Exceedingly Handsome Guy - pondering on superficial beauty

In the Listmania of Home Life Simplified, we listed our tween/teen crushes and our current day ones...and someone put forward Satoshi Tsumabuki, who I had to google. One of his movie parts was titled "Exceedingly Handsome Guy". Can you even fathom this?

Agent "Oh, there's a part for you in Tokyo Drift. It's Exceedingly Handsome Guy"
Actor: "oh, perfect."
a little later...
Actor "Hi, I'm auditioning for Exceedingly Handsome Guy. What do you think?"

I can not comprehend the self-assuredness this would involve. I can't imagine looking in the mirror and being so happy with what I saw (and knowing that everyone else would love it too).

So are these people born this way? Or does having an Exceedingly Handsome exterior create it? Like the 'bubble' that Liz talks of in 30 Rock (or that Seinfeld touched on in an episode). Or does the abundance of confidence have an infectious quality, and like Jedi Knights, if they tell us we think they're good looking, we agree?

I'm not talking vanity, just actually being so good looking and knowing it, like it's a fact as if you were tall. If you were 6'6, you'd know where to stand in the class photo, as a matter of common sense. Do the truly beautiful of this world know it as a fact and the world is in general consensus?

Of course, everybody can make themselves look their best, and everyone has moments of beauty. Usually that comes with youth, but not always. Some people rock their looks as they age. I love the juxtaposition of the young awkward teen George Clooney and the current heartthrob Clooney (on the meme with the words: Never give up. Someday it will all fall into place!") and for those with teens at that hideously self-conscious age, I'd blow it up and plaster it to the wall (but the teen probably thinks the after shot is equally unattractive so maybe there's no point)

I once went on holidays and became friends with a Japanese woman. There was a Japanese staff member who was incredibly good looking and every Aussie female would go giggly, falling all over themselves to flirt with him, however he didn't get the same reaction from the Japanese. And he knew it. He played up to the attention of the Aussies and French, but was merely civil to the Japanese. I asked my new friend if he was good looking. She said "No, only so-so". Apparently the perplexing behaviour of the women had been a great topic of conversation at the Japanese tables most nights.

Imagine what it must be like to be an Exceedingly Handsome Man all your life and then go somewhere where your looks are not recognised? (I guess for the majority that place may be middle age). Or the wake up when you go to somewhere where people are overwhelmed by your good looks to the point of stupidity, when you've grown up and accepted you're not very attractive to look at to the majority of your peers?

Humans are very strange beasts, and a lot of our concerns are in our own heads, and in those awkward teen years, they're often based on very superficial concepts. Is there a way to detour that? Can we create Exceedingly Handsome Guys & Gals? Do the Exceedingly Handsome people still flay themselves with self doubt and low self esteem?

I have just been informed that my friend's very beautiful, tall, slendor, leggy blonde daughter has developed an eating and self harming disorder. She's been traditionally good looking all along - I understand this disorder is not really related to appearance, but even so, she must not see herself as she actually is. It terrifies me.

I have no answers.  It is only skin deep, but we put so much thought and emotion into it from a very early age. Then we spend the rest of our lives telling those we love not to worry about it. And we do love them more than life itself, and we wish they could see their beauty through our eyes.


Unfortunately, I think you have to be a certain age and level of world weary before you understand.


Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it.

CONFUCIUS