The fear of vanity.

Most perfectionists have a fear of vanity. We’ve been cautioned against it, because, as always, vanity gets in the way of other people’s wishes regarding your love for them. “He’s so vain; he only sees himself and doesn’t give me a time of his day.” However, he enjoys his mirror image; he loves to treat himself like a work of art; who is anyone to say he’s doing something wrong?

Healthy people want to look good for others; to give them a positive experience when they are being looked at. It doesn’t mean they’re after admiration, per se; they want to make it apparent that the other person’s experience of them matters and that they want it to be positive. They don’t want to inflict ugly on others.

There are two sides to looking good: enjoying your own self and allowing others to enjoy your looks, too. It is also a pleasure to see someone who clearly carries themselves in a way that is meant to be an experience for someone else. It is pleasurable to watch people enjoy their own skin.

Victims of narcissistic abuse

However, a person may feel they HAVE TO look good for others in order to be loved. A lot of beauty-critical thinkers feel this clearer than the wish to give others a pleasurable experience of looking at them. A person who has suffered narcissistic abuse pertaining to their looks is going to be quite likely to feel pressured to look good, rather than feeling good about it. Therefore, they criticize people who enjoy their good looks, thinking they’re doing it to, first of all, lift the standards impossibly high for a normal person, and secondly, allow themselves to be narcissistically abused by someone forcing them to look good.

Narcissistic abuse can go the other way as well: You don’t get to look good, only I can, or, since I don’t look good, you don’t get to look good, either. A narcissist wants to control how you express yourself so they can feel happy around you, and as far as looks go, it can go in any direction.

The first thing people see is your looks – but hopefully not the only thing.

When you don’t have a positive experience of being loved for who you are unless you look amazing, you feel the only thing people are focused on is your looks. Clearly, the first thing people usually notice about a good-looking person is their looks. That’s the first compliment. However, if there is something else to be seen, the looks quickly take a back seat. It is worrying if they don’t. Your looks can also be so distracting that people never look behind it; I shaved my head for 2 years, thinking it would prompt people to ask, “What kind of person,” instead, I spent two years talking about my scalp. I loved the look, but I had to grow my hair back to change the discussion topic.

A person’s looks is a part of the way they think. It says something about you. How respectful of others you are. Are you playful or boring? Are you artistic? Looks are a form of communication; even if you are not doing it to be loved, it’s still social. There is very little point in looking like anything specific if you spend all of your time alone. That also means that if you don’t attempt to communicate through your looks, it sends the message: “I’m not interested/interesting, leave me alone.” If you even plan on getting out there one day, there’s a standard that many people want to maintain.

Fashion is a language, a look is a lie.

The way you look is a form of communication, nothing more. Creating “a look” thus, is a lie. It says something about you that isn’t true. When you dress and maintain your looks, remember you are communicating. It makes thinks simpler. What are you saying? What do you wish to say instead?

Then, ignore the comments of fashion illiterates, MANY OF WHOM work as stylists, incredibly ironically!

What sexual flavor are you offering?

One obvious function of expression of your looks is the sexual message you’re sending. You must be aware of it, too. It can be removed completely or added in, but to do it efficiently, you also need to sense sexual energies in other people. Otherwise, you may not be able to reduce it or add to it.

Sexually speaking, what is the flavor you want to offer people? Gerard Depardieu is hardly a good-looking man, especially getting older, right? Still, he is sexy as hell if you ask most women in the world, and many of them love a classically good-looking man. So what is he doing that allows him to look like a proboscis monkey and get away with it? Sure, I know he has his haters and controversies, too, but… Can you tell what it is? I certainly can. I’ll give you a clue that gets you closer: hedonism. Everything about him speaks of pleasures he’d help you explore.

How much of your looks is due to pressure one way or another?

Now. In terms of your looks, how much of it is authentic and how much of it is pressure from outside? Mind you, you can be pressured to put on weight, and give up on your looks, too. You can be pressured to NOT GIVE A SHIT about what others think, and as such, purposefully dress in an unbecoming manner. You can be pressured to communicate a false message.

There’s a happy medium in there, but have you hit it? You should go for something, please or attract or communicate with a certain type of individual while ignoring the objections of another. Who do you bow to, who do you moon at? Don’t get them confused, fearing you won’t be good enough for the ones you wish to bow to, anyway. Be honest about it. Do you want to look good or not? Do you want no standards at all or would you wish there were people who think you look nice… Or even sexy… Or interesting?

What you need to do is to match your looks to the message you wish to deliver. Ignore people who don’t like or cannot read the message… Or, add a line that will help even the slowest ones to see your message, if you can.

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