In his classic book Psycho-Cybernetics, plastic surgeon Maxwell Maltz wrote that many of his patients were not helped by his surgery because what was getting in their way of happiness was "more than skin deep."
It was as if personality itself had a "face." . . . If it remained scarred, distorted, "ugly," or inferior, the person himself acted out this role in his behavior regardless of the changes in physcial appearance. If this "face of personality" could be reconstructed, if old emotional scars could be removed; then the person himself changed, even without facial plastic surgery. Once I began to explore this area, I found more and more phenomena which confirmed the fact that ‘self-image’, the individual’s mental and spiritual picture of himself, is the real key to personality and behavior. ...
Dr. Maltz explained why he changed his professional direction.
These observations led me into a new career. ...I became convinced that the people who consult a plastic surgeon need more than surgery and that some of them do not need