What is it like to be beautiful?

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I would describe myself as pretty and have had a few admirers in my life, but I'm not outstandingly beautiful. I'm not tall or slim enough (boobs too big for my small frame, legs that could be much longer and hair that always needs a lot of styling to look half bad,). How about you? What is it like to be considered a beauty? Is life easier than for the rest of us mere mortals? I had a friend who was breathtakingly beautiful, but she was never happy with her lot in life. Disappointed that her looks didn't give her more of an advantage in life. Just wondering what it must be like to be considered a beauty.

It’s great, thanks for asking.

I haven't a clue, because I'm not. But I'm very comfortable and confident in my own skin and I've done just fine, and that's what actually matters. Skin deep, and all that.

I’m just plain/average looking but my elder daughter is ten and is really beautiful. She has been since she was about 2. As far as I can see it doesn’t make much difference to her compared with my other three, except that people notice and favour her. For example, I notice at ballet she will often be complimented highly by teachers when in fact she is dancing the same/less well than other girls. She can go to a birthday party where she doesn’t know anybody and within 20 minutes she is surrounded by new friends. However, that could just be because she’s really confident and chatty naturally.

If we compliment her we never say anything about her looks, other than she looks smart in new clothes etc, because I don’t want her getting the idea that being beautiful is any different to being tall/short/pale/dark.

I'm not stunning but I know I get treated way better when I've scrubbed up so to speak. I think it also goes that if you look good, you feel good and therefore are more confident, and I think confidence goes a long way.

What I mean is, I don’t think it affects her or her personality, but it does affect how others treat her sometimes - it was especially noticeable at preschool and dance classes.

I’ve been called beautiful throughout my life but didn’t consider myself so.
As I’ve become older I realised that being younger and considered beautiful made life a bit easier.
Losing those things I’ve noticed things being less easy.

In some ways it probably does make life easier. Men may treat you better or do more favours based on how you look. But you can also get a lot of unwanted attention, which can lead to bad experiences.

A friend who is more beautiful than me was always treated as a trophy and hasn't had a great life. I'm not considered a beauty like her but I am very pretty and was probably 'beautiful' in my teens and early 20s. I was also treated this way from time to time. My plainer friends have had more success in relationships as well, so beauty is no guarantee of happiness.

Not me, but my sister is more coventionally attractive than me. She isn't confident or assertive though. I'd say she got used a lot and treated as arm candy in her late teens and twenties. In the party/drug set. Men were shits to her, often.

I think if you are very good looking, beautiful infact, then it must be harder as you get older and you must have to work harder to maintain your good looks. Im glad I wasnt a real beauty but I got by very well and had a few admirers. Beauty is only skin deep as they say.

I think it matters less as you get older when things like wealth and how much care you take of yourself start to become more important. This will make me sound awful and shallow but I was struck recently by a picture of a woman I know only a little bit. She is so beautiful but she's not got the time or money to spend on herself so unless you really look you don't notice how pretty she is (I hadn't until I saw this picture), you just see the unstyled hair, tiredness etc. Maybe that's just me.

I'm not beautiful at all. I could list all the things "wrong" with my looks and it would be a very long list!

I'm visually challenging.
People love me or hate me for reasons which have fuck all to do with my looks, thankfully.
I'm grateful for that because I'd hate to be judged purely for my looks.

I definitely think it must be a double edged sword. Frankly, I feel shite ageing and I am moderately attractive. I can't imagine how it must be I'd your youth was defined by your beauty. But even so, how bloody marvellous it must be to be considered beautiful beyond compare

😂 I wouldn't call myself that but I'm a model. The good thing about being tall /slim etc - you get a lot of options (men) to choose from. YES looks are not enough but if you have the usual: degree/career/friendly/kind, then it's easier fo stand out, and take your pick of men.

If you don't go for dickheads it's quite easy to find a man who ticks all these boxes: v v successful, tall, handsome, good in bed, generous, genuinely funny, romantic.

That's the best thing about it ☝🏻 Now the downsides...... the worst one is getting old

Veronika13 love your honesty. Lol I lucked out with my DH. He's gorgeous and thinks I'm the most beautiful woman in the world ( lol at least that's what he tells me). But I still can't imagine what it must be like to be so beautiful and to age😬 I personally love to see older beautiful women. I think experience makes them even more beautiful. I can still recall the insecurities of the teenage years and am thankful to have survived those years 😁👍

There are pros and cons. Which ones win out depends on what you personally think is important. Very few people have been both beautiful and ugly at the same stage in their life, and that makes informed comparisons difficult.

I'm no Miss Universe, but I'm pretty enough, and I hated always having to wonder whether whomever I was dating would still want me if I were less attractive. Ending up married to someone who wanted me for all the wrong reasons sounds worse to me than whatever social slights I might have experienced had I been ugly. But maybe someone who desperately wanted marriage and children, and who believes her lack of physical beauty was the reason she never had either, would feel differently about that.

I find this intriguing too. I am very plain, not attractive as such, but scrub up decently. I know I look nice when I put on a dress, some lipstick, big earrings, to go to a party.

But some people are very beautiful. They get treated differently, better throughout life. I find this interesting. A bit jealous I guess. But accepting, I've always accepted it as just so.

Not me but my friend was a model. She looked like the blonde woman from ABBA in her youth. As someone above said, it was a double edge sword. She was often favoured - invited to parties, offered discounts, free passes to events, that sort of thing. On the other hand, some people talked to her like she didn't matter. I remember a 'friend' in a pub sitting there and telling her why he didn't fancy her in front of all of us - picking out minuscule subjective flaws - in front of all of us. She was dating his friend and had zero interest in him, but he still thought it was ok to talk to her like that. Some women were very obviously jealous and would bitch about her constantly when In fact she was and is a really lovely person. She went on to get her PhD, married a man with a PhD and they both live a happy nerdy life in the countryside now.

Top model Cameron Russell has done a really great TED Talk on what it's like to 'win the genetic lottery'. This is worth a watch.

@Strokethefurrywall 😂😂😂

I was beautiful, but am not anymore.

As a child, adults seemed to conflate beauty with 'goodness', and frequently favour and praise me for qualities not wholly related to appearance. I was always considered honest, well-behaved, clever and kind. While I was all of these things, so were lots of my less beautiful peers, who weren't frequently gushed over in the same way. I think it had the effect of making me warmer and more complimentary to others, which increased my attractiveness and sustained/increased the warmth and praise I received. I'm sure this cycle is pretty common and that, sadly, the opposite is also true.

I received a lot of attention from men and was approached frequently wherever I went. I mostly enjoyed it but, as a teen and young adult, a number of close friends stopped seeing me because their boyfriends paid me too much attention, which was hard.

Everybody in the street stared, which made me distractingly self-conscious, so it was quite a relief, several years ago, to notice that I'd become invisible (until I opened my mouth).

I don't mind not being 'beautiful' beautiful now. It'd probably only lead to mischief. I don't know whether I could be faithful through the most difficult periods of my marriage if men were professing their undying love and kneeling to kiss my toes on the bus like they did in the old days

I was beautiful when young (tall, slim, blond wavy hair, blue eyes) but not very confident having been sexually abused. I received slot of unwanted male attention and consequently carried myself in a very aloof way for many years. I came out as a lesbian in my thirties, gained a lot of confidence and also over a few years lost the long hair and aged and ended up with very short silver grey hair, which made me immune to the male gaze. I sometimes get called sir these days by sales assistants until they look properly and see me rather than just my hair.

A friend of mine was a model in her youth. She’s now in her fifties and can’t cope with getting older. Her husband told me that she is very unhappy - she is now a size 10, which she sees as fat, and no longer turns heads when she enters a room. She is still very pretty, and looks about 35, rather than 55, but she is having more and more work done - she started with her lips and Botox, which was subtle, but is now using fillers, and has gone too far, so instead of thinking how fabulous she looks, she is at the point where people comment (privately) on what she has done to her face. It’s a real pity.

I’ve got a friend whose beautiful, dark thick long hair, big dark eyes, huge red lips (enchanced now with filler) slim and tall. She’s so unlucky in love! Feels constantly lonely and unhappy with herself. She’s so self conscious and doesn’t ever feel pretty enough. She’s always being used and dumped by horrible men. Currently ones just seeing her as and when he wants with zero respect for her.

I feel very sorry for her, I hope she focuses less on looks and meets someone funny and caring who makes her laugh.
She focuses on having a partner more than any friendship and she says it’s because she wants to be loved. I think deep down she wants to be loved for who she is and not her looks but she’s choosing superficial horrible people.

I was considered very beautiful in my youth.
It brought me a lot of attention mostly wanted but not always.
Other women never seemed to have a problem with it and I’ve always had lots of female friends. Some men would be difficult though. I would get hit on all the time and quite a few just don’t like to be told no.

I had two very beautiful friends in my group of girlfriends but when we all went out it was my more mumsy friend who always got chatted up. I think men found my beautiful friends intimidating even though they were lovely girls and didn’t approach them.

I had a very beautiful friend in my late teens so was able to observe. She looked like a young Sophia Loren. I remember men used to do double takes and she'd get approached in the tube etc. It was like people saw her beauty and not her. She was actually very down to earth and funny but always felt sad that people didn't want her for the right reasons. As the "girl-next-door" mate, I often got men chatting to me so they could get closer to her IYSWIM... I got to the point where I assumed they weren't interested in me! 😆