There is NO Shade in Beauty

The world is talking Lupita.  In case you don’t know why, here’s an excerpt from a recent speech that she gave:

“My mother used to say to me, ‘You can’t eat beauty, it doesn’t feed you.’ And these words played and bothered me, I didn’t really understand them until finally I realised that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume. It was something that I just had to be. And what my mother meant by saying that you can’t eat beauty is that you can’t rely on beauty to sustain you.

What actually sustains us, what is fundamentally beautiful is compassion for yourself and those around you. That kind of beauty enflames the heart and enchants the soul. It is what got Patsey in so much trouble with her master. But it is also what has kept her story alive to this day. We remember the beauty of her spirit even though the beauty of her body has faded away.

And so I hope that my presence on your screens and in magazines may lead you, young girl, on a similar journey. That you will feel the validation for your beauty, but also get to the deeper business of feeling beautiful inside. There is no shade in that beauty.”  –Lupita Nyongo 

My Thoughts

Lupita definitely said it best.  Beauty is something that is more than a shade-more than the color of your skin.  But I will go even further to say that beauty is also more than a shape, more than a size, more than the length or versatility of your hair, more than the stretch marks you have on your skin, more than the acne you have on your face, more than the slight crookedness of your teeth, and it’s more than what the world says you have to look like.  Beauty is something you just have to be.

According to Merriam-Webster.com, the verb to “be” is used to indicate the identity of a person or thing. In other words, in order to “be” something, YOU only have to identify yourself as that person or thing.  Therefore, YOU can make the conscious effort to choose to be anything and any person you want to be.  And that is exactly what Lupita was saying.  She was telling women-young, old, black, brown, white, and everything in between-that you don’t have to wait for someone else to tell you that you are beautiful.  Being beautiful is a choice that we all can make for ourselves.

The question then becomes well, how do we do that?  How do we identify ourselves as beautiful?  Do we add more makeup to cover up the acne or the stretch marks on our skin? Do we add another track or two to extend the length of our hair or change our hair to look like the latest model on TV?  Do we lighten our teeth for that Hollywood smile? Do we increase the padding in our bra sizes to make us appear more voluptuous?  Do we get botox injections to reduce fine lines and wrinkles?  Do we always wear black to appear to look smaller than we actually are in order to fit in?

The answer may actually surprise you as it is really quite simple.

Proverbs 23:7a says “as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he”.  Therefore, in order to be beautiful, all you have to do is think AND believe that you are beautiful-right where you are and exactly how you are.

This is often a major struggle amongst the women and young ladies in our society.  Like Lupita, we too wake up in the morning and criticize ourselves.  We compare ourselves to the Beyonce’s, the Angelina’s, the J-Lo’s, the Kim K’s, the Halle’s, the Tyra’s, the models, the video vixens, the commercial girls.  Maybe you don’t, but I know I do.  I find something wrong with me almost everyday.  But I always challenge myself to face myself in the mirror and look at the beauty that is in front of me.  I look at my curves. I look at the fullness of my lips.  I look at my flawed skin.  I look at my hair, my makeup, my outfit.  I look at everything that embodies and personifies who I am.   And then I tell myself, “she did that”!  That’s  just simply my way of telling myself that I am beautiful.

I look at myself one more time and I slowly begin to smile.  While my appearance is not always perfect on the outside, by telling myself that I am beautiful, I have changed my entire thought process about myself. It is in these moments that I make the conscious effort to choose to identify myself as beautiful.  Yep-beautiful.  I then proceed to take out my phone, snap a shot of me, give myself a quick wink and walk out of my house with my head held high and a fierce umph in my step.  😉

So, yes, you are very correct Lupita-there is no shade in beauty.  BEauty is something you just have to BE. Like Lupita, I encourage you all to just be beautiful.  As you go through your own life, do not compare yourself to others.  Do not wake up and look for flaws in your already beautiful skin.  You are beautiful exactly how you are.  Learn to BE beautifully you.  Learn to BE beautiful.  Learn to BeYOUtiful.

XoXoXo  ~V.Davis

***See Lupita’s full speech here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPCkfARH2eE

© Videllia Davis – “I Am Me”. All Rights Reserved.