Beauty

Ok, so I have a confession. I have a bit of an obsession with the TLC show "What Not to Wear". Something about seeing people wearing clothes that just are not good for them transformed into these beautiful people by different clothes, hair and make-up just tugs at my heartstrings a little. I hadn't seen the show in awhile, so tonight was a bit weird to see how my viewpoints have been altered by my faith.

After a marathon session tonight with my Mom, I got to thinking, why do all these women have insecurity issues? There seems to be one of two extremes on the show: either a woman will dress bland and frumpy in order to hide any perceived body issues (legitimate or not), or she will dress very revealingly in order to attract attention because any sort of attention is good attention for her. It makes me sad. As I was talking to my Mom about it after we started talking about how women get so down on themselves. They don't think they're pretty, they don't think they will be desirable.

I know that I definitely had struggles with that. I've always thought that I wasn't pretty enough, or that I needed to go above and beyond what other girls would do in order for a boy to want to be with me. Now I've met the man I'm pretty sure God personally picked for me (we'll just call him J), and he helps remind me that I am loved for who I am, not what I do or how I look. I won't lie, I still struggle with it. I still have a hard time believing that J finds me attractive and loves the way I look BECAUSE it's part of who I am. So I'm working on it.

So as I talked with my Mom, I said "We need to do things for the glory of God. We can't compare ourselves to other women, we need to take care of ourselves because then we are taking care of what God created."

The most beautiful women I know (in real life) are the ones that are totally sold out to God. They don't think about how they look (or rarely). They take care of themselves, but they don't spend every second worrying about if they look OK. They just live, and they have a bit of a sparkle in their eyes which no amount of cosmetics can get you. I did a youth camp with some of these women last summer and we spent hours going over with those girls the idea of inner beauty. A couple of the verses that we used, that would be a good reminder for me, are:

^"Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, 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 adorn themselves..." 1 Peter 3: 3-5

and all of Proverbs 31, which is long, but it's awesome so you all should go read it!