What Is Beauty?

Hear me out, throughout the ages and all over cultures, beauty is seen widely differently. I mean strikingly so. In some durations of history, things we think of as downright ugly presently, were redeemed as the highest in beauty standards. So if its something that’s always changing so drastically based on time period, place, culture.

Is the way we have thought about beauty even real?
I don’t think so.

This post is especially important for my fellow insecure people, and people with body dysmorphia.

I remember as a child, noticing the way beauty was portrayed and sold to me on the television, in books, in the way people spoke of certain people, in music videos, in advertisements.

I remember, also, seeing beauty in things no-one else did.

In people, no-one else did.

I remember loving myself so whole heartedly, my near non-existent top-lip, my small and flat breasts (I’ve gotten a boob-job and filler).

I remember being a small child and being in love with my reflection just the way it was.

I remember falling in love with girls and guys that no-one felt the same way about.

I would often be asked why I liked people so “below my league”.

I remember wondering why I was the only one who felt this way.

If there was something wrong with me.

And picking up on the realization of my “less then” physical traits over time.

I remember thinking my momma was so beautiful, I remember thinking the old man on the street was so beautiful, that my grandma was so beautiful, that a dying tree was so beautiful, that a rat was absolutely gorgeous.

I remember thinking the strangest things, were absolutely mesmerizing.

I still do.

Why have we so easily forgotten the truth of beauty?
It is always changing, depending on the time period, the culture, the place.

So the logical definition of it, just doesn’t stand.
Isn’t that obvious?

Isn’t it obvious that centuries ago, we saw beauty totally differently?

And that centuries from now, beauty views will be nothing like what is now?

For example, ancient Greek statues; Plump, round, soft.

And now we worship at the alter of thin.

In many cultures, pale was seen as more beautiful, now tan is all the rage in America and has been for a very long time.

In other places in the world, we see there beauty traditions they have as strange, terrifying, and ugly.

The ancient tradition of Ohaguro dates back to tenth-century Japan and consists of aristocracy painting a dark black dye on their teeth. It was seen as a sign of maturity, beauty and civilization.

Currently, present day, all over the world, the culture, and location, DRASTICALLY changes the beauty standards. And I mean immensely.

“Women of Myanmar are known for their bronze rings that they use to elongate their necks. Depending on the wealth of the family, young girls will start wearing the rings as early as five or six years old. The belief is that the longer the neck, the more beautiful the woman”

“Malawian people believe that sharp teeth are a sign of grace and elegance. To achieve the beauty standard, they have to get their teeth chiseled to a point. As well as being painful, some women get their teeth chiseled so their husbands find them more attractive and have less of a desire to leave them”. 

“Men of the Ethiopian Bodi Tribe find obesity beautiful. Most people obsess over being skinny, but in the Bodi tribe, obesity is considered attractive. So the single men sit at home all day for six months, drinking only milk and animal blood so they can gain the most weight to impress marriageable females“

And those are all PRESENT day beauty standards, at different places in the world.
Each culture and society has there own specific ones.

Beauty. It’s always changing. And it always will be.

Depending on the time period, the culture, and where in the world you are.

That’s the nature of beauty, of humanity, and of the heart.
And they are intrinsically all connected.
And always changing.

Each culture has a unique view of beauty, far more unique then many of us are actually ever exposed to.

Beauty, is a felt thing. It’s a thing that depends on a lot of different factors.

When we shed all programs, all training of the current era and culture we reside in;
It’s something you feel, it stirs you, awakens something in you.

And have you noticed how each persons preferences are different?
Because each persons background and personality and culture of origin is different.

When we remove ourselves from what we have been programmed to see as beautiful, we realize the oddest of things can be gorgeous.
Like my lopsided face, my dark purple under eye circles, and my tiny natural lips and tits.
Absolutely, strangely, marvelous.
I honestly always thought so.

I have always loved myself, my unique beauty specific to me, and I’ve always admired others unique beauty too.
I have never viewed beauty in the same way others do.

Like the girl who’s naturally a bit heavier, or the girl with a grey streak in her hair.

Or the anorexic girl.

Or the girl with freckles covering most of her body, the boy who had a cleft lip as a child and who’s surgery didn’t go as planned.
Exquisite. All of it.

I love the mainstream beauty of my current society and time period too, and I still communicate in ways easier for people to understand, abiding by societal beauty opinion conditions.
I’ve gotten a breast augmentation, and I use filler, and I love playing in it all.

But…

With each person I have fallen in love with, I have learned flaws are not flaws at all.

It’s twisted my view of beauty farther and added more complexity, more philosophy.

The deeper into love I fell with them, the farther out of my own societal and cultural programming on beauty I would fall out of.

Flaws? Or make believe walls.

The idea of beautiful and ugly is just a binary way of thinking so that we may experience more, differentiate somehow. Form opinions, choose things, develop a culture, and navigation and interaction system by which that culture can operate.

And it will always be changing.
Beauty is always changing, if you travel, or if you just stand still and let time and the trends pass.

You get to decide what beautiful is.

Not your society, your culture, your time period, the tv, the magazines, social media, your friend groups, your family.
No.

You Do.