"Your beauty should be that of your inner self. The unfolding beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is if great worth in God's sight."
-1 Peter 3:4
What does it mean to be beautiful anymore? I constantly ask myself, how can I be enough? How can I be…beautiful? Society says “be a barbie doll. Have that fake plastic smile along with a face that is painted on.” Because that is what beauty is. Beauty is you spending half an hour in the mirror drawing lines underneath your eyes, and on your eyelids and putting ink on your eyelashes so that we can ..“actually see them”. Beauty is having perfect hair. Beauty is going to get your imperfections "fixed" because the are not appealing to society. Beauty is wearing a certain type clothes because "everyone is wearing them." Beauty is going to the gym more than usual to get that body that is acceptable to society. Beauty is stepping on that scale and seeing the number that society tells you that you are supposed to see. If you are below that number then you are “too skinny.” And don’t you dare weigh more than that “fantastic” number or else you are “too fat.”
Do we not realize that everyone is different! Everyone is unique! Everyone is enough? Society has given us such high standards for ourselves that we begin to … believe them? And not only do we believe them but we start to… hate ourselves and envy other females? The pressure of being beautiful is over bearing. And we do all of this work to be perfect just to be told “you’re pretty but...” And then we start to ride the carousel again. We begin to re-ask the questions that we could have sworn we already answered. “How can I be enough” and “how can I be beautiful?” when in reality we ARE enough. We ARE beautiful. Beauty comes from within. Beauty is not the amount of time we waste killing ourselves in the gym or how much make up we put on our faces every day. It’s not the clothes that we wear and it’s not the type of hair that we have. It’s not what society tells us it is. Beauty is what we believe it is. Beauty is what God created and placed on this Earth. Beauty does not have a limit. Beauty does not have a scale. Beauty cannot be painted on. Beauty cannot be measured. Beauty is infinite. Beauty is within you. Beauty is in your heart. You are worth way more than what society says you are worth.God is the only one that can judge who you are.So love yourself because YOU are beautiful and YOU are enough.
"Beauty isn't about having a pretty face. It's about having a pretty mind, a pretty heart, and a pretty soul."
-Unknown.