In a society where we place a shape, color, size, and name to beauty it has distorted the self-esteem of many women in the world. As I become more of an ambassador for my own personal beauty I realize beauty does not have a specific appearance. Beauty has to be defined on our own terms not by the majority in America. When I think of beauty I began to think of the eclectic style of Erkyah Badu, Solange Knowles and Rihanna . These women have set their own standard of what beauty feels like and look like to them. It feels amazing to go through a journey to find what fits me as a woman because in this journey I am finding my beauty. Many African American girls struggle with the idea that their dark skin, dark hair is not beautiful because they are faced with the idea that pale skin and blue eyes are the ideal beauty. White women struggle with the illusion of being curvy is considered to be fat when curves are the epitome of womanhood, the gratitude of beauty.
Beauty has no name, shape, size, color or texture however it is the hidden secret of what a woman holds inside. When we can tap into our own inner beauty then we can unlock a glow that can radiant externally. I look at women such as Lupita Nygon’o who has been such an inspiration for women of color because she has broken the barriers of what beauty could be if we look beyond the surface. We are raised in a society where it is encouraged to change the way we look to be accepted by the world but God created us in his image; perfect. In the May issue of Essence Magazine Solange Knowles stated, “As women we have the choice of how we want to look and how we want to feel and that’s the beauty of being a woman.” We should not allow society to have a voice on how we look, feel or define our beauty. Many women deal with low self-esteem because what they see in magazines. However, Beyonce Knowles song Pretty Hurts discuss the standards society places on our beauty but we have to be willing to understand beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder. It is time for us to look in the mirror and remove the mask of the wrong self-image of who we are to kindly replace it with an image of how we define beauty. Beauty has no face it is truly established by what we say, see and speak about ourselves. Let us strive to replace our negative views with positive affirmations of our own personal beauty because in the end beauty truly has no face!Reference:
Essence Magazine May Issue
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