Our Everly Mag Writing Leaders told us about their definitions of beauty and how beauty plays a role in their life. In their responses, they think critically about who gets to define beautiful, how they can make other people feel beautiful, and about times when they feel beautiful.
This article was written by our writing leader Kathryn. Get to know our Summer 2018 Leaders here!
What is beauty? For some, beauty is creating that smoky-eye they finally perfected. For others, it is looking like the girl on their favorite magazine. Others think of beauty as the popular girl with the long hair that’s always styled. Sometimes we feel beautiful, sometimes we don’t. See that’s the thing about beauty; it’s fleeting, it’s fickle, and it’s subjective. What society thinks is “beautiful” now may not be beautiful in a few years. Maybe it won’t be beautiful in a couple of
weeks.
I will be the first to say, living of society’s standard of beauty is a difficult task. Keeping up with the pace of my personal life is a challenge without the pressure to be pretty. There are many days that I just don’t have time to plan the perfect outfit and put on the makeup that people say make you pretty. However, I always have time to be my definition of pretty. Before I started writing this, I thought about what my definition of beauty was, and about some people who I think are beautiful. When thinking about this, I saw a trend: all of the people that I think are beautiful have a kind heart. To me, a kind heart is the most beautiful trait someone can have. Maybe they don’t have the perfect smokey-eye on, maybe their hair isn’t totally in place, but their heart outshines every “imperfection” they might have (spoiler alert: they aren’t really imperfections).
There was one time that I felt more beautiful then ever before. I was going to my friend’s Quincenera later in the day, and I needed to get ready. I had picked out a dress that I thought was really pretty from my closet, curled my hair so it would stay in, and I put on my new heels that my mom let me splurge on a few days prior. When I got there, I met some of my friends at our table. There were many people I didn’t know there, which made me a little nervous. Once the dancing started, a girl that looked a little older than me pulled me aside, and told me that I looked really pretty. It made me feel amazing, and for the rest of the night I felt more beautiful then ever. As beautiful as I felt, I think that young lady was even more beautiful. She not only looked pretty with her light purple dress on, but she also took the time to tell someone else that they looked pretty. I will always remember that beautiful girl for her kindness.
One thing that I have tried to do since then is help other people feel beautiful like I did on that night. I tell people I see that they look really pretty because not only is it the truth, but I love to see the smiles on people’s faces when I do. It makes me really happy to see people’s eyes light up. I once saw a YouTube video on a channel called SHEA that was like this. She went into different classrooms and asked if she could pull someone out. Some of these people she knew, but most she didn’t. She recorded them, and on this recording you hear her tell them the purpose of the project: to photograph things that she thought were beautiful. When I watched this, I couldn’t help but smile with them. The truth is, they are beautiful, and so are you!
How would you react to this experiment? Comment below!
All articles submitted to Everly Mag are property of Everly Mag and the writer only and may not be copied, reproduced, or duplicated in any publication or entity. Everly Mag © 2018. All Rights Reserved.
Check out Everly Mag on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook.
Feature Image Credit: Everly Mag
