Women, in a man's esteem, what balance between body and mind would you like?

I’m going with 25%looks/75%mind (which I think is the same as personality).

It’s super awesome that my guy thinks I’m hot. But one day I’ll be old and saggy and wrinkly, and the hotness will be a thing of the past. It’s even more awesome that he thinks I’m smart and witty and good to be around. Hopefully, that will never change and we can intelligently and wittily reminisce about the good ol’ days when I was hot. :)

This is an excellent question. What an interesting contradiction.

I think perhaps creating a ratio is missing the point: it forces a lover’s appreciation of a woman to be zero-sum. Really, I think there is room to be appreciated on all fronts without sacrificing the others.

But I’m not sure. I’m looking forward to reading other answers.

Since I think my intelligence, my heart and my sense of humor are my biggest “assets,” I’d be foolish not to want them to count most. However, since I think my looks are certainly acceptable, I would think any man who loved me for myself would also find my looks attractive and I would enjoy getting compliments on them as well as my more important attributes. Ratio? 80/20 perhaps.

I have never wanted to be complimented on my looks. It is, on a smaller scale, like being complimented if you are celebrity. There is no way to know if it is real.

Men, biologically, like women’s looks. The penis’o’meter boings when a woman, any woman walks by. Knowing that, it is a little hard to take compliments seriously.

That said, if someone says something to me that is very specific a la, “You have beautiful eyes. love the way the gold and green flecks make them look different colors on different days,” then I treasure it.

@daloon Wow – you obviously hit on something with this question. Lots of activity.

I’d never have enough interest in someone I suspected was with me more for my looks. Ha ha- a better way to put it is my looks have never yet afforded me that choice. Anyhoo, I most like a partner who is genuinely into me enough to where I magically transform in their eyes and they start to think my looks are just right for them and they start finding all kinds of neat little things they like about the package that adds to the experience of the contents.

Yes, I want my man to be physically attracted to me enough so I am assured he isn’t squinching up his eyes when we’re doing “it” and pretending he’s with someone else in order to get off. I don’t want to question if he’s got an inner turmoil going on about how great he thinks I am but there’s “something” missing in our chemistry.

I want to be liked, respected and valued for the efforts I make in how I care for my partner, for building our relationship and how I treat others. I want my partner to take notice of the romantic (I try) gestures I enjoy to make or share. I want my partner to acknowledge, value and not be threatened by my occasional hyperfocus on things I may think will benefit us both (or people we care for) in the bigger play of things. Above all, I want my partner secure in how I see them and think of them, their value and importance to me.

I can’t give a ratio to this :(

Ideally, heart & soul would equal 100% with looks a bonus 50! is that cheating?

because i like to think of myself as being somewhat more intellectual i like to be appreciated for my mind but i also like hearing that someone finds me physically attractive.

I guess my ration would be a 35% body, 65% mind.

I think people in general like to be noticed for all of their key points and not just one thing. Or the first thing that comes to mind. Part of it also has to do with the ego. Everyone likes a compliment. it makes you feel good about yourself. For me I don’t like shallow people. People being with someone mostly based on their looks is much to superficial to tolerate.

That’s like people say the “hot” people are crazy or egotistical because they never have to work for anything. why tolerate that? to look at something pretty for a little while before you’re fed up?

but i think that’s something that tends to separate women more so then men. Many people can look at different couples and if a so-so guy is with a hot girl it’s not really a big deal. but switch it around and have a hot guy with a so-so girl many wonder why is he with her? couldn’t he get someone prettier? i think women are less worried about the outside package.

I never took it as much of a compliment when a man commented on my looks. I have nothing to do with my DNA. I also hate compliments about simple things, as if it is so hard to, for example, pass a test. I guess I just hate compliments.

I want someone to appreciate me, good and bad. It’s not about esteem, but about understanding. My wife tells me I’m beautiful when I haven’t showered for days, and tells me how great I am when I fail. That’s what I want.

My partner must be inspired by my intelligence and personality above all else – I get a lot of compliments on the looks anyway..it’s all irrelevant and therefore the person that I have chosen to spend the rest of my life with has to want me for more than just looks…that being said, obviously, I want him to be attracted to me physically as well…So maybe 90%/10%

Sorry to say this but generally a womans shelf life is shorter than that of a man when it comes to looks. A woman is rarely ever the same again physically after having kids, plus I don’t know anywhere near as many guys who like older sexy women than women who like older sexy men. Guys tend to go for younger women given a choice, as they are closer to their physical primes.

Personality should always come first as good looks are usually temporary (relatively speaking). Of course it’s great to have a physical attraction and to be sexually compatible too, but when you’re both old and frail it will be the personality match that keeps you happy together, probably not your sex life or physical attraction to each other.

35% looks, 65% personality and intelligence, maybe even 40/60. I want to be appreciated for the whole package, not just one or the other. If either facet of attraction and intrigue isn’t there, he’s not going to stick around for too long. Personally, I am more confident in my mind, for the most part, and I have many more insecurities about my body, so hearing those compliments is appreciated when they are sincere and from someone who really cares, rather than the random guy passing by on the street.

A compliment on looks is sweet but It doesn’t make a girl heart go a flutter like a compliment on her sense of humor or her intelligence. They seem more personal than looks. A lot girls got a nice butt or pretty eyes but only you have your sense of style or/and talent. 2 other things about looks are 1) they don’t last and 2)when you are attracted to someone because of personality- they become cute to you and yet there are a lot of good-looking ugly people are there who seemly could curl milk on sight once you get to know them

I don’t feel like I’m responsible for my intelligence any more than I’m responsible for my looks. They’re both qualities I was given, not something I earned.

@nikipedia But you became educated through your own hard work.

@nikipedia First, it’s not a zero sum game. It’s merely distributing the relative importance of each in relation to the other. You can be as beautify and as intelligent as you want to be, but there is still a relationship between you and your attributes and how you want to be liked. You could say 100% looks and 100% brains, and that would still equal a 50/50 split.

Regarding intelligence, assuming there is such a thing, @tinyfaery‘s point is spot on. Genes are potential. How they are expressed depends on environmental factors; some of which you are responsible for. You could have a huge potential for thinking complex thoughts, or creative thoughts, or whatever, But if you don’t put in the work to develop your skills, that potential is meaningless.

Funny, you sound like me. I hope you’re not depressed. I hate to break it to you honey, but you get to claim credit for what and who you’ve become. Sorry. It ain’t just anyone who can become a brain scientist, and genes alone will not get you there.

This is a really hard question, I have started to answer it about 27 different ways and then when I think about the answer, I think, well that’s not quite right.

I want my mate to find me attractive physically. And I must say at first my answer was going to be as you discerned your feminist friends to be, you better love me for my essence not my looks. But then I had to admit that I must be physically attracted to my mate of it would not be a comfortable fit, at least I don’t think so.

But of course, your heads have to meet as well. I couldn’t be with anyone whose basic ideas on life and compassion were not at least similar to mine. I don’t mean we have to have the same opinion on the death penalty, I think I mean we have to have think similarly about things that relate directly to us and our life.

So wow, could it possibly be 50 50 for me. I don’t think I like that I might feel that way.

I can say though if I had to sacrifice ground in one area, it would be in the looks or physical attraction department, especially at our ages. The skin doesn’t fit as well as it used to on either of us, heheheh. So maybe we should make that 20 to 30 for looks and 70 to 80 on minds.

Very good question @daloon.

I am very curious how you would answer this yoursel (I don’t mean in how you perceive women – I mean what of you do you want a woman to be attracted to????? You should pose this question to men as well, I wonder how the answers would differ)

I was also thinking that the reason why feminists wanted the ‘compliments’ to stop was not necessarily because women don’t want compliments (all people do)...but it was because compliments on look was the only thing discussed about women…

I would want men to first be attracted to me because of my looks but not automatically assume that I have no brains. I would hope he doesn’t think a woman either has one or the other.

Ok. I asked the question. Do you think men will answer it? If we get more than a handful of real answers (not jokes), I’d be very surprised. This goes against “the man code,” such as it is.

But to answer @rooeytoo‘s question—I would want to be attractive to women because of my sexual attractiveness. Just like evolutionary biologists would predict. I would hardly care if they are attracted to my mind. How shallow is that? Anyway, 85% physical, 15% intellectual.

In reality, I think my attraction is the opposite—90 to 95% intellectual, and only 5 to 10% physical. What I’ve found is that if women like my mind, then they tend to like my body more. Then again, what would I know? It’s not like women run around blurting out every thought they have about how men look.

When I discovered that a good mind was a turn-on, I was somewhat comforted, but I didn’t really believe it for a long time. However, I knew, from early on, that if I was going to attract a woman, it would be through my mind, so that was an incentive to try to understand how to please women. Even so, it was problematic, because in order to show a woman my mind, I had to talk to her, and if I asked her out and she said no (probably, I believed, because I wasn’t attractive enough), I had no way to attract her. The internet makes it much easier to find people to listen to you. No dating required!

This reminds me of the way I pursued the women I had long term relationships with. I remember so many conversations about philosophy and religion and politics and the meaning of life and such. We would write long letters to each other (except, oddly enough, my wife, who I met doing something physical, not mental). It had to be all about minds because I didn’t want to insult a woman by commenting about her body.

When a woman turned out to like me, I think I was generally somewhat surprised. My lack of confidence in my body extended to my mind. After a while, this lack of confidence got built in. In all aspects of life. I would take jobs with lower pay and fewer responsibilities because I didn’t believe that I really had much to offer—mindwise. I justified it because I was doing good work (fighting the good fight), but I secretly felt that this was the best I could do. People would tell me that I held the place together, but if so, that didn’t stop me from being laid off, so I never believed that claim, even though I secretly thought it was true.

I guess I never got recognized—not as a child and not at work. When I finally did get recognized by my boss, at my current job, I couldn’t believe it. I was proud of it for a month or two, but after that, my doubts returned. I believed I was doing a good job. I just didn’t believe anyone else thought that.

I never trusted my mind as being something anyone would value. I had never been told it was interesting or attractive in my life. The best I had gotten was no criticism. I looked around, and it seemed to me that it was the hot guys and the bad guys who women were attracted to. The bad-asses. Like my avatar. A wishful symbol for me—ironic and secret.

Having learned all that I learned in my life about what women like in me, my answer remains the same. I want to have a magnetic physical presence that makes women swoon. I want women to be attracted to me because of that. Never mind that my mind works far better than I could have imagined. I still want to be a hunk.

This is a difficult question, although it seems so simple on the surface. As far as evolution goes, looks show how healthy and fertile you are, so they are quite important in that way. Now, the way someone looks implies much more, including wealth, intellect, and self-respect. I can’t help but make assumptions about people based on how they look and dress, as much as I like to think I judge people only on their personalities. And I also can’t help be concerned about how I look, even though I consider my personally much more important.

I think I pretty much agree with @Likeradar with the 25% body/75% mind ratio. Let’s put it this way: I’m glad my boyfriend thinks I’m sexually attractive, but I’m much more satisfied that he fell in love with my personality and not my looks. I feel disgusted with men who make comments like “Daaammmnnn, she’s hot!” because it feels demeaning, but at the same time I am both embarrassed and disappointed when someone makes negative comments about my looks.

There are things about my body that I would want to change, I suppose, to make myself more attractive. But I’m glad I wasn’t born “too ugly” or “too beautiful” since I can be pretty confident that when people like me, it’s mainly because of my personality.

I want to look good for people because it shows that I care about myself, but I most likely won’t respond to people who immediately respond to my looks alone. I’ve never been deeply interested in someone based solely on looks, and I’ve never developed feelings for someone until I know them well as a friend, so I guess that’s what I want men to feel about me, too.

I don’t know if this answers your question, but it’s the best I can do for you at the moment. :)

@daloon – You are a most interesting person. There is an AA speaker I truly love to hear and he says, he “analyses spaghetti.” Meaning that he never takes anything at face value. He is a physician and he says it is his best and yet most troublesome character trait. I sort of have the same problem which is why I spend a lot of time in gray areas, I analyze so deeply, it is difficult to ever come to an absolute conclusion. I think you are probably in a similar category as well. I am not sure if this outlook insures that our lives are forever more complicated than they have to be or if we are the ones who see life as it really is, and it isn’t ever simple!

I too would like to be the ideal image of what society or biology deems a woman should be, a willowy 5’7” with thick wavy blond hair. I would keep the mind I have. The thing is I realized that if I were as described above, I would never have become the me that I am and I really pretty much like me (even though there are many others, mostly male, who would prefer the pliable personality of someone who went through life without a struggle).

I think you give very honest answers about what goes on in your male head. I don’t think you speak for all males, anymore than I speak for all females. But it is not very often that I have met men, even in groups, who search as deeply inside for answers as you do. It is always good to hear what you say even if it occasionally pisses me off!

Thanks for sharing

@rooeytoo Thank you (I think). I can understand the “analysis spaghetti,” but I’m also a statistician, so I understand that there is no perfect understanding of anything, and anyone who says there is is deluded (or ignorant). It’s good to be able to distinguish between shades of gray, and when you do make a decision, it is on the basis of likelihoods, not certainties (which don’t exist). So I don’t think our lives are more complicated than they have to be. I think the notion that there is a simple, straight-forward life is a cozy fantasy we create when we want to think life won’t always be so complicated. No one sees life as it really is, I don’t believe, but those of us who know it is complex have an advantage over those who want to draw pictures with a paint brush and one color of paint.

Now if I was a gorgeous hunk of a man—sure, I probably wouldn’t have developed my mind as much as I have. I surely wouldn’t be this whiny, sniveling, feeble character I portray myself as (fortunately, today, I am not that person). Actually, I do believe that despite all the pain that has been given me by my fucking mind, I have a pretty strong sense of who I am and what I am about. It’s just that my failures matter a lot more when I’m depressed. In fact, I can’t see past them when I’m depressed, and even my successes look like failures.

Where you and I are different, is that I believe I would give up being an academic in a second if I could be Adonis. Or Achilles. I mean, have their bodies. I don’t want their lives.

I prickle a little bit when you discuss my “male head.” I’m not sure there are a lot of men like me. That’s part of why I want to know what it’s like to be a man’s man. As to introspection—I suspect you don’t get out all that much. There are a lot of introspective men. They flock the halls of academia. I’m not sure how you would locate one in the Outback, though.

My whole point in participating in fluther is to be able to be honest. I try to see myself from two different perspectives at the same time. One is the interior me—the person experiencing and observing my experiences. The other point of view is one where I try to look at myself as I would look at another person. I try to be that person who can pick out all the points where I seek to deceive myself. Since I do know exactly what is going on inside me, I can arrive at these points of deception rather quickly. And now, with fluther, I can expose them to see if the self-deception is real or not.

I have feared other people’s approbation all my life, but no one can get to me here. I just have to turn off the computer, and everyone is gone. So if people were to seek my head (my actual head, not my “man’s” head), and the heat got too hot, I could leave it behind. I feel lucky that I’ve managed to explain a lot of inappropriate and immoral behavior well enough that people have not yet sought my head. There’s always the possibility that their patience will wane. It could happen at any moment.

I am curious as to what has pissed you off, but maybe you’d rather tell me (if you want to tell me) in private.

I think that a lot of women would be likely to say that they are not attracted to the typically “hunky” type. Speaking for myself, I tend to go for the dorky/nerdy, really smart ones who have a sense of humor whose minds are a bit more developed than their pecs.

Well, I am not a normal chick. I have to have lots of sex, I don’t like a guy to be in shape or go to the gym, and I don’t like when guys cry. I don’t care if he’s not super smart, but as long as he’s not dumb, it’s fine.

I want to be liked for my body! I don’t give a shit what people think of my mind!

@Just_Justine you don’t mean that, do you?

@Simone_De_Beauvoir oh absolutely I do. I don’t have a need to impress with my mind. I allow thinkers to think in their own minds. As I am approaching 50 I would like to think I still got “sex appeal” why? Because I am a sexy old bint.

@Just_Justine I totally understand what you are saying. It always annoys me when people tell me they like me because I’m intelligent. Just once I’d like someone to like me because they think I’m the sexiest thing since…. uh….. Adam, I guess.

And also, you don’t get to call yourself old. You can only call yourself old when you catch up to me!