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I am a 28 year old female with questionable self worth. As a younger woman I had greater value with the promise of an advantageous intelligence and an acutely symmetrical face. My face is still sitting on a relatively straight line but in allot of ways the promise of my intelligence and success is less likely than it was a few years ago when I 'had more time'. There has been this reoccurring theme in my life that I hadn't reflected on for a great deal of time until the recent media exposure of hedonistic worship in Hollywood. I was raised to believe that a woman is more valuable if she has more to offer a man than beauty and fertility. This meant that I needed to outcompete my vagina to win a good father for my children. Being a seeker of intensity I was excited by the challenge of greatness. I always wanted to be 'number one' because I believed if I was the ultimate human, I might then, potentially, be worthy of love, so long as, I didn't let 'myself' go and get fat after having kids because then, it would be my fault for making my husband leave me to raise our children alone. yeah, issues. So, this theme that has haunted my frail and costly existence is that every time I was number one at something, other than being an attractive young woman, there was always a specific ultimatum that eventually would stand between success and my efforts. The ultimatum went something like: 'you are really good at preforming in your area of interest and that makes you more sexually desirable. Are you willing to trade sexuality in exchange for equal consideration for investment opportunities? Are you willing to renounce the value you place in the knowledge you've acquired in order to utilize it? 'Equal consideration' meaning: To be judged based on the merit of my success and not sexually. Though, in reflecting retrospectively, maybe everyone is judged by their degree of attractiveness and some of us get ignored and some suffice to entice predation. Every time I attempted to live a 'moral lifestyle' (one that opposes hedonism and moral relativism) and contribute tangible value to society, I'd encounter an older male authority that would compare my potential for success to my willingness to consent to being the object of their sexual gratification. When I tried to pursue some of these people legally, I was essentially made to feel that I needed to conform to a deranged reality where I have nothing to offer but sex and if I resisted conformity the consequence would be estrangement from any related opportunity for economic growth. Eventually, I became discouraged and slipped into a further depression that was initiated by competing with Hollywoods standard of beauty. During adolescence and young adulthood men in my age demographic would viciously and remorselessly ostracize women who did not emulate supermodels and divas like Brittany Spears. I realize they had also experienced pressure from being bombarded by propagandized media promoting the worship of Hollywoods decadent and satanic culture. My point is, for a while I've been trying to see the world in a different light-calling myself a foolish 'feminist' for fearing the potential risk of being in those situations again and reasoning with myself to refrain from the generalization of the moral integrity of all men by the actions of the ones I've met in my life and I'm grateful for that. But, I see now, how being disappointed over and over by working hard to achieve greatness only to have my efforts be diminished by the desirability of my sexuality has created an incentive for me to avoid 'success'. In a way that result was to my benefit because now I'm focused on entrepreneurial pursuits rather than apprenticeship and collaboration with institutions that are already in place. In another way it's unfortunate that even when I was absolutely the most valuable and productive within a group of people focused on a universal task, acheiving the greatest understanding and command of the relative skill set wasn't enough, I still needed to be willing to do 'something' that was obviously irrelevant, empty and meaningless to me. Fortunately, I didn't sell out, the majority of the time, though, once I tried it to see what was one the other side. You guessed it, absolutely nothing was on the other side of that door, not even another door, just nothingness. I realize that men deal with this sort of thing too and it's really more about the relationship of culture between generations rather than gender. Like, baby boomers vs millennials for example. I'm not sure that the generation preceding Baby Boomers objectified them the way us 'useless' millennials are. I'm optimistic that there is an honest discussion happening about the treatment of young people in regards to respecting the sacredness of an individuals sexuality. Disregarding the impact that sexual experiences have on an individuals life, to the degree that it is formally claimed to have no affect at all, creates a culture that considers a spectacular actor to only be worthy of opportunity in exchange for ownership of their body or sexuality. In a way it appears to be some form of weirdo ritualism, like, 'are you willing to erase yourself in exchange for economic success?'. Living in our current corrupt society, where we are coerced into paying tax on dollars that have inflated beyond any tangible value, it's understandable that many would tend to conform to evil in an attempt to be 'realistic' rather than sacrificing themselves like Socrates, for moral virtues. Now, after all this time, I'm sure that ones soul is more valuable than anything material. Unless you have children? :/ Life is a tough nut to crack. I suppose, the only way to out-compete your genitals is to refrain from games of that nature: Competitions measuring a persons self worth based merely on their sexually desirable characteristics. Humility and honesty about reality is the only way we can create the world we hoped we would enter from our youth into adulthood.