Hey no prob!

I went on a bit of a random rabbit hole to end up in this thread, and well basically I am autistic and love data dumping lol.

My ... second highest voted comment on lemmy is, oddly enough, a kind of similar data dump about a sinilar topic, I basically just copy pasted the relevant partss, editied it a bit.

It was... commentary on a pic of... a very tall, 6'9" woman... I think a Scandanavian Olympic athlete or something? Contrasted with a 5'4" dude... whom I dubbed 'short king'.

Anyway, yeah, I get what you mean, that its... relatable, but isn't something you hold to be super important, personally.

I tried to use a balance between .... statistically precise language, to not say something that it technically untrue, or not actually present in the study, but... also be generally readable.

The stats deal with means, averages, trends... there will always be variance, and, probably just that you are on lemmy means you cared enough to find the platform, which probably means you are more thoughtful than most.

I of course completely agree that such things as a person's actual personality and their financial situation are more important when considering a long term, monogamous partner... but, not everybody is actually looking for that.

... often people have absolutely no idea what they are looking for, lol.

It... does sound like you do have some self-esteem issues, which is... not fun.

I've been there, but in a different way, as well, I'm a guy, so... not the same set of social rules/guidelines for judgement, expectations.

I can tell you that if you just straight up said 'You don't need to be super tall, I'm just looking for a decent person', on a profile or on a first date or something, well at this point, so many dudes are used to the 6 foot tall 6 figure salary thing just being 'the bare minimum', and most guys do tend to assume (for broadly statistically valid reasons), that tall women are just de facto out of their league... that you would seem immensely reasonable.

But... there's of course more to self-esteem than... your ability to attract a mate, feel desired, etc.

Something that helps me with self-esteem is basically just trying to do something that will be good for myself in the long run, no matter how small, but try to do something like that every day... and then tell yourself that you are proud of yourseld for being responsible, defining yourself.

Maybe that's a bit of regular excercise, maybe its developing some skill or working on a project, maybe its learning how to make some meal you normally buy... yourself, at home, maybe its just setting aside some savings or double checking your budget.

To a certain extent, its 'fuck other people, actually'... most people these days are just lying to themselves or others about how awesome they are, in some way.

Thats not real self-esteem, thats projection to mask insecurity.

So you're further along than that, if you actually just... know how you really feel about yourself, and can be honest with yourself about it.

I may be rambling at this point, but what I am trying to say is:

Be your own source of self confidence. Define your own sense of what being a good or accomplished person is, and take realistic, actionable, small steps toward that. Cut out of your life people who are constantly judging you and pressuring you for things that are ultimately superficial. Always remember that social media is usually, 99% of the time, people trying (and quite often lying) their hardest to convince you how awesome they are.

I can't promise that that'll all make you some kind of supermodel heartthrob, but I can say that it has a decent chance of resulting in you being able to just feel ok or even good about the person you are and body you have.