WHAT IS BEAUTY?

This blog will be a state of vulnerability, a place I have never been before or admitted to others. So, bear with me… and I pray this will also be a place of refuge for you.

I am very excited to write these various blog posts that I will be posting throughout this week. I have needed to express these thoughts for some time now. What is true beauty? I have pondered upon this thought time and time again… I feel that over years of seeking, I am now barely coming to scratch the surface of understanding what it means to be truly beautiful. I am finally coming to see what really matters…

We have always heard the statement: “Everyday is the first day of the rest of your life…” or “Today is the start of something new!” etc. Yeah, I know that. It’s one of those cute cliché Pinterest quotes that you see, pin it to your “Life Sayings” board on move on to the next. But what would happen if we actually began to apply it? Today, March 24th 2014, I decided to begin. Today was the beginning of my healing process.

Operation 1: Love myself.

I have suffered my entire life with self-image issues. It wasn’t until the last year of my life when I began to see that this plague was infecting my life, and I needed to rid myself of it. Ever since I can remember, I wished I were skinnier… at the age of 12 years old I would post sticky notes around the house telling myself to eat less or to stop eating completely. I would come home from school every day and there underneath my mattress I hid a tape measure and a notebook, keeping record everyday of the inches I was losing… I had a problem. I don’t remember how long that lasted for, but even though I stopped with the measurements, that didn’t stop the constant battle my brain was raging inside of me. I was constantly comparing myself to others and belittling myself for who I wasn’t. I was comparing my weaknesses to others strengths… and feeling like I was nothing. As Sister Holland says it, “I seemed to have a real knack for fighting life’s battles on two or three or four fronts at once—and I took a lot of needless shrapnel as a result.” (Sept. 1988, Be Renewed In The Spirit of Your Mind, byu.speeches.edu) I would allow the world to impact my views of myself telling me to look a certain way and to be a certain way. I was confused and I couldn’t fully love others because I couldn’t love myself. I look back now and I see that many of my actions throughout my life were determined because of these negative thoughts that Satan was throwing at me. It wasn’t until I relied upon my Father in Heaven, that I began to see what true beauty really is and what He sees in me. As Sister Dalton teaches us, ‘Deep beauty is the kind of beauty that shines from the inside out. It is the kind of beauty that cannot be painted on, surgically created, or purchased. It is the kind of beauty that doesn’t wash off. It is spiritual attractiveness. Deep beauty springs from virtue. It is the beauty of being chaste and morally clean. It is the kind of beauty that you see in the eyes of virtuous women like your mother and grandmother. It is a beauty that is earned through faith, repentance, and honoring covenants.’ (Apr. 2010, Remember Who You Are!) This is what we must see in ourselves.

I need to say this now, because it defines everything about me: My Brother, Jesus Christ, will redeem us from all things. We can and will be set free from all of our weaknesses. Christ not only took upon Himself the pain and the sicknesses of all of us, but He also took upon Himself our infirmities... What does infirmities mean? Weaknesses. "He will take upon him their infirmities [weaknesses], that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities [weaknesses]." (Alma 7:12, The Book of Mormon.) I trust in Him, and have faith that I can be made whole. I ache at the thought of His suffering, but how humble it makes me that He did this for me, that I can be healed and become as He is someday. Because of our Savior and His Atonement, He will set us free as we come unto Him and cleave to Him. I cannot overcome these battles on my own, never could I do that. But my Beloved Savior gives me hope each day. I am changed, and will continue to be changed because of Him. I preface with this because it moves me to my next point, I began to be healed when I was on my mission.

As I look back I see the hand of my Heavenly Father in the details of my life, and I explain it in a way that He simply picked me up on a good path I was on, and placed me somewhere better. He placed me on my mission where I was able to learn what becoming converted is; I was able to learn that true joy comes as we forget ourselves as focus upon His children and bringing them unto Christ. I also learned my self-worth and potential, I was able to find healing when I didn’t know I was in need of it. He always knows what we stand in need of.

My mission was just the start to this journey. I have been home now for over a year, and my trial of self-image issues and lack of confidence only has deepened. But I have come to understand my potential clearer than ever before! I see who I can be and my worth as a daughter of God. I see that our role as daughters, and someday Goddesses, is divine. Our trials today are building us to become this. How grateful I am for the opportunity to grow and change! Just as Nephi exclaims: “I am encompassed about, because of the tempations and the sins which do so easily beset me. And when I desire to rejoice, my heart groaneth because of my sins; nevertheless, I know in whom I have trusted. My God hath been my support; he hath led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness; and he hath preserved me upon the waters of the great deep. He hath filled me with his love, even unto the consuming of my flesh. He hath confounded mine enemies, unto the causing of them to quake before me.” (2 Nephi 4:18-22, The Book of Mormon.) This is what He has done for me, and will do for all of us. He confounds those enemies in our lives: the enemy of comparison. The enemy of lack of confidence. The enemy of the world. The power of His Atonement and His love makes it possible for them to quake before us. I know this to be true.

So my daily walk of healing starts TODAY. Over the next week I have made a choice to not wear makeup. To me, this is a statement that I can love my natural self even with my flaws, and that others can love me and see me for who I really am. It’s being vulnerable. A step to feeling comfortable in my own skin. This will be my week to start my new journey of healing for the rest of my life; it will be the beginning of new and healthy thinking of my life, my body and myself. It will be a daily reliance upon my Savior. I know I can do this, but I cannot do this without Him!

So here I go... CHANGE STARTS NOW.