A friend of mine works for Public Relations UK, a specialist beauty agency. He’s a very old friend of mine; we went to school together and shared one of my life changing experiences. When we were sixteen years old, we went backpacking in Cornwall together and it was my first real taste of true freedom. We wondered where we wanted to go, made our plans spontaneously, and rested our heads where ever we were when night came. It was amazing, and it gave me much of the confidence I hold as a person today.
However, since joining this PR Company, he has become more and more image conscious. We never cared what we did or how we looked, and of course that does change as you move into adult hood, however the extent to which it has happened is shocking me slightly.
Of course it is important to look presentable, especially in the work place. Someone who looks like they are doing good job is more likely to gain the respect from his colleagues and employers than someone who is working really efficiently but appears to be a big disorganised mess. My friend is taking it too far for me though. I was round his house to visit, and found him searching for ‘weight loss surgery uk’ on his computer. When I asked him about it he admitted that he has decided that he wants to have Chest Reduction surgery. What?! Chest reduction surgery? I tried talking him out of it, but he is convinced that he is too large and that he needs to loose weight. Worse than that, he is currently become unhappy as a person because of his weight. This guy has never had a weight problem, not really. Okay so he’s not the smallest of men, but he’s not fat or overweight at all.
The thing that upsets me was realising that working at this PR place has made him into an unhappy person. Before going there he was pleased with who he was and how he looked. Now he is very subtly miserable.
I am going to support him with his drive to have this surgery done. Why? Because he will be happier once he is smaller. The thing I can’t help but remembering is that the only reason he needs it, is because someone convinced him that he needs it. If he’d never thought about it in the first place, he would have been perfectly happy as he was.
