This is a comment by Rebecca Jane Weinstein on the post “I’m Stark Naked: Deal With It“.
I just spent the last year interviewing and writing about large people and body image and sex. People who, for the most part, are much larger than Noah Brand. And by larger I mean fatter. I couldn’t possibly tell you the myriad of fascinating things I have learned here, about both women and men, but I will sum it up as best I can: Self perception is everything. I know that sounds simplistic and cliche. It also seems to be true. The primary difference in whether or not people get noticed sexually, is whether or not they feel confident and open about being noticed sexually. That doesn’t deny all of the societal crap.
I am not talking about who is hot in a magazine or in the movies. But between real people in real life, male and female, the energy we put out is the energy we get back. (I don’t like that word, energy, but I have a paragraph here). I am not suggesting this is easy. I for one, am terrible at it. Getting to the place of self confidence where people are drawn to you is damn hard work. But it’s not gender specific. Having spoken to men and women, I don’t know that it is harder for one gender. It is certainly harder, or easier, for some people.
At any rate, these photos and sentiments are fabulous and I would be quite surprised if they weren’t effective for Noah, in the woman thinking he is sexy department—which is probably not what he anticipated.
Photo credit: Flickr / glennharper
A lot of this “energy we put out” stuff is expressed through body language, which is unfortunate for those who are body language impaired.
No matter how you see yourself, if you’re not projecting it in a way that other people can understand, it won’t do you any good. You are ugly by default.
An intersting comment Rebecca. I’m glad you dropped in to say something on this. There is a long running belief that you’re only as beautiful as other people think you are. The perceptions of other people and how you feel about your attractiveness have been bound together. Breaking that bond will not be easy. What makes it so hard is a question of how can you believe that you are attactive when you have gone the majority of your life (a few decades) being told that you aren’t attractive (either with direct words or indirectly by simply never being told… Read more »