Beautiful

Recently I received a compliment that I couldn't stop thinking about. I had heard it said only once before, its just that this time it took on a whole different meaning.

My close friend Maria was kind enough to say that when I enter the room, I don't just walk in, I seem to magically float in. If you are wondering what that even means, like I did, let me explain.

About 6 years ago my uncle married a wonderful girl named Irene. She was simple, kind, and had a wonderful heart for people. Just by talking to her I often felt that I was in the presence of greatness, and I couldn't even pinpoint why. All I knew, was that everything about her was beautiful to a point that it was even hard to take my eyes off of her.

The thing is, that Irene was pretty, but it wasn't her features that made her stand out, it was something else. Watching her, I knew that there was something deeper and more powerful than her outward appearance.

I soon began to want this kind of beauty for myself. I looked for it in the bible, in the people I met, and in the prayers that I prayed. I searched for it daily and stretched myself thinly.

I think the importance was significant to me because I felt that I wasn't the most beautiful girl out there. Coming out of a long line of pristine genetics, I was aware that I had some how fallen short on the scale, and weather it was because of the world and its fictitious models, or my own interpretation of perfection. I found myself often living a life of comparison because some how Gods "perfect" did not help in making me feel like I was.

Saying that, I find it amazing that when the time came and I searched for security in my youth, God knowingly sent me a boy. Meeting Eugene, it was his compliments and flattery that became a starting ground to believing that I was created, perfectly, by God.

Even to this day I feel that Genius plays a large part in how I view myself. It was freeing to think that I no longer needed to compare myself to others.
And being the God that He is, I think He used that small bit of acceptance into strengthening me spiritually. In the years that followed, as my marriage grew, love deepened, and a faith matured, beauty looked different to me. More and more of it became less of what I looked like and more of who I was.

I realized this a couple months ago when we took family photos. As they exploded over my face book page and instagram, the feed back I received was mostly good. All but one girl, said that my updo made me look older in the photos and my reaction to her opinion, shocked me. Because instead of feeling threatened by her youth and beauty, I took hold of my age and replied that my intention was not to look younger or prettier. If I looked older, it's because I am well aware that I am aging. And that if I look like a mom, it's because I am.

For the first time in my life, I felt totally okay with that.

I now understand that on my own I am not a very good reflection. That beauty was never meant to be given, or earned, but rather beauty was intended to take the shape of the work that God is doing in my life. As for compliments, they are not supposed to help my self esteem, instead they are conformations of what god is working out in my life.

So, it's that kind of beauty that floats. It surrounds us, follows us, and takes on a different appearance. First by believing we were created perfect and then letting God complete His perfect work in us. That is nothing short of beautiful.

Floating, Hope.