Steve63130

Go for it, Pumpcat. Just go do it and report back. That's your homework assignment for this week! LOL Steve

Pumpcat and Histiletto, Both of those posts are excellent and bring up good points. If you can't or won't change your gender, then change your mindset and stop worrying about rigid social protocols. Get out there and start changing the scenery. It didn't suddenly become acceptable for guys to wear earrings. Enough guys started to wear them so that it became so commonplace that we now accept it like it's no big deal. But it took 20 years, one ear at a time! Heeling today is where earrings on guys were in 1992. Fashions DO change over time. We have to push them in the direction we want. That's what the earring guys did and the women who wanted to wear pants. I'm not changing my gender but I want society to change its perception of what males can wear, and it will, eventually. Steve

Pumpcat, sounds like an opportunity to develop a new friendship there. She may be a woman who is passionate about shoes. Engage her in more conversation? Buy her a flower? Go for coffee? Steve

Kneehighs, you're exactly right (as usual!). I've always thought that guys can wear thicker heels and platforms quite easily, and those boots are a perfect example. Good job, indeed, Mr. X. Steve

Stiletto2004, You were lucky to get those boots as cheaply as you did. They cost me $115. I suggested to my wife that we go to Payless so I could try them on, as you and another person we both know from another forum, both recommended those Marcie boots very highly. So we did that last Thursday, and although the boots cost me $40, the TWO PAIR that my wife bought for herself cost another $75! It was an expensive outing (but she did get nice boots, I admit!). So stop being such a bad influence on me, dude! LOL Steve

Me, too! Steve

It's a waste of time and energy to wish for something that didn't happen. If you were born male, and you aren't willing or able to get a sex change operation, then the best course is just to be happy with your gender, and wear whatever you want. If you want to wear heels, do it. If you want to wear tights, leggings, pantyhose, or stockings, do it. If you want to wear skirts, do it. There are lots of guys here who will tell you from experience that most people don't notice, some do, almost nobody cares, some will point it out to others, and teenage girls will giggle. So try it and see for yourself. We fret about a lot of things we can't or won't change, but the whole reason for the existence of this forum is to help each other change the things we CAN change. We CAN wear heels. As guys. Do it, but be careful about attracting women who see you as confident and sexy! Steve

I have had women look at my pantyhose and want to touch it. My standard reply is, "Hey, I'll give you just 20 minutes to take your hand off my leg!" HA HA HA Steve

I got nice compliments just the other evening. We went out to supper with our neighbors, K & C who live next door. We hadn't seen them in a while so it was good to get together. We just walked to a local pub about a block away (small town) and since C is passionate about shoes and knows I am, too, she noticed my hh booties said she really liked them. I was wearing black Aerosoles "Besotted" booties - google them. They have a 3.5" heel, I think, and they were pretty thin heels for me. I'm used to thicker ones. But she loved them and told me so, and during the course of the evening repeated herself a couple more times! It was great to hear compliments from her, and I'm glad my wife heard them too. Steve

I agree with you about JCP's pants, at least in women's pants and jeans. I'm much bigger in the waist than you are, and I also find JCP stuff that fits me well. Target is another place that I have success with. Steve

Hey, great to see you posting again. We thought you went behind the moon! Welcome back. Nice shoes, all! Steve

Hey, welcome back. Good to see you posting again. Do what you need to do to feel comfortable and keep your job secure. And do what you want on your own time, with your wife's support. Mainly, have fun and don't get hurt! Post more often! Steve

... But the guys I've seen who don't hide the footwear have seemed to be the ones having a better time.

Perhaps, but I tend to wear longish bootcut jeans and slacks and I'm still having a great time. I do it because my wife likes it better, and if that's all it takes to get her support, I'm sure not gonna argue! So I don't know whether what you're saying is generally true or not, but for me, I hide the footwear a bit and still enjoy the experience of wearing, because I do it for the feeling, not necessarily the fashion or appearance.

Steve

Great milestone! Thanks for sharing. Good luck on getting more fashionable outfits. Steve

You've inspired me to get serious about shedding a few pounds. I don't do soda pop, but I do too many chips and snacks. I can do better on portion control, too. All three boots are great, but I think getting the ones that your wife likes best is the best choice, no matter what YOU think! If she's happy, you will be too. If she isn't...well, don't even go there! Good luck. Post some pics when you get the boots, and show us where your pot belly isn't any more! lol Steve

I hypothesize that those styles are promoted by the hosiery companies around the world to accelerate their business. I would think a person wearing those shoes with spikes would easily destroy any nylon hosiery/tights/stockings worn with them. It would be easy to get them snagged and poof, there goes another pair of hose into the bin! LOL Steve

Heelster, Car pooling is very possible. Just let me know, even at the last minute. If we go, we're driving, so we can pick you up. I'm pretty sure my wife will join me, unless she gets a better offer (how would THAT be possible? LOL). Steve

HHboots, I agree. Thighbootguy always said to look at yourself in the mirror before you go out in public to make sure you're happy with the image you present. In skinny jeans and stilettos, I would double up with laughter! Just not my style! Steve

Matt, Great progress! You've really gained a lot of confidence, and I'm glad you got it from this community. It's a great group of friends here. It's helped me, too. Thanks for sharing your story. Steve

Sorry you didn't have time to stop by and visit. Hopefully next time, and bring your lovely wife! Steve

My wife was talking about going back there to visit again. We'll let you know. Steve

I'm a maybe, but a definite maybe! LOL Would love to go. Chicago is about a 7 hour ride from here, but it could work out. I'll do my best to be there. Steve

Actually, it's a good thing you missed Halloween. If you wear heels then, nobody would take you seriously afterward - they'd think it was just a costume and a one-time prank. Wearing heels when it ISN'T Halloween sends the message that you're serious about it and have the confidence and guts to do it. And yes, learning to walk elegantly in heels is extremely important, both to bolster your own confidence and to impress others. If you walk like a teenager in her first heels, you're not going to catch any fish. Steve

See post #67 in the thread "Anyone Too Scared to Wear Heels Outside?" I won't post it again here, but it's worth the read. Steve

Thanks to a post on this forum (but I've forgotten who posted it), I've been reading an interesting book on popular psychology called “You Are Not So Smart,” by David McRaney (Dutton, New York, 2011), which dispels a number of myths about the way people think. The following chapter is particularly relevant to those who wear or want to wear heels in public and nervously think everyone notices. As you will read, they don't.

Chapter 29 (page 162)

The Spotlight Effect

You spill a drink at a party. You get a mustard stain on your shirt. Your forehead is breaking out on the day you have to do a presentation. Oh no. What will people think? Chances are, they won't think anything. Most people won't notice at all, and if they do, they'll probably disregard and forget your imperfections and faux pas within seconds.

You lose some weight, buy a new pair of pants, and strut through doors expecting some sort of acknowledgment. Perhaps you get a new haircut, or buy a new watch. You spend an extra fifteen minutes in front of the mirror expecting the world to notice. You spend so much time thinking about your own body, your own thoughts and behaviors, you begin to think other people must be noticing too. The research says they aren't, at least not nearly as much as you are.

When in a group or public setting, you think every little nuance of your behavior is under scrutiny by everyone else. The effect is even worse if you must stand on a stage or go out with someone for the first time. You can't help but be the center of your universe, and you find it difficult to gauge just how much other people are paying attention since you are paying attention to you all the time. When you start to imagine yourself in the audience, you believe every little misstep is amplified. You are not so smart when it comes to dealing with crowds because you are too egocentric, and they are just as convinced that they are being scrutinized.

The spotlight effect was studied at Cornell in 1996 by Thomas Gilovich, who researched the degree to which people believe their actions and appearance are noticed by others. He had college students put on T-shirts featuring the smiling face of Barry Manilow and then knock on the door to a classroom where other subjects were filling out a questionnaire. When you are late to a class or to work, or walk into a crowded theater or nightclub, you feel as if all eyes are on you, judging and criticizing. These students had to shed their normal clothes for a shirt with a giant Barry Manilow head beaming back out into the world, so Gilovich hypothesized they would feel an especially strong version of the spotlight effect when they had to walk into the classroom. Each person did this, and then walked over and spoke with the researcher for a moment. The researcher then pulled up a chair and told the embarrassed subject to sit down, but right as they did they were told to stand back up and were then led out for a debriefing. They asked the subjects to estimate how many people noticed their shirt. The people wearing the embarrassing attire figured about half of the people in the room saw it and noticed how awful it was. When the researchers then asked the people in the classroom to describe the subject, about 25 percent recalled seeing Manilow. In a situation designed to draw attention, only a quarter of the observers noticed the odd clothing choice, not half. Gilovich repeated the experiment, but this time allowed the students to pick a “cool” shirt depicting Jerry Seinfeld, Bob Marley, or Martin Luther King, Jr. In this run, the estimates were the same. They thought about half the class saw their awesome shirt. Less than 10 percent did. This suggests the spotlight effect is strong for both positive and negative images of yourself, but the real world is far less likely to give a shit when you are trying to look cool. Gilovich has repeated his work on crowded New York streets, and although people felt as if a giant spotlight was shining down illuminating their tiny place in the world and all eyes were upon them, in reality, most people didn't notice them at all.

The spotlight effect leads you to believe everyone notices when you drive around town in a new, expensive car. They don't. After all, the last time you saw an awesome car, do you remember who was driving it? Do you even remember the last time you saw an awesome car? This feeling extends into other situations as well. For instance, if you are playing Rock Band or singing karaoke or doing anything else where you feel your actions are being monitored by others, you tend to believe every up and down of your performance is being cataloged and critiqued. Not so.

You will apologize or make fun of yourself in an attempt to soften the blows, but it doesn't matter. In 2001, Gilovich had subjects play a competitive video game and rate how much attention they thought their teammates and opponents were paying to their performance. He found people paid lots of attention to how they themselves were doing, but almost no attention to others. While playing, they felt like everyone else was keeping up with how good they were at the game.

Research shows people believe others see their contributions to conversation as being memorable, but they aren't. You think everyone noticed when you stumbled in your speech, but they didn't. Well, unless you drew attention to it by over-apologizing.

The next time you get a pimple on your forehead, or buy a new pair of shoes [heels! – Steve], or Tweet about how boring your day is, don't expect anyone to notice. You are not so smart or special.

_________________

Chapter 40 of the same book explores the level of attention from the point of view of the observers rather than yourself, with equally supportive results. Here is the first part of the chapter.

_________________

Chapter 40 (page 220)

Attention

Think of the last time you were in conversation at a crowded party or in a nightclub. The guy in the corner doing the running man, the girl dropping it like it's hot, the pulse of low-budget techno – it all fades into the background as you strain to hear the other person's voice and picture the trip to Ireland he or she is describing. The room is still loud, but inside your head, things have changed. When you focus your attention on one thing, everything else blurs into the periphery.

In science fiction movies like Minority Report and Strange Days people's memories are played back for others, and they are usually depicted as short films. The way the camera captures the action is the way memories are played back, but this isn't how you see and remember the scenes in your life. You tune out sounds all the time at work, in a city, watching television, turning down the volume on what you aren't interested in – but you don't notice it as much when you do it visually. When you single out one voice among many, the rest of what is happening is not only getting turned down; most of it is also slipping through your mind without clinging to memory. You accept this easily when it comes to sound, but the same thing happens with the information coming through your eyeballs. The things you pay attention to create your moment-to-moment perception of reality. Everything else is lost or blurred.

Not only do you see only what you're focused on, over time you can become so accustomed to seeing familiar environments, everything blends into the background. Where are those damned keys at? You left them right here, didn't you? Oh, man. You're running late. How can you lose your keys in your own house? No doubt, you've lost your purse, wallet, phone – something – and then found it sitting in plain sight. You go on a scavenger hunt among your own possessions wondering why your IQ has dropped thirty points.

Psychologists call missing information in plain sight inattentional blindness. You believe with confidence your eyes capture everything before them and your memories are recorded versions of those captured images. The truth, though, is you see only a small portion of your environment at any one moment. Your attention is like a spotlight, and only the illuminated portions of the world appear in your perception.

Psychologists Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris demonstrated this in 1999. They had students divide into two teams and pass a basketball back and forth. Half wore white shirts, and the others wore black. Simons and Chabris recorded a video of the action and then showed it to subjects in the lab. Before the video began, they asked people to count while watching it how many times the ball was passed from one person to another. If you want to try it yourself, they put the video online at www.theinvisiblegorilla.com. You should check it out right now before reading on if you don't want me to spoil the experiment for you. Most people had no problem getting the answer as they stared intensely, hardly blinking. The researchers then asked the subjects if they noticed anything unusual during the action. Most people said they didn't. What the subjects failed to notice was a woman in a gorilla suit who walked into the middle of the players and waved at the camera before casually strolling out of the frame. When people were asked what they could recall, they could describe the background, the appearance of the players, the intensity of the action, but about half missed the gorilla.

Simons and Chabris showed tunnel vision is a fact of life – it is your default setting. In their research, they point out how easy it is to miss people you recognize in a movie theater as you scan for a seat, or how often you fail to notice when someone gets a new haircut. Your perception is built out of what you attend to. In the gorilla experiment, people are more likely to see the bizarre intruder if they are just allowed to watch the video without expectation, but it doesn't guarantee they will see it. Your vision narrows to a keyhole view of the world when you are focused, but it doesn't widen to take in everything when you are relaxed. You are usually ignoring the periphery or thinking about something else. When you end up in the closet wondering why you walked in there, you stand there and blink like a sleepwalker who just awoke because in many ways, this is what you are when the spell of your attention breaks.

The problem with inattentional blindness is not that it happens so often, it's that you don't believe it happens. Instead believe you see the whole world in front of you. In any event where eyewitnesses or close inspection are key, your tendency to believe you have perfect perception and recall leads to mistakes in judgment of your own mind and the minds of others. Human eyes aren't video cameras, and the memories formed aren't videos.

________________

I hope both of these excerpts help guys who are nervous about going out into the world wearing heels. They underscore what many of us have found out by doing it: most people don't notice. We're so wrapped up in ourselves, we just THINK they do. We are not so smart.

Steve