup that plays up my eyes plus actual lipstick to make my lips look fuller) then I get tons of attention from men. And I truly think this is true of like 80% of women. But to do it you have to tailor your appearance for the specific stuff that men as a group respond to and that can be time consuming, uncomfortable, and annoying.

I think like 5% or less of women just naturally look the way you have to look to get lots of male attention.

The good news is that if you are just looking for a mate, and not trying to win a beauty contest or become an actress or simply be considered the hottest woman in your social circle, it takes far less effort on appearance to attract a single man you are interested in.

Basically being the kind of woman men spin around to look at is not as great as people seem to think it is and just isn't worth the effort for the vast majority of us.

[Anonymous]

I have ugly duckling syndrome. I'm finally realizing it in my 40s. I also grew my hair out during the pandemic and it's quite long now. And I got divorced. All those things and while I'm older I get a lot of headturns and glances now even though I don't think my body is that great - it's still within conventional attractiveness norms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Much more attractive in my head compared to photos. However when I see myself in videos I look really different than I imagine but not in a bad way.

Same for me

[Anonymous]

Equally unattractive in both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel way way better about myself than how I actually look. It’s a blessing and a curse.

Same. I *think* I look fantastic. 😂

I’m happy to have a good ego.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s quite the opposite for me. My mom still tells me that I don’t know or appreciate my beauty. Friends tell me I’m a beautiful woman. I don’t dislike myself but the reality is that I’m invisible to men.

Who cares if you’re invisible to men? I hope you haven’t been basing your worth on that.

[Anonymous]

I’m definitely younger and thinner in my head! I am pretty but have never traded on my appearance or wore makeup so thankfully losing looks isn’t an issue/mourning thing for me

[Anonymous]

I think most people believe they are more attractive than they are.

[Anonymous]

In about one out of ten photos of myself I actually don't cringe and instead I think wow, I look pretty ok! The same day I don't like a picture of myself I could look in the mirror and think I look pretty good. Mind games!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is such an interesting question to me because it has totally varied for me by age. When I was in my 20s whenever I looked in a mirror I would be shocked by how much worse I looked than what was expecting. In my 30s and 40s it was the opposite. I’d come home from an event and wonder if people had been kind of staring at me because there was something wrong and be surprised by how great my skin and hair looked. Now in my 50s—well, I don’t even want to talk about it honestly. I actually didn’t recognize myself in pictures from this Thanksgiving. It’s a surreal feeling.

Thats a shame

I look much better now at age 55. I get tons of attention from men, im very fit and pretty.

I had let weight creep on in the past. I have my face 'back' now and my body is slim and toned. Im also busty.

Im just going to enjoy it while it lasts. Kind of annoyed with myself that i let myself go in my 40s.

[Anonymous]

I’ve always thought of myself as horrifically ugly, and pictures only confirm that. I think most people would agree, but what baffles me is that I occasionally come across a woman who says I’m extremely handsome. One woman said I was very good looking and I knew it, which was really weird.

[Anonymous]

I think I'm still a 9. This is delusional. Part of this is that I'm very photogenic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am self-conscious. I am a rare feature person in a sea of people who have similar skin tone and dark eyes. Think Aishwarya Rai. I get complements on my eye color daily but I never wanted my friends or family to feel like I stood out in some way so I always think of myself as less attractive but other people seem to find my features make me more attractive.

It's not helpful when people don't know who the person you're describing yourself as is.

I’m trying to imagine being so dumb and helpless that I decided to type that out instead of using google.