I’ve learned a few things about beauty while traveling the world.
One: the concept of beauty changes in different cultures.
In Asia, for example, the whiter your skin is, the better. It is impossible to buy soap or facewash here without finding “whitening” as part of the advertisement; people walk (or ride) around covered head to toe with gloves, hats, face-masks, long sleeves, pants, socks, and umbrellas to keep the sun off of their skin, which would tan them and make them less beautiful in society’s eyes. This idea of beauty of course contrasts with America’s view, where people spend hours in the sun and hundreds of dollars in tanning beds or spray salons to get that “golden glow” that hopefully will make everyone believe you’ve spent your weekend at the beach or the pool.
Two: People from all walks of life, all cultures, and all shapes and sizes have to deal with self-image.
Those women you think are gorgeous and never have to worry about what they eat or if that dress makes them look fat or how their make-up looks because their skin is so perfect they don’t even have to wear make-up to look pretty…yes those same women worry about how they look too. I am amazed at how many tiny, petite Asian women I have met who are absolutely adorable, and yet tell me they are on a diet to lose weight, or that they wished they had skin and hair like mine. Even women on my squad who are absolutely gorgeous have admitted struggling with their self-image. What lies are they believing that tell them their body is not beautiful enough?
Awhile back my family of women here had a discussion about self-image, and we concluded that poor self-image was a spiritual attack. Satan loves it when we start comparing ourselves to others, because it causes division. He loves it when we isolate ourselves because we don’t feel good about ourselves. He loves it when we let the world’s lies cover up the truth that we are beautiful daughters of God no matter what we look like on the outside. So what if your hair is thin and scraggly? Or if your tummy bulges a little when you sit? Be confident that God doesn’t get tripped up on those details and they shouldn’t be your focus either.
Three: It’s good to desire to be beautiful when you realize what beauty really means.
Recently, I was dealing with a self-image problem. Not in the sense I’ve been talking about above though. I really am pretty comfortable with my physical body. Worrying about if my thin hair looks flat or if my legs jiggle when I walk hasn’t really affected me for some time now. My negative self-image was directed towards my attitude. I had become an ugly woman, and I knew it. Not physically, but relationally. At first, it started with complaints about little things outside of my control that I didn’t like. This later turned into full out whining, and there are few things that make a person uglier than listening to them whine. Secondly I began having a judgmental attitude towards my teammates. I kept this to myself, but eventually it started showing in my actions towards them and I would make prideful remarks and treat them without respect because I convinced myself they didn’t deserve that from me. The thing that made me the ugliest though, was my anger. Maybe movies try to make angry women look attractive, but I am sure that thought was not going through anyone on my team’s heads when I put on my “say something to me and you’ll be sorry” face. I was convinced my anger was justified for whatever reason, and so I let loose on anyone who got in my path, whether they were just an innocent by-stander or not.
I was hideous.
I hated what I looked like. Not my hair or my skin or my body, but my character. When I looked in the mirror, I had a veil of pride in front of my eyes, keeping me from seeing clearly. My pride was giving me a heavy emotional beating, and I hated that when the people I lived with looked at me, they saw those disfigurations, those scars, those bruises, and I couldn’t cover them up. I wanted to be a beautiful person, to treat people well, to show patience and selflessness, to be slow to anger, to sacrifice for others, but I literally felt helpless to change my attitude.
After reading a chapter from “The Pursuit of God”, by A.W. Tozer, I was convicted about my pride, and how ugly I had become because of it. God graciously gave me enough strength to confess and repent before Him and before my team, and after some more struggling to figure out that this process of pride-removal is a bit of a painful thing, I began to understand that I had to rely completely on God to make me beautiful. A heart change was needed, and scripture tells us it is God who gives us a new heart:
“And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” -Ezekiel 36:26
Recently, I have been asking the Lord to keep my body from rejecting this new heart He has put in me. The result has been a beauty that is far more breath-taking than a set of gorgeous eyes or a perfect smile. My actions, words, and attitudes reflect the One who lives in me and helps me to overcome any and all ugly attributes that try to creep back into my nature. I feel beautiful again. Like the image of God my Creator intended me to be.
