Appearance is the proverbially visible frontier between our inner and outer world, what translates of our insides to the outside, what hides the inside from the outside.
We can’t really be seen and understood unless we show ourselves. Whether we do that sparingly or spectacularly, 'presenting' is a necessary condition to our connecting with others and finding our place in the collective.
Yet, what we project and who we are tend to be dissonant; they do not align, not naturally, not after we’ve grown up in a hostile and sick world.
We put up a good front, portray what will attract us the desired sympathy, support, admiration or lee-way - or so we hope - and forget to show who we really are, potentially deep into losing track of what makes us us.
Meanwhile, however deceptive our own appearances may be, we buy into what the world shows us, somewhat oblivious to the pretence of it all.
There is no better way however; the packaging is the reason we open the box.
When we awaken to a truth, we gain the faith that it needs to be shared with the world, and we seek more.
As we learn to see through appearances - see the person behind the persona, the intention behind the action - we gain the compassion that binds us to our kind.
We understand the value of cultivating our inner world.
We go through life anonymous to most, just another blurry face, a piece of the big machine that makes the world go round.
As long as we keep ourselves ‘just a cog’ in the system, exempt of any personal undertaking, there is no room for us to catch the eye.
When we break lose, even for a mile or two, and walk our own walk, the rebellion lends us a story to tell, for ourselves, for the bystanders, by the audience.
The ‘clothes make the man’ may be a sad truth, a recipe for deception, a mould that cramps our style, it also simplifies social interaction. It is a code. ‘I see you, therefore I know who you are’ is a mighty help in society.
Caring for our appearance can be governed by pretence or by truthfulness, an intention to be seen and understood for who we are, projecting an image that does not hide, inflate, or weaken our nature.
Magnifying the appearance is not the goal. Self-care and nurturing our true essence is how beauty surfaces.
When the rewards of shining through starts to be felt, we can be deluded into thinking what it looks like is what count. But that beauty erodes, the surface can't remain polished if the substance is crumbling.
Beauty pours out from the inside. Without continued sustenance, the source dries up.
Seeing someone’s soul is a divine experience. There is a magic, purity, an unrelenting pull, a stubborn conviction that they can do nothing wrong and we are safe.
The strength of these feelings can feel like infatuation, delusion, seem too good to be true, so we recoil.
But all humans have that kind of beauty, which is only visible to a lucky few.
Those we can see are our spiritual partners; the ones we marry, the friends we’ll never loose, our mentors and muses.
Beauty and luxury are siamese sisters - they can’t part, whether or not they like and respect each other.
The shared belief that beauty is precious, both rare and anyone’s right and duty, criteria for love and favours, demands luxury, whether as the means or the reward.
But luxury just calls for more, dissatisfaction is woven in its nature. Competing - or never mind, playing ! - is a losing game.
Better not engage and show up as we are, realness is our most beautiful anyway.
Real beauty lies in vulnerable authenticity, imperfect truth, bare decency. Ornaments are lies, removing them, showing the plain reality for what it is, unburying the hidden gem, exults beauty more than any stylish move.
Beauty
Grace
Adornment
Beautifying