I

t started with a swirling rumor and persistent text messages. Yep, juicy stuff coming up, people.

Some time ago former colleagues started dishing that a certain former boss had gradually, yet not so subtly, changed her appearance: Leaner, firmer, with a generous dash of youthful glimmer. Taking multiple leaves of absence, she eventually emerged looking not only younger by a few years, but by a whole couple of decades. In a mixed tone of shock and awe, the rumor mill spewed out speculation that, beyond rigorous exercises and diets, innovations from Korea were in play.

The messages originated closer to home. A dermatology clinic at a fancy Singapore address has been sending me promotional texts on aesthetic procedures. I ignored them at first and reasoned that they must'€™ve picked up my number during my frequent Singapore trips from an active cellular GPS '€” otherwise it would'€™ve felt somewhat insulting, like suggesting I had to have work done.

Then one day I decided to depart from gossip. I launched a semi-scientific exploration that included dermatologist appointments, informal patient interviews and chats with nurses and receptionists, who turned out to be quite insightful. Rather fittingly, my findings could be summed up in a mantra-like tagline: younger, faster, shorter and wider.

Younger clientele. Mature ladies make steady business, yet 20somethings are now coming for mild needs (adult acne, sunburn) and many wants (eyelid crease enhancement and breast augmentation, just to name two).

Faster procedures. While full facelifts or liposuction still need hours under general anesthesia, patients favor the less invasive methods mostly developed in Korea: less than an hour under local anesthesia. '€œLunchtime mini-lipo/lift'€ is the lingo that covers many services from eyebag removal to neck tightening and underarm slimming.

Shorter downtime. Urbanites no longer deign to disappear for a weeklong '€œspa retreat'€. Now clients want scarless bruises that heal before Friday'€™s cocktail party. The aforementioned Korean techniques conveniently offer such ease.

Wider reach. Women no longer dominate. Men, by no means limited to gays or metrosexuals, sign up for hair implants, chin tucks and, to put it descriptively, '€œmanboob'€ removal.

Many have long decried modern people'€™s vanity pursuits. Media-driven lifestyles, including social media presence, is tagged as the ultimate exacerbation of such shallowness. As active senior citizens now are on Facebook and chat apps, everyone'€™s feeling the pressure not to only do cool things, but also to look their best doing those things. Everyone sucks in their tummy or reapplies makeup before picture-taking and scrutinizes the snaps afterwards for the '€œsharing-worthy'€ one.

I think the desire to look our best was formed when cave-dwellers finally made sense of the reflections staring back at them from the water. The regimens have since run from basic grooming to fountain-of-youth-level preservation, like those peculiar potions Cleopatra reportedly religiously subscribed to. Seriously, which one of us who hasn'€™t been handed a jar of '€œtrusted'€ concoction from our grandparents that promised to make our hair bouncier, or our teeth shinier? Vanity is no monopoly of modernity.

What the recent era contributed was a shift from looking the best that we can to looking better than we should. Forget looking good for your age, now you need to look like your younger self. The 46-year-old JLo has achieved that by looking better than her 30-year-old self, or any 30something for that matter. But, strangely, while people seem to have developed expectations and applauded celebrities for accomplishing such feats, when a real 40something Jenny-from-the-block openly goes under the needle/knife, judgments rain down like from the February sky. I wonder why.

Our longer life expectancy is already turning '€œ40 is the new 30'€ catchphrase into '€œ40 is the new 20'€ lifestyle. Add the elevated pressure to be as fit and presentable as ever. Yet we refuse to accept that at this rate Spartan exercise and diet just won'€™t suffice in the long run. Many opine that since celebs live off public life they'€™re pardoned for seeking professional help to remain preternaturally preserved, while commoners, who ironically aren'€™t born with the great genes bestowed upon most celebs, should strive to age gracefully in an increasingly media-obsessed life. So strange are the contradictory circumstances we set upon ourselves that it is unclear how to tell depth from shallowness.

Can it go too far? Renee Zellweger became the latest poster girl for a frivolity borderlining on a psychological problem and I'€™m sure she won'€™t be the last. Yet tiptoeing on the ever-thinning self-restraint line is the price we all must pay for inducting selfie and please-like-my-picture buttons into our self-awareness realm. From where I'€™m standing, those who, by far, manage to tread the line, like JLo and my ex-boss, deserve equal nods.

None of the clinics I talked to released a definite number, yet from their qualitative remarks I could surmise that business is growing like collagen on 15-year-old skin. Old-moneyed Indonesians are longstanding clients and now new-moneyed Chinese, toting cash-filled satchels, fly to Singapore for tummy tucks and nose jobs. The same can be deduced for practices in Jakarta. I'€™m on the long-haul treatment for melasma (severe hyperpigmentation from years of unprotected sun exposure) and lately it'€™s hard to make my 45-minute procedure as my dermatologist is overbooked by patients scrambling for Korea'€™s latest: the V-shape, thread lift.

Nipped and tucked, in denial or not, into the deep and shallow ends of the fountain of youth we all dive.