Tell Me What You Don’t Like About Yourself

“Tell me what you don’t like about yourself” ask the doctors on Nip/Tuck. For most women this is an easy question to answer. Most of us have a laundry list of things we’d like to change. My hair started graying when I was 13, after two attempts with braces the gap between my two front teeth won’t remain closed and damn those extra pounds; and that’s just the beginning of my list.

BUT we’re told those things shouldn’t matter. Accept yourself as you are because confidence is what’s sexy. So there we have it; the dual pressures. First we feel the pressure to look and be perfect. Then we feel the pressure to pretend we don’t care to look and be perfect, while also portraying a confidence about not looking or being perfect. It’s a double edge sword that pokes at us here and there. It doesn’t kill but it maims, and even the strongest of us isn’t strong enough to withstand it.

None of us are immune to bouts of insecurity. Insecurity makes us do silly things; we’re not ourselves, we say and do things to make ourselves feel better. We become needy in hopes that someone else can give us back a sense of  ‘hey, you’re not so bad.’

I often wonder if this is exclusive to the female gender. Do males go through paralyzing bouts of insecurity? I know that most males have fears but do those fears cloud their judgement like they do ours?  Do men lower their standards and accept less than they deserve because they don’t feel as handsome as the next guy?

Just curious…