Looks play a very important role in our society. How we look can affect the way we define ourselves. If we have been told all our lives how pretty we are, then what happens to us as we age? If we are only defined by our looks, then aging can be a very traumatic ordeal. There are some of us who can be very critical about the way we view ourselves, because the way we describe ourselves is often based on the way we feel other people view us. We tend to focus on the negative physical attributes about ourselves, and not on the more positive non-physical descriptions of ourselves. If we have always been told how pretty we are, then, we will probably define ourselves as being pretty. But what is real beauty? How will we define ourselves as we age?
How we define ourselves should have less to do with how other people see us, and more to do with who we really are. We should not be judging ourselves according to how we think others see us. All through our lives people say things to us that stick with us and then we use those principles as guidelines for our self image. But we need to take the time to weed through what is true about us and what we have fabricated in our minds based on the ideas of others. We need to find the value in ourselves that is not based on looks. Because our society places a high value on looking younger, there is an age limit that that is held as acceptable and anything over that is disregarded. But there are beautiful women who are still vibrant, beautiful and older than that arbitrary number.
People have been lying about their age for years, especially women. It is as if lying will turn back the hands of time and give us back the youth we long for. Having the experience of walking into a room and seeing people's eyes go to the younger looking person is usually the turning point in people's lives. But if we can learn to cultivate our inner attraction, then the external changes will be less difficult to accept. Our inner life is our real life and if we don't do the inner work, aging will be difficult. Cultivating our inner self helps to not be attached to external things that fade away with time.
So, what can we do to cultivate our inner selves? We can start living life for ourselves and stop living it for other people. Aging should be about giving ourselves the freedom to be who we were really meant to be. As we age we can start to see that there are things about us that are better than they have ever been before. We can also start to appreciate that there are things that have happened to us that we are glad that we will never have to experience again. Since we don't have to depend so much on our looks, we can start to enjoy the freedom that comes with maturity and self awareness.
The cosmetics and anti-aging industries are making a fortune off of us because we are doing things to simply appear younger. We are devoting so much time, money and effort into looking younger, instead of focusing that energy on other areas of our lives that have a deeper meaning. We aren't even aware that people are more attracted to our inner beauty than our outer beauty. We are so afraid that getting older means being less attractive, losing our looks, or just fundamentally not mattering in the world, that we have lost sight of the fact that there are reasons we do matter no matter how old we get. As we get older we accumulate more knowledge, we have more love to give, we have more of an appreciation for life, we have more compassion for others and we are more forgiving of ourselves. These are the qualities of life that are priceless and time cannot take away.
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