Spynat has a good blog post about the nature of beauty. I started responding, but it all got so complicated I killed my comment and decided to start again here. I was going to take it little broader, and go into the nature of physical traits.
Physical traits, such as beauty or intelligence, strength or height, are given by quirks of genetics for the science minded, or gifts from God for the faith based. Regardless of who or what threw them to each and every one of use, we all get a different mix. Some people get blessed/ lucky, some get unlucky/cursed.
There seems to be two main ways of responding to this. Rail against luck & God, or get to work maximizing what you have got.
Height seems to be the odd one out here, but beauty, strength, and intelligence can all be worked on. If you have a decent plan, and wish to strive for betterment, you can get smarter, you can get stronger, you can get more attractive. Results will vary. Life is unfair.
But the very act of striving for betterment makes you more attractive. Assessing your trait openly, and working on it will improve your lot. I like people, and I like a big range of people. I like some really pretty people, and I like some real ugly people. I like some smart people, and I like some dumb people. These curerent status traits fall into insignificance versus the will to improve. The drive to make themselves better.
Dumb people who do not see, or revel in their lack of intelligence, I avoid. From bitter experience, they are dangerous, and bad things happen around them. People who moan about their fitness levels while sitting on the couch growing a bigger butt will try and get you into their bad habits.
I'm on a IT help desk. I'm in the helping industry. I am by nature a helpful person, and like to get my "knight in shining armour' on. But once again I have discovered that there is no point even offering help to those who do not strive. You can give a perfect solution to someone who doesn't want it, and they will muck up their life and everything and everyone around them.
Being pretty makes life much easier. Being smart makes life even more significantly easier. Not striving, or giving up, makes life intolerable, and people detect it, and the good people leave and the broken ones come flocking in.
I summarized this in some advice I gave to someone previously on this blog: You are not smart enough to be lazy.
5 comments:
Yes I've always subscribed to the school of improvement...still...it shits me when people who don't know you overlook your inner fabulous-ness...but that's just me and my bi-annual 'woe is me' period.
Yeah but anyone who overlooks you for superficial reasons is obviously a vacuous tool and isn't worth knowing. It's almost a self-selecting tool identification mechanism.
Great post Bart, the point that the act of self improvement is in itself an attractive quality is valid.
Memory is a particularly interesting element. Very challenging.
Hmm. How odd. The security captcha is "bionican".
All for improvement, but what if you are perfect? Disclaimer: may have had a number of drinks prior to this comment.
I cannot stand certain behaviour in certain people, but in other people I will accept it and embrace it. I couldn't fathom this hypocritical behaviour to begin with, but then I realised the difference is that all people make mistakes, I like the ones who choose to learn from them.
I am living proof of potential versus hardwork. There are some pretty special people out there who are born with so much potential, but unless they learn about delayed gratification, they will soon be overtaken in life by those who know how to make what they have go further.
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