Self-Defining Personal Beauty

Just because you are blind and unable to see my beauty doesn't mean it doesn't exist. 

I love this quote by Margaret Cho. "My beauty," she says. How potent a statement that is. She's not comparing herself to anyone else or condemning herself for not meeting the beauty standards so often set by society and so deeply ingrained in our culture. She is claiming her uniqueness, her personal beauty despite another's possible inability to see it for themselves. That's powerful!

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

Confucius

We, all too often, fall into the trap of disliking ourselves simply because we don't look like the images we see everyday, an altered beauty that is impossible to achieve. Photoshopped thinness, erased blemishes and imperfections, plumped and distorted body parts have become the norm. We rely on these images and the opinions of others to define us, so much so that we have blinded ourselves to the beauty we posses... our personal, unique beauty.

If you look closely at a tree you'll notice it's knots and dead branches, just like our bodies. What we learn is that beauty and imperfection go together wonderfully.

Matthew Fox

There is a kind of beauty in imperfection.

Conrad Hall

How much time have you wasted by not recognizing your own beauty? How many things have you avoided because of how you perceive yourself? How much more are you willing to miss out on?

Beauty is not about how we look. Beauty is so much more. It's a glorious compilation of all the things that makes us who we are. It is self-defined. Self-defined. That makes it the responsibility of each of us to recognize it, nurture it, and proclaim it as our own no matter what anyone else thinks. 

It's time to reevaluate, redefine, and reaffirm our own personal beauty. It is time to refuse to let the blindness of others to affect our own sight. It is time to confidently present ourselves to the world with self-acceptance, self-love, and self-respect. That is positively mesmerizing. That is... beautiful!

Beauty is how you feel inside, and it reflects in your eyes. It is not something physical.

Sophia Loren

There is no definition of beauty, but when you can see someone's spirit coming through, something unexplainable, that's beautiful to me.

Liv Tyler

Anything in any way beautiful derives its beauty from itself and asks nothing beyond itself. Praise is no part of it, for nothing is made worse or better by praise.

Marcus Aurelius

picsource:http://www.flickr.com/photos/starsalive/4012182601/