An Asian Girl with unrealistic beauty standards :(

[TrueRiot]

Wow. This is so crazy. Men around here LOVE Asian women.

I'm African-American, so yes, completely opposite of the American beauty standard. I have brown skin, a non-European nose, high forehead, high cheekbones, kinky hair, and "cat-eyes". I also live in the south so I'm surrounded by the blonde-haired, blue-eyed southern belles, and you know what? I feel like I'm just as beautiful as any of those girls.

The beauty of "ethnic" women is unique because it's underrepresented. We're exotic, and there's nothing wrong with that. If you feel beautiful and present yourself with confidence, others will pick up on that. If a girl like me, who is this far from the white beauty standard, can think I'm a 10, and be treated like one, so can you!

Take pride in the fact that you don't fit into the "norm." The problem is that so many people want to be the norm that they all end up looking the same. I LOVE standing out--I turn heads wherever I go. If you feel like how you look defines your happiness in life, there's something going on internally that needs to be fixed. Don't let the media steal what is truly yours, a beauty that so many women would kill to have. Asian women are GORGEOUS and highly desirable. All it takes is for you to love yourself, work with what you have, enhance your beauty, hold your head up high, and strut like you're the hottest girl around.

Please keep us updated...

 

[luvsic]

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[sweetonmakeups]

hmmm, i'm Chinese and my feature isn't the best BUT i love them. My eye is one side with double eyelid and one side without, i like that it is different and unique. My nose is small and most sunglasses don't fit my nose. I love how cute and adorable my nose is even it isn't tall. I like my lip it is super chubby and i'm overbit and i think my overbit make me cute. My skin is super white and to me i think they are great. Also my hip is wide, it isn't small like most model but i like how it filled out my dress like i have a curve. I have two kids and left me tons of stretchmark but it don't bother me a bit. OHH i also forgot, i have big calves LOL I can't say i love it but hey what can i do about it. Fact is I make the best out of my feature good or bad. Why compare, learn to love them.

 

[sweetonmakeups]

hmmm, i'm Chinese and my feature isn't the best BUT i love them. My eye is one side with double eyelid and one side without, i like that it is different and unique. My nose is small and most sunglasses don't fit my nose. I love how cute and adorable my nose is even it isn't tall. I like my lip it is super chubby and i'm overbit and i think my overbit make me cute. My skin is super white and to me i think they are great. Also my hip is wide, it isn't small like most model but i like how it filled out my dress like i have a curve. I have two kids and left me tons of stretchmark but it don't bother me a bit. OHH i also forgot, i have big calves LOL I can't say i love it but hey what can i do about it. Fact is I make the best out of my feature good or bad. Why compare, learn to love them.

 

[Rudyru]

Oooh, girl, you may be my twin...I feel the exact same way. I hate the fact that I look "Asian." I hate being tan, I hate my slanted eyes, I hate my pudgy upturned nose, the jet black flat hair...everything. I covet caucasians because they can wear colours I will never be able to wear and the fact that their gene pool is so varied. They have the higher ability to produce children with striking blue eyes yet with onyx coloured hair....while we sit here...with the same tired old gene pool: black hair x brown eyes, brown hair x brown eyes, black hair x black eyes, brown hair x black eyes...not too exciting. No wonder why everyone thinks we look the same, our genetic compositions aren't as expansive as any other (and I hate to use this term, because we are all just one race: Human) race. Sure, once in a while, you'll find someone who transcends this genetic barrier, and they are the ones who'll be propelled to stardom because of it.

Like you, I hold myself to the western standards of beauty, and I feel that I can never be beautiful or gorgeous enough to ever fit my sense of aesthetic. Even applying makeup is a chore because there are looks that I'll never be able to create because of the way my eyes are shaped.

I have contemplated getting plastic surgery to remedy all of this, but when I think deeper about it, I get scared because I know I won't be able to stop. I will always find someway to degrade myself, to make myself feel insignificant.

You know what the funny thing is? I'm constantly told I'm gorgeous, that I should become a model, that they wished they had my features...but even that doesn't cut it, because it is I who wants their features. I want to look like them, because for me...I would give everything I own to look like them. I don't want to have exotic beauty, I want to have their beauty, NORMAL beauty. I can hide from the sun, I can contour differently, I can be thinner than a toothpick, but it will never change the fact that I'm Asian.

And to expand further from even internalised racism, I hate my weight. To many, I am considered skinny (even too thin), but to me, I can never be as thin as I want to be, because my ideal proportions would equal the death of me. I want a thirteen inch waist, I want my thighs as thick as my wrist, I want my hip bones protruding out of my skin...UGH. I'm so fucked up...

Sorry if you feel like I'm trying to one up you, but really, you're me. Everything you've listed applies to me including the ones I've just posted...and I can relate like no other, and it's hurting me just as it's probably hurting you.

edit: I'd just like to add for the sake of my conscience that I'm not saying all Asian women are ugly or do not fit my ideals of beauty. I think they can be just as beautiful as any other woman. But to me, THEY can pull it off, THEY can be themselves and still be gorgeous. I, on the other hand, feel that I cannot be as gorgeous as they are because my features do not fit me, nor fit who I am...if that makes any sense at all.

 

[Shadowy Lady]

ok, so many have said this before me, but I'll say it again. Not everyone looks like a barbie doll or whatever the current western society (by that I mean mostly media) thinks is the ideal woman form. So try to focus on the positive of what you have. You are wasting your youth, when you have the best health, skin, brain power, obsessing over something that's not even true. Ppl's ideas of beauty vary from person to person. If you keep chasing what you don't have, one day you're old and you will wonder why you wasted all these years.

Plz start to see all the positives about your features. How old are you if you don't mind me asking? When I was in my teens, I was annoyed at how tall I was (I'm 5'7") and so I was taller than a lot of boys even...but over time I got to appreciate my height and right now I actually love it. So at the end, you cannot have all that you think is ideal, and why you spend time obssessing about it, you'll miss out on so many opportunities (like say ppl that find you attractive).

Hope my rambling helped

 

[reesesilverstar]

I'm not going to bother reading everybody elses posts, because I'm sure it's going to be encouraging and telling you to embrace your own beauty etc...

As unfortunate as your story reads, to me, it sounds like you don't need beauty advice, you need professional help. You do realize and acknowledge that your expectations are unrealistic, yet you still hold on to it... Before it goes any further, I say talk to a mental health expert. It's nothing to be ashamed of and you'd be surprised what you may discover that could help you along the way. Just try it...

And good luck.

 

[nichollecaren]

If you are willing to try something difficult that might help...you can do what I did.

Put yourself out there. Take pics, even though you hate doing it. Find yourself in a job that rmakes you visible, and make it HAPPEN for you. Interract with others, and soon you will realize people accept you, and begin to do the same.

I am half asian half black. Pre my 20s I never thought of myself as 'pretty' I had bad skin, I was extremely skinny, and I was so shy and introverted, I wouldnt talk to anybody. One day, I decided I had had enough. I applied and auditioned for a job that required me to host a TV show. I barely got the job (barely). For weeks i stressed out about my first show, and how I would do and how I would look and what I would wear...and the first show was...horrible...the next even less horrible....and eventually, it became easier. I became less focused on how i looked, and more on how smart Ican be, how much of an intellectual I am, and how well I had learnt to speak. I came home and did my makeup and took HUNDREDS of pics of myself, til I found the right angles, the right pose, and the right smile...Eventually, I felt more confident, and my looks improved.

I'm not dishing you BS, people have told me...since that job, I am literally better looking. Why? Confidence improves your looks dramatically! The topper came after I accepted Christ and became a christian, but that part is definately up to you and your personal belief system.

Based on my own experience, I do believe the root of your dissatisfaction with your looks is your dissatisfaction. It is a hard cycle to break, but you can, and if u have difficulty doing it alone, ask a trusted friend to help you.

 

[chocolategoddes]

I know you've said that you hate pictures of yourself and don't currently have a camera (i think), but now I'm curious to see what you look like.
I bet you're a lot prettier than you think.

 

[obentick]

Quote:

Originally Posted by luvsic Hey again all, I know I've been posting like crazy right now (few posts have to do with MAC stuff :/), and I apologize..but I feel like I just need to vent out my frustration... I have had image problems since I was maybe 14 years old. In that, I think my strive for physical perfection has driven me insane. I don't only compare myself to airbrushed models, I also compare myself to beautiful girls who I see every day, whether they are friends of friends, random facebook pictures of people, whatever. They "meet", to me, the ideal if what girls should look like with their perfect selves and how they perfectly fit in to the beauty standards I see as "most" beautiful. Most of these girls are Caucasian. It sounds silly, right? But in my head, I have this image of what I would look like if I were *perfect*, and because I am so far away from that image I break down all the time. I have set unrealistic beauty standards for myself. As an Asian girl, I have a tendency to hold myself up to white beauty standards...I have been reading the post "URGENT...I need to pass this message on!" and it has offered me a little insight and comfort on issues like these, but for some reason, I feel like I can never feel happy or comfortable in the skin I'm in. It's a little strange how I feel, I still find exotic beauty beautiful, but only if it still conforms to a more "western" standard. I am disgusted when I look at myself in the mirror - to me I just see small, squinty eyes, a huge nose, a mouth that's way too small for my features and ugly hair. I have such a twisted mentality that "if your nose was slimmer and your eyes a little bigger, you'd look GREAT" but my nose is not slimmer and my eyes are not bigger...and I hate myself for it. I have researched rhinoplasty and eyelid surgery for years but have not found a doctor who can meet my needs to craft my vision of the perfect me - because the perfect me isn't just shaving down a hump on my nose, it's reshaping it entirely. And it's just too big of a risk to go to anyone who cannot give me the results I want exactly. But then again, I have unrealistic expectations...nobody could ever give me the results I wanted exactly, to be honest. Sometimes I am perfectly rational. I tell myself that beauty is only skin deep, and I should work on my personality and inner self. But every time I'm haunted by a bad picture I fall into this deep paranoia or depression and slump back to my old self again. I was just wondering if any of you ladies had any advice, or similar experiences, on how to accept and love yourself the way you are, and EMBRACE the way you look as a woman of color. Because for me, I feel like I'm still so far away from loving myself because I'll never look like a white girl, or anything close to that. Oh, and I feel like a WHACKO for sharing this, but I HAAAAATE taking pictures of myself, or when other people take pictures of me, for that matter. They always turn out disgusting looking, I always hate my awkward smile, and the way I look like 99.9% of the time. I wish I could delete every single picture taken of me. I duck away from cameras because I just don't want my picture taken in any place and time. It's sad, I won't have many picture memories when I grow up..but as of now I can't stand seeing my face.

When certain females grow up they always have that look that they want to achieve and I dont blame you. You need to walk with a confidence and when you look at yourself in the mirror everymonring just tell yourself that you are beautiful and every individual is beautiful in their way.
Also if that is you in the pic,I dont see why you compaining, and if its not you are still beautifull. Take a camera and just for fun take pictures of yourslf ( I used to do that too) and look at those pictures and say see I am a beautifull person.
And you are,

 

[X4biddenxLustX]

I know how you feel on this. I use to always stare in the mirror when I was younger examining everything about me. I came to the conclusion that I had big fat cheeks, a big bulbous tipped nose, and I was hairy. I was SOOOOO jealous of all the Caucasian girls that were considered gorgeous. The stupid reason was that all the boys liked them and they got all the attention. I just felt left out and sort of like the outsider. I eventually thought that maybe if I wasn't Chinese I wouldn't have the features that I didn't like about myself and that if I was Caucasian everything would be much better for me. Back then I had no clue whatsoever on how to take care of myself physically and emotionally. My makeup and beauty skills were horrible. I won't I kind of ended up using makeup as my "mask" to become someone else who was much more confident and could actually like herself.

Years passed and I started realizing more and more that there is no reason to be ashamed of how I look whether or whether not it had anything to do with my race. I realized that I had quite a distorted view of my appearance. My cheeks and nose aren't THAT big. The images of them had grew to such a large size in my head because I kept picking at myself about it. I obsessed over. Things aren't as bad as you may seem to think they are! We are our worse critiques really. I also realized that I will never be able to compare myself to Caucasian girls or to girls of any race because we all have different features. It doesn't make one race more attractive than the other. Were just different, being different can be a good thing.

I think you should be less hard on yourself. I don't even need to see a picture of you or anything to already know that you are a beautiful girl! Being beautiful goes beyond having nice makeup on and having guys find you pretty. It's about whats inside too, it's the part that everyone should love us the most for.

 

[luvsic]

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[piika]

I'm Asian too, but quite a bit older than you.

For me, the best way to feel better about your image is not necessary trying new techniques or thinking about how to accept your features, but to go out there and accomplish something in you life. Nothing gives you self-confidence like it, and with self-confidence, you will be very beautiful and feel it too. It's not easy to achieve success in anything, of course, but it's a hell of lot more realistic and healthy goal than looking perfect. If you got a real sense of self-worth, your image of yourself will change completely.

 

[frocher]

,,,,,,,,

 

[luvsic]

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[user44]

I think everyone has moments like this...
Most days I wake up thinking that Im the sexiest thing ever made...
But then some some days I don't like my weird cat shaped nose or my cat shaped eyes that I wish were slantier...

 

[metal_romantic]

I am white but I can relate to how you feel. I have never felt pretty. I don't know how it started, but I remember announcing to my mum when I was 5 that I would never get married because I wasn't pretty enough, so I must have felt like this practically my whole life. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one in the whole world that knows how it feels- but I guess I am not! i don't want anyone else to feel bad but in a way it is a relief to know that I am not alone! When I see photos of myself I want to (and often do) cry and think "I can't believe I look like that!". I don't have any issues with ethnicity but I just feel so unattractive that I want to punish myself for it sometimes because I feel like it stops me from having a better life. (I know that sounds weird but that's how I feel when I get upset and irrational).
I see women of all different races and think they are beautiful. I think Asian looks are gorgeous.

Try looking up BeYouTified on Youtube. Makeup Artist Eve Pearl has some videos of makeovers, and a few are with Asian ladies. They look so lovely. You may get some great tips from this

Her book is titled "Plastic Surgery Without the Surgery: The Miracle of Makeup Techniques". Speaking of surgery, please be very careful. I often feel like my face looks like a pack from Ikea that came without instructions and was assembled by an intern while God was on his lunch break, but I would like to have hope that one day I will learn to accept myself as I am, flaws and all. What if you changed yourself and then one day realized that you lost an important part of who you are? What if you look in the mirror and don't feel like "you" anymore? The face plays a part in our identity- which is a reason why we love makeup here! (Of course this is your personal decision, and if it what you truly want to do, that's your own choice and no-one else's- just trying to give you something to think about to help you make that choice.) Besides, think of how much surgery costs and the risks involved.

I have read a couple of Amy Tan's novels ("The Hundred Secret Senses" was one) and I think they are wonderful. I love her writing. She is Chinese-American. Perhaps it might help you to embrace your ethnicity? I think that might help you from the inside. Of course there are plenty of other ways to do this, but I really enjoyed the books and even if they don't help they might be nice to read anyway

 

[Triskele]

I'm going to make kind of an odd suggestion here, but it's one that I think you should seriously consider.

You're Chinese, ethnically, no? Have you ever considered going to China?

If you go on a home exchange, or even visit for a week, two, a month, and are surrounded by a lot of gorgeous people and culture that is YOUR OWN...your perspective may change.

 

[doomkitteh]

^ That might work. To put things into perspective, I'm a brown Asian girl (I'm south-east asian, chinese, and indian) and I grew up somewhere with many Chinese people, and I in no way fit any typical east asian beauty ideas that was idealised there. The whole thing just really annoyed me but I didn't obsess about it. To be honest you sound too preoccupied with how you look. I also think east asian beauty is idealised/fetishised to a certain extent, and you must have seen this, especially on the internet. There are definitely chinese/east asian 'beauty role models' in the media, more so than many other ethnic minorities.

 

[Tahti]

I'm sad for you that you feel that way ;( I'm Caucasian, and IMO Asian ethnicity is really far more beautiful.

Self esteem issues are difficult to try overcome, I've had them for 12 years, and I still don't like myself. The only time I ever feel good is when I distort my image into something totally over the top - wear crazy clothes, change my hair, cover myself in makeup, cause that's the closest I can get to changing how I look without surgery.
I don't have many ethnic features, but my nose is one. I hate my nose the most, it's a very typical Finnish nose, and every time I look at myself that's all I can see, and all I think is how much better I'd feel if I had a straight nose, larger eyes, et cetera.

What makes me feel better is just playing around with makeup really ;D It's amazing how different shapes can make your face look totally different, and this makes me happy.. I hope one day you can feel at peace with yourself. I'm sure you are beautiful just the way you are. xx