Beautiful

There is one hundred ten billion dollars in the diet and beauty industry. Billion. One hundred ten billion. Why? Because we'll buy it. We'll buy beautiful.

In my culture, "Beautiful" means "Sexy," and if I'm not "Sexy" than I must not be "Beautiful." "Sexy" is whatever Hollywood defines it as . . . on magazine covers, bill boards, tv commercials, and movies.

I don't look like the magazine covers. Chances are, you don't either.

Webster's Dictionary defines beauty as, "(1) The quality or aggregate of qualities in a person or thing that gives pleasure to the senses or pleasurably exalts the mind or spirit; loveliness (2) A beautiful person or thing; especially a beautiful woman (3) A particularly graceful, ornamental, or excellent quality."

I worked in the beauty industry as a cosmetologist. In school, I was taught what "beautiful" is suppose to look like. The only beautiful face shape is the oval. If you don't have an oval face, you're not pretty. I was taught how to create illusions to make other face shapes appear oval in order to finally be beautiful.

It's buried deep in the heart of all women. The desire to be beautiful; to be desirable.

Undoubtedly, God made me beautiful when His hands shaped me. Genesis 1:27 says, "So God created man[kind] in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." I'm made in His image. "For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well." (Psalm 139:13-14) Made wonderful. Made in His image.

But I still get sucked in to this culture's definition of beauty. Or maybe it's not really beauty, but just a facade of truly beautiful.

If only it weren't so hard to stop thinking about my outward appearance, to stop being concerned with what other people will think of me, and just be me. Be the way God made me. Be beautiful.

Proverbs says, "Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;
but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised."

I've met those women. Women who aren't always drop dead gorgeous, and who haven't made the magazine covers, but who have a beauty that doesn't fade away. They shine with something more, something deeper . . . something truly beautiful. And it's not something they bought at the drug store.

"Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful." (1 Peter 3:3-5a)

A gentle and quiet spirit. How modest. How feminine. How beautiful.

Coffee House Princess

I was sitting outside a coffee shop with a friend in the late afternoon sun. A father and his two small children walked by us. The older of the two, addressing her younger brother, said, “I am a fashion model in the mirror.” She flipped her hair, and skipped with her feet. She was probably only six or seven, but she truly understands what a princess she is. I could see it in her face, in her gestures, and in the way she danced down the sidewalk. I watched her skip by our table, and follow her father out to the car. What a shame that probably only a few years from now, she will no longer recognize what a princess she is, or how beautiful, or how very precious. She will likely be comparing herself to her friends, and trying hard to fit in whether by the clothes she's wearing, or in the activities she chooses to be involved. She will look for attention from guys, and she may hide her true self inside in the hopes that she can become what her world tells her she should be. She may go to extreme ends to have the body, and the hair, and the skin, and the abilities that are praised in movies, or on magazine covers. I will probably never see her again, or get to talk to her, but I hope she never decides she's not a beautiful princess. I hope that she only grows in her sweet preciousness that captivated me as she told her brother who she was outside that coffee shop. I hope she remains confident and sure of her beautiful femininity. And I hope that she aspires to be nothing less than the princess that she is.