Dear Beautiful

Dear Beautiful,

I see you walking down the street, head down, holding your bag close to your chest hoping no one notices you. I see you, and you’re so beautiful.

You're not wearing the latest fashion trend and you may feel that you need to shed a few pounds. You might even hint that you’re a tad bit different. I don’t care. You have your own thing going on and its awesome.

Do you see it? I do. You're kind and strong and love others. As you were helping that pregnant woman pick up her belongings she dropped, I caught a compassionate spirit through your eyes. I can tell you may not know it, or someone may have told you that you’re not, but you are beautiful.

You are. Seriously, you’re beautiful. 

You didn’t boast and you didn’t want the credit. You were happy to help her. You have the real stuff, the real beauty. But your shoulders slouch and you head hangs low. Why, beautiful?

Real beauty comes from a heart filled with integrity, compassion, selflessness, and grace. You’ve got that. I noticed it. And don’t allow anyone to tell you differently. Don’t allow another’s opinion of beauty control or sway who you are or what you think beauty is. Your voice is important. 

Speak life. Live boldly, aggressively, and confidently. You are beautiful.

Beauty is not just a word or possession. It’s who you are. It’s your heart within your delicately designed soul.

Beauty doesn’t come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles or fine clothes and jewelry. Rather, it comes from your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit. God loves you for that and he is so pleased. 

Your clothes don’t define you. Your career doesn’t define you. The number on the scale doesn’t define you. Even your loved one’s opinion of who you are doesn’t define you. The most beautiful people I know are those who have known pain, known struggle, known defeat, known loss, and have still found a way out of the depths. There is a beauty in the chipped, the charred, the rough around the edges. There is beauty in the trying, the failing, the falling, and the crying. These beautiful women have an appreciation, sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with kindness, tenderness, and a deep loving concern.

Don’t allow defeat outweigh the beauty that comes with triumph. Beautiful people do not just happen. Beauty glows from the process of letting go of excess and excuses, in the losing and the grieving and the starting from the beginning.

Beautiful, you are not a mistake and you’re not a problem to be solved. I don’t care how many times you’ve been told that. However, you won’t discover this truth until you are willing to stop punishing and fearing yourself. You are ridiculously amazing. Love yourself and give yourself a break. 

Don’t underestimate your talent, purpose, possibility, strength, or love.

Nothing gets accomplished with doubt lingering over every step you take. Walk tall, shoulders back, face up, and the biggest smile you can muster. And don’t you dare, for one more second, surround yourself with people who are not aware of the greatness that you are.

It’s a beautiful thing when women use their voices, laughter, and gifts to encourage and cheer on one another because they know they’re peers are beautiful. Find those people and keep them close.

You are beautiful. Life is beautiful. Today is the day to be your best self, your most beautiful self - the one you were created to be.

Love,

From one beautiful woman to another