The Heightist

Emperically, yes and no.

Its all a matter of perspective. How tall do you want to be? 6’0″? 6’6″? 7’0″? Would an extra inch or two change your life dramatically? Would you be happier if you were taller than your friends and colleagues?

Plenty of short people have gone on to achieve tremendous things in their professional as well as personal lives. Plenty of tall men I know are major idiots.

As a society, we place a greater emphasis on physical characteristics than intellectual ones, and that is the primary cause for all the insecurity and poor personal image bred out of a short stature. We laud our kids when they win the football trophy, heap accolades on our sports stars. Despite the fact that the 21st century world revolves entirely along intellectual lines, we continue to place a premium on good looks and strong physical characteristics.

In the end, being tall boils down to the perception of leadership. Taller men are perceived as more commanding than shorter men. Studies have regularly shown that random people will pick the tallest one from a group as being the most commanding, even though in reality, he might be way inferior in rank. The honor guards in most militaries around the world regularly induct only the tallest of troops – the average height of the honor guard in the Chinese army is almost 6’3″ – quite a handful for a nation where average height is still 5’6-8″ for males.

Because of the perceptions that have been built up by our society, shorter men tend to feel inadequate and insecure, even if they have superior abilities. Of course, its all a matter of confidence in the end; if you’re confident about yourself, there’s little chance you’ll be too concerned about how tall you look.

The question then is, how short is too short?

Honestly, its a matter of personal opinion. To some, 5’6″ is okay, to others, even 6’0″ appears short. But yes, if you’re a male and you fall under the 5’6″ category, then you’ll be battling deep stereotypes against your height throughout your life. For women, 5’1″ would be an appropriate “shortness” limit.

Ask yourself: how much of a difference could a couple of inches make in your own personal perception and your confidence?

If you’re 5’4″, a couple of inches could do a world of good by pushing you from “short” to “below average” category. If you’re 5’6″, a couple of inches could take you from “below average” to “average” category. If you’re 5’11″, though, the extra 2 inches won’t make much of a difference in your life and you’re better off doing more constructive things with your time.

The bottomline: its your height, its your perception. There’s no such thing as too tall or too short. But since we’re living in a society that has deep prejudices against “shortness”, you’ll be swimming against the tide if you fall into the short category. Despite what every feel-good-guide and your own common sense will tell you, your height, unfortunately, does matter in our society.