Invisible Realities that Ruin Your Life

Have you ever noticed someone who just looks very different? Maybe it’s a noticeable scar, or strange hair color, or that they are just really out of place, or odd.
Worse yet, have you paid attention to the proclamation of some ‘authoritative expert’ that a particular physical attribute is a true sign of beauty? … Then looked in the mirror to see if you possess it? Or worse, done the mirror check to look for what someone else told you was unattractive.

Our society has moved to a point where folks are constantly comparing themselves to the standard that they are convinced represents real beauty and attractiveness - and finding themselves unable to measure up to that ideal. So, needlessly, they opt for surgery, or spend huge amounts of time and money trying to get that look.

Today, this unreasonable concern that we might be unattractive is causing serious issues for our mental wellbeing, by convincing people they are ugly – or that everyone thinks they are ugly, not worthy, or alone because of that.

It is so bad that some see no other way out but to take their own lives.

In the mid 1980s, Robert Kleck, along with several others, preformed a tightly controlled – and truly revealing - experiment. If you want to find documentation the results of the experiment were printed in the Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, in 1985, volume 3, issue 3, and titled: Gender and Responses to Disfigurement in Self and Others.

What we can pull from this simple but ingenious experiment is truly illuminating.