Delightful Beauty

Yesterday as I was getting ready for the day I ran into an old acquaintance;  not really a welcome acquaintance at all.  My hair wouldn't cooperate, nothing seemed to mask the dark circles and the only warm clothes I brought with me were sweats.  I did NOT feel beautiful!  That's when vanity popped in for a hello.  I actually pouted, my eyes filled with tears and I moaned, "I just want Annie to think her mom is beautiful!"  Saying it out loud, I was ashamed.

I DO want Annie to think I'm beautiful, but more than that I want her to know what true beauty is.  Things like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control...these are the things that make us beautiful.  Not the mascara that promises longer, fuller lashes;  not the concealer that is supposed to cover fine lines AND dark circles;  not the blush and eyeshadow and eyeliner and lipsticks and good grief!!!  Annie won't care if I look like I should be on the cover or Vogue or Shape, but she will care if I am full of love, if I laugh from joy, if I introduce her to the Source of all Peace and let His good character be nurtured in me.  These are the things that matter. 

It's easy to forget this.  I feel pressure to be superwoman.  To keep a clean and efficient home, have laundry done at all times, have nutritious meals and baked goodies waiting, feed, change and inspire creativity in my child, work out, take the dogs walking, grocery shopping...and on top of all this and more be a drop dead gorgeous "hottie".  Are you kidding me???  I have friends who feel this pressure and also work outside the home.  It's amazing more women aren't having nervous breakdowns!  I want to stay grounded in what is true, in what matters.  It is a daily fight to nurture those "fruits of the Spirit", but it is a necessary fight.  I want to be gentle with Scott and with Annie.  To be kind when I view the world around me.  To have some self-control; have some balance.  I have read the Proverbs 31 woman-text many times recently and nowhere does it say, "She does all this looking like she just walked out of Nordstrom." 

I have a dear friend who was diagnosed with breast cancer when her daughter was four months old.  She had to quit nursing cold turkey, cut her beautiful hair super short because it was starting to fall out from the medical treatments, is facing a double masectomy in a month and I'M struggling with vanity?!  So ashamed.  I cry as I even write this.  Oh, friends...if we could all grasp the importance of encouraging each other in real beauty.  Point out the beauty that God placed in each of us.  From beautiful smiles, to kind and generous eyes, to infectious laughter to a steady spirit...these are the things that won't fade as we age or get sick.  These are the things that will be our legacy.  These are the things our children will pass on to their own.   

"Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised."
(Proverbs 31:30)

"Cultivate inner beauty, the gentle, gracious kind that God delights in..."
(1 Peter 3:4)