| | Last weekend I was combing my hair, and thinking that hotels really are something of a reality check for me. The fluorescent lighting is not flattering for skin tones, all the blemishes and wrinkles seem magnified, and somehow I always find another white hair--not to mention all those full length mirrors don’t lie (though I wish they did). I was having this beauty crisis when we went over to Barnes and Noble where I picked up Set-Apart Femininity by Leslie Ludy. Did I ever find soul-food.
The whole subject of femininity is something I’ve been thinking about off and on the last year. For years I shied away from the word because it sounded prissy to me. I’m not a lace and tea party kind of girl. Even super-soft voices or supreme sweetness get to me after awhile. Let’s be REAL. You know? On the other hand, I do appreciate graciousness,. There is nothing beautiful about a woman who is sloppy or always loud or unmannerly. For some reason, I saw the two extremes as the options.
In the last couple years, I’ve started seeing another example. I’ve gotten to know a girl who has such grace, but her style is a lot like mine. She likes funky colors. She wears square heels much more than pointy. She would be more likely to serve foods on chunky ceramics than fine china. She’d go for polka dots or stripes over floral, but she doesn’t shun everything pink or soft or ruffled or…well, feminine. She is somehow modern and feminine all in one. I like it a lot.
While I was talking with an older lady about aging she said, “You know, there are women who are so beautiful because of who they are in Jesus . They have become so much like Him, that when you look at them you really see Him. I don’t even notice that they have wrinkles. (And even their wrinkles are different because they come from smiling instead of wrinkles from an uptight expression.)” Whenever I hear that, I know it’s all so true! Yet, I also feel the tug of wanting to be an attractive person.
--You know how sometimes you meet someone and her looks really aren’t outstanding. Then you get to know her and you start seeing her as a very, very beautiful person?
--Or at first you think she’s so beautiful. Later you notice that it’s not her features, but who she is…her radiance, her personality?
--Or when you’re with her, you always think she is so pretty. When you see a picture of her, you’re surprised that she’s not actually that stunning. (On the other hand, you see a picture and think she’s beautiful. In real life her demeanor and spirit negate the beauty you thought was there.)
--Other women are just plain beautiful in a way that strikes you the minute you see them. They‘re 100% pretty.
We so often hear that it’s what is inside that really matters (and it is); but I think we all feel the desire to be the kind of beauty you recognize immediately--not just once you’ve learned to know us. We often feel we don’t measure up. In Set-Apart Femininity Ludy says, Such is the dilemma of all too many Christian young women today. We are told to appreciate our own unique beauty and accept ourselves for who we are. Meanwhile, we are constantly assaulted by a world that insists we aren’t alluring enough--that we need to change our bodies, our clothes, and our personalities in order to be more appealing. Why don’t we see ourselves as beautiful? Is it our perceptions? Is it only that the world has influenced our view of beauty?
And later the definition for femininity: Set-apart femininity blends the classic womanly grace and dignity of an Audrey Hepburn with the sacrificial, poured-out-for Christ lifestyle of an Amy Carmichael. It’s true feminine beauty merged with absolute abandonment to Jesus Christ. It’s the sparkling vibrant, world-altering Christ-like version of femininity that your King created you to exude.
I don’t think these two quotes alone nearly give a good representation of the book. Still, while I gobbled up each word I read, and knew it was all so good, my question remains. What about physical beauty? No, we shouldn’t measure our beauty by the world’s standards. Yes, each of us has a unique beauty. Yes, each of us is beautiful just as God created us. Yes, there will always be someone else who we think is so much prettier and makes us feel unattractive in comparison. No, we shouldn’t compare ourselves to others. Why, then, do we so desperately want it?
I’m also trying to make sense of how this applies to women in general and how it’s different for me coming from my conservative Mennonite background. In the community where I grew up, people didn’t talk about looks. On my wedding day, someone told me, “You look beautiful, Christy….but every bride is beautiful.” 
Okay, I know this is very much a ramble and disorganized and sort of about femininity and sort of about beauty and has no definite direction or conclusion….but if you have made any sense out of it, I really want to hear what you’re thinking. What do you think about beauty? Do we over-emphasize it? And mainly, is there any importance there? (And don’t be afraid to disagree with me. I’m not afraid of debate.)
[A little more about the book: I didn’t write this down, so I can’t quote, but one of my favorite lines from the book was on sacrificing. She was talking about a missionaries who gave everything--bicycle, food…everything they had to people who had less than them. That is sacrifice. Yet we feel good about ourselves if we do a short-term missions trip with our favorite magazine, ipod, and cell phone in tow. This whole book is about living a radical Christian life. She expresses my ideals….the ones I’ve kind of forgotten about while I’ve gotten pretty comfortable with normal life.
I wish I would have taken notes on another part--it‘s not on physical beauty, but that inner beauty. It has been bothering me when I hear it, so I guess that‘s why I just loved reading it in a book--Many contemporary Christian books and conferences are teaching women to reconnect with the beauty within them. But really, there is nothing beautiful that is of ourselves. Any beauty in us is because of God; searching within ourselves for real beauty is futile.]
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| | Posted 11/8/2009 5:34 PM - 640 Views - 42 eProps - 33 comments
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Great post! REC!
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If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, why do we have such a hard time believing that what the other person sees is beauty in their eyes?
Why does someone have to be knock out gorgeous in order to be "beautiful?" Like maybe they have gorgeous eyes or an amazing complexion but we don't notice b/c we see only their face as a whole and think they're "average." This is one of the unexpected things that happened to me since I started doing photography. I have on more then one occasion put my camera to my eye to take a photo, dropped it (and my lower jaw) and exclaimed, "you have gorgeous eyes" (or whatever) b/c I'd simply never noticed. In one of the last magazines I got there was an article on marriage and they said one of the secrets of happily married couples is that they focus on the things they like in their marriage instead of always trying to work through the negative stuff. Maybe that's what's wrong w/ us. I constantly notice my freckles and skin spots and nose and coffee stained teeth and a lot of other things instead of looking for the strengths that God did give me. ??? I agree that you can focus on outward beauty too much but I agree w/ everyone else that most Menno's have the opp problem. It's so wrong that you almost have to make yourself look ugly and you worry so much about being "humble" that you end up focusing on yourself all the more......
Liam's up and crying. I'll be back to see what more people think.