Sometimes, guys walk away from me midconversation to talk to a better-looking girl. Attractive waiters earn more tips. Beautiful people get more job interviews, get promoted more quickly and make more money than their unattractive counterparts. We need to teach them that their worth comes from much more than their appearance.

We need to stop shopping the narrative that everyone is beautiful or could be, if they did x, y, z. We need to lift women up to be competitive workers, voracious learners and empathetic people. No matter what they look like. This is a hard lesson to learn.

Being/feeling ugly seems to be the source of all my problems

But, it hit me: Playing with my appearance became fun again and I began to do things because I liked them, not for other people. I am a good and loyal friend. I have found love not only romantically, but in my life, in the little things, in my career. I know this will sound vain, but it's not the sort of thing that I would ever say out loud or ever feel comfortable saying.

I try so hard to be the perfect person, I always have. And I just feel like I don't deserve to be ugly. I do well in school, I have talents. I always include people, I put others before myself, I don't leave people on read, I don't create situations where anyone might feel uncomfortable. I give compliments, I carry a conversation, I embarrass myself to make others feel better.

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I always put everything I can into advice for other people, and make them my number one priority. I care so much about people, because I understand what it's like to need a pick-me-up. I devote myself to everyone else, but at the end of the day, I'm not the person i want to be. When I look in the mirror, I don't see the person I feel like I am.

And when I compare myself to the 'pretty people' in my life, I don't feel like they're as worthy of it as I am.

13 Ugly Men

Like I said, I'd never say any of this out loud or to anyone, and this is so out of character for me. But it's something I need to say and saying it to a computer screen is easier than saying it to a friend, especially when I feel like deep down they'll agree with me.

In high school this is exactly how I felt. My sisters would always say things about how jealous they were of my body and that I should learn how to 'flaunt' it, which would only make me more self-conscious and feel more guilty and ashamed of not being able to like my appearance, as well as just further distrusting them and any of their opinions. I was disgusted with myself. I think of it now as a very normal insecurity that most people have in high school everyone does at some point to different degrees that was intensified by my anxiety. If I started to feel less self-conscious about my body, then it would move to my personality, or the way I spoke in presentations, way I dressed etc.

It was the anxiety and low self-esteem that was the problem, not my body or myself in anyway.

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Saying these insecurities out loud to a psychologist will give you some relief, and hopefully start the work on accepting yourself. CBT would be great for you I think. You will eventually be able to make decisions and act in an a way based on what YOU want, not based on minimizing the anxiety.

Takes hard work, not a quick fix, but what is more important than your own mental health? Something that changed my perspective on my body is having severe chronic fatigue for a year To start - try and focus on the positives of what you can 'do' rather than how you look, which you can work on later.

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Welcome and the others have given you some wonderful responses already from their own experiences. I don't have much to add except that what you are going through is very normal, though I realise that doesn't make it any easier. A lot of people struggle with this to different degrees and for different reasons, but body image and self-confidence come up so often on these forums.

And the reason why is because it totally sucks to deal with. I'm a pretty average looking guy who's too lazy to do anything to "look better" - it mattered to me a lot before, and it matters to me less now, though it is a persistent thought in the back of my mind. You said it does bother you and you can't just switch it off. It's a pretty core feeling right now. When people say just don't think about it or don't let it bother you, what they really mean to say is work towards the goal of not letting it bother you.

This will take time and, I hate saying this, but we have to be patient with ourselves. As you well know, we are not robots, so changing our beliefs can take time. But we do need to work at it. That's a good one. The first in regards to your first kiss. Don't feel weird or ugly because you haven't had one. I know it's not much comfort just saying that but i truly do mean it.

The environments we interact in make us value things differently. School is an example of this. I am 24 and haven't had my first kiss, havent had sex and havent hooked up. I guess i do feel a bit worried about how people might perceive that but then i think 'screw them'. I will make my own values and set my life according to them. I guess you could adopt a similar thing maybe idk? I know what you mean about being empathetic too btw.

I feel like i help others and all this and i dont want to be alone or feel ugly. But there is nothing quite like someone who is beautiful on the inside and outside so i suggest you keeo going at it.


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As a single virgin male at 24, i dunno if i can provide much in the way of expertise on the matter at hand. I guess all I can do is empathise with you and encourage you to keep on keeping on. Modern culture seems to push all sorts of crap on us in relation to relationships, sex and everything. Try and find things to occupy your time and find hobbies. Focus on what matters in your life most at this point.

The notion that you are wasting it if you dont flaunt it and such.. But i know people are surprised if they find out i am a virgin.. I chose the former. In my life atm i am trying to figure myself out.

AM I UGLY?

Thats the best thing any of us can do. Anyway i hope what i said helps somehow. Just try to focus on wherever it is you are at in life: Hey, I know this forum has been long inactive, but the other day I googled something along these lines and my post came up as the first suggestion. I feel like a characteristic of any person searching for this, reading this, relating to this, is not someone who feels as though they are in the majority; for it is often that very feeling of difference that we locate and define as: And while I am still occasionally subject to this feeling, it is important to note that even in such a short stretch of time I am a much happier person now than I was then.

And I can say for sure that the thing which has changed has not been my looks, but instead the extent to which I let them effect me. I have been suffering with the same thing. I have good and bad days. The part about it all that annoys me most is that I care so little about other peoples' appearance and feel so superficial that I focus so much on my own. It really consumes my thoughts and can get me down like nothing else. I am a perfectionist so when I feel like my looks aren't perfect, it throws everything else out of whack.