I don’t find every single person on the planet attractive; why should I worry about whether or not every single person on the planet finds me attractive in return?
I wouldn’t want to give up the positive opinions of those people that matter. But I wouldn’t want just anyone’s opinion to matter either. That’s kind of the trick of the thing. It’s easy to say that the only thing that counts is what’s going on INSIDE of a person. It’s not as popular to say that, well, the outside counts, too. It just doesn’t count the way the world wants it to count. And all of that inside stuff has an impact on how the outside stuff gets perceived as well.
Here’s the plainest I can say it (and maybe I should just delete all of that wordiness above and come right down to this): External validation is nice. But it cannot be the only thing you have or you have nothing. Because there is no way to make everyone appreciate your outside no matter what it looks like. External validation can be nice; it can also be creepy and scary and full of pressure and expectation. It isn’t the end-all, be-all of worth, not for anyone but especially not for women. Let’s reprioritize the external validation, move it way down on the list. And if someone appreciates your outer package, let’s make sure it’s YOUR outer package, not one you’ve ripped out of a magazine because you think that’s what people want from you, because you think that’s the only way you can be acceptable.
— Marianne Kirby at The Rotund (via rkb)