1. As they were taking the bandages off Janet Tyler’s face, the nurses looked on with dread. This was the eleventh surgery attempt to make her look normal. As the final bandage was lifted, the nurses shrieked, “No! No! It didn’t work!” The poor woman was the same “twisted lump of flesh” that had arrived at the hospital the first time.
Janet was traumatized. She was still Janet, blond with petite features, smooth skin, and sculpted eyebrows. Her doctor and nurses? They had the faces of monsters. That’s because they were in The Twilight Zone. “Eye of the Beholder” was my favorite episode.
There was no shortage of women on TV looking like Janet and not like me growing up, and I idolized every one of them. But, lucky for me, all it took was a little science fiction to make me question everything. Early on I started to wonder who gets to decide who is beautiful.
The media has a lot to say about it. They put pictures in our heads to influence our thoughts and convince us they are right. They push their standards of beauty because that works—it sells stuff, and we eat it up. But the version of beauty we see all the time is just one part of the story.
I have seen trends come and go, and I have witnessed the low self-esteem that results from constantly seeing these hard-to-avoid images of so-called beauty. I’ve been there too. There was a time when I used to hope my legs would grow longer and my nose would shrink. Prizing certain body shapes and facial features is a fabricated construct that society is feeding us. No way am I going to look like them. And why should I?
Here is something I know. Being in the beauty industry for four decades, I have had the privilege to travel widely and meet thousands of women one-on-one. Not from a stage looking at a mass of people, but in person. So close I could count their eyelashes. I have seen so many interpretations of “beautiful” that it would take your breath away, because it has for me. I have had no choice but to expand my own vision of what beauty is just by looking around me and studying faces. (I’m not stalking you; it’s admiration.) Faces hold truths, they tell of life experiences, they reveal character and express emotion.
The most compelling story of beauty is its generosity. It’s not restrictive, not exclusive. The more you see it, the more you understand it. And understanding leads to caring about other people and their journey. It also leads to caring more about yourself.
Don’t believe everything they tell you about what is or isn’t beautiful. It’s horsefeathers. The more beauty you see in the world, the more beautiful you become.