Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus is a great book and is correct that men will never fully understand women. I certainly don’t understand the females species. I’m still trying my best.
I am amazed at this ladies comments about herself. Her issues about body image is hard for me to understand. I think she’s looks fantastic for a lady in her forties.
Its a very interesting peek into the complexities of the female mind. I’ve seen these same insecurities sometimes in my wife when she changes outfits three times for an evening out. I think my wife has very good taste in what she wears, but the process of getting dressed sometimes takes her awhile. The final results are always stunning and worth the wait.
This gorgeous lady has always had serious issues with her appearance.
I’m not sure if she resolved them yet. Her reaction to hr current photos makes me sad. She really can’t see her own beauty?
Semi-nude B&W artsy photo. Use your own judgement in opening.
Is she kidding herself? She claims acceptance for her “fat body”. But she’s not fat. She’s a great looking lady in her forties. Yet she’s obsessed by her appearance?
I’ve never given my own appearance this much thought. I keep my weight down, but I’m aware I’m not in the same shape as college. I don’t really care either. I’m healthy and still do things I love like backpacking, cycling, and water skiing. I’m planning a two and half week backpacking trip for this summer and will hike over a hundred miles. I have no plans to pose nekkid anytime soon. I’ll spare the world that joy.
Firstly, she did indeed look far better when she was twenty five than when she was forty six. I can say that cause I don’t have to care about her feelings as she isn’t reading this.
Secondly, she still looks very nice at forty six.
Thirdly, it would be entirely wrong if she looked better at forty six. I know that evolutionary psychology (is that the right term?) is thought of as a bit daft, but it has underlying truth. The human race would be in a lot of trouble if men preferred forty six year olds to twenty five year olds.
Forthly, and much more importantly than the other points: men are from mars, women are from venus is a pile o crap. Men and women are both perfectly capable of emphasising with one another and thinking like one another. If you ask me, it’s all about preferences. Men and women prefer to think in certain ways. Basically the male way of thinking is at once more logical, and yet more psychopathic. But we can still think in the same way if we really try to.
And my fifth, or perhaps forth and a half point, to illustrate that - cause I prefer to think in the male way, I’m not going to bother reading the blahdeblah she has to say about this - cause on a very brief skim read it’s tldr feelings-oriented boring crap - and if I’m wrong I don’t really care cause, and in all honesty I don’t even realistically entertain the possibility that I am wrong. Cause that’s how I prefer to think:)
I think she looks very good in both pictures, very sad that she can’t see that yet.
Body dismorphic disorder occurs in both men and women. It occurs more in women because they are objectified by the male gaze of the media. Women are taught from a very young age that their worth lies in how sexually attractive they are judged to be by men. This is for most people probably not an overt message they get from their parents, family and peers, but rather a sneaky but general message they get from television and advertising.
This has very little to do with Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. The book is absolute nonsense and contributes dangerously to the destructive ideas of huge inherent differences between the male and female brain. It widens the gap of the false gender binary that divides our society sharply in two.
Watch this for an excellent introduction by Cordelia Fine on all that is wrong with John Gray’s terrible book. If you want to find out more, look up her books and also the research by Dr. Rebecca Jordan-Young. They both discuss the vast flaws in the research into the differences in the male and female brain.
Years ago I read this about some art gallery: one of the exhibits was of a woman sitting at a dressing table in front of a mirror. All she did was meticulously put on her makeup, then take it off. Over and over again.
She was surrounded by a crowd of women, crying.
I try to be accepting of other - thinner and healthier - women’s need to discuss how their bodies aren’t perfect, that they need to lose weight, that they’re unhappy with how they look.
But for the love of little green apples, what a fucking drama queen! Shut up, bitch. You have a healthy weight. You have a physical trainer. You are wealthy enough to hire a professional photographer to take pictures of you. You are self-aware enough to say “in twenty years, I’ll probably recognize how good I look.” The only person telling you that you’re ugly is yourself, and you’re doing it so people will take pity on you and tell you how pretty you are. Fuck off.
Regardless of the accuracy of the book, we do have huge inherent differences in how our brains work. We are actually more different than we appear, not less; even when males and females do equally well on a test (like a spelling bee, for example) brain scans show their brains are accomplishing the task in very different ways. Tens of millions of years of divergent evolution leave their mark.
I would never have believed some of the body image insanity that goes through my wife’s head, and she was not open about a lot of it until we were together a long time.
Its not just a self destructive way to think, it is literally impossible to satisfy, as it even takes into account fashion so a woman who was agonizing and crying over her full curvy ass a decade ago is not crying because its not as full and curvy as is currently in fashion :smack::rolleyes::smack:
It also has NOTHING to do with what straight men want, not really. It has to do with what other catty women claim men want, which is often gross(visible vertebra) and doesn’t take a real male view into mind.
Her “ideal” body sounds disgusting to me, basically she wants to be non-female.
Thank you for explaining this. I should have said something similar in the OP.
I’ve been with my wife for almost twenty-five years. We don’t always speak the same language. She has strengths and abilities I don’t have. She’s really good at seeing through phonies for example.
Men & Woman think differently, but neither is smarter or better than the other.
I only brought this up because self-image and appearance are usually very different between the sexes. It would be extremely unusual for a guy to make the comments the writer did in her article. Guys obsess over different things like cars, electronics, and loss of hair.
Humans age as time goes by.
Pretending otherwise is idiotic.
I happen to be in better shape than I was in my 30s but not as buff as my 20s.
For the record, I am in my 50s and I try to keep in shape.
Not just because I am suddenly single, but because I would prefer to die later than earlier.
Women apparently like my silver hair.
Weird how that works.
I’m thinking it’s a little absurd to post a story about a woman who suspects she has body dysmorphic disorder (and if she’s “horrified” at how “fat” she is in any of those photos, that might be a fair assessment) and say “This is how women view themselves.” This ain’t how this woman views herself and I suspect there are a lot of others like me.
I’ve seen these same insecurities sometimes in my wife when she changes outfits three times for an evening out. I think my wife has very good taste in what she wears, but the process of getting dressed sometimes takes her awhile. The final results are always stunning and worth the wait.
