A few years ago, one of my teenage daughters developed an eating disorder as a result of poor self-image and body image anxiety.  She eventually recovered, thankfully, but my experience through that ordeal was eye-opening and life-changing. During that time fraught with fear and reflection, I began to give the whole concept of beauty some serious thought.

As women, we’re empowered on multiple levels, but we have yet to truly master this one. In fact, beauty itself is widely misunderstood, and not by women alone. Few of us take the time to really see and experience the depth, meaning and richness of real beauty, in ourselves and in the world. We follow ritualistic, sometimes rigorous, sometimes outrageous beauty regimens and treatments in order to feel like we measure up, like we are beautiful enough…Will we ever be enough?

Maybe we should ask ourselves this instead:  why and how do we learn to think this way? What are we taught about beauty as we grow up and become women?  What do we learn about its meaning, its power, its value?  What do our children, our daughters, learn about beauty from us?  I want my daughters to think of beauty in a more meaningful way.  I want them to know its truth, its vastness, its depth. I want them to know how to translate it into creative, positive action in the world. The last thing I want them to subscribe to is the notion that beauty is primarily about how they look. Beauty superficiality, physical perfectionism, beauty ideals… these do not speak for what I believe true beauty to actually be.

So what is beauty?  Have we lost the meaning of this rich, multi-layered, multi-faceted quality?  Our collective understanding of beauty is in need of a makeover.  Beauty is not just in the face. Beauty is energy. It is in the mind, in the heart, in our actions, in our conduct, in our aspirations, in our courage, in our creativity. It is in art, in nature, in the petals of a flower, in the majesty of trees, in the wisdom of an elephant, in the flutter of a hummingbird’s wings. Beauty is the visual representation of truth, of love, of possibility, simplicity, complexity.  It is inner strength, integrity, self-respect, dignity…Beauty is spirit.  It is so multi-dimensional and yet so frequently taken for granted and encapsulated into small, superficial if not trite definitions.

Beauty Remastered is an effort to restore dignity and respect to beauty itself, and in the process enrich our understanding and appreciation of it, and improve our personal relationship to it.  God knows our psyches deserve that.

As we redefine what constitutes beauty, as we explore its many, abundant manifestations in ourselves and in the world, we begin to more clearly see the nature of our partnership with it. The truth is that all along we have been co-creators with this magnificent quality, and it is time for us to strengthen this partnership and embrace its potential. Beauty is not something that is handed down to some and not to others. Beauty is innate in us all. It is part of everything. I’ll admit, there is still a lot of collective inner work to be done. But I have faith, and I know for sure that the status quo is hardly sustainable.

From my heart to yours,