Page 35 - Dr. Nisha Bunke

Honesty in Beauty

By Deeba Van Overberghe

Sitting in Café Cute on the corner of blah blah & blah blah blah, she As I did research for this article, I was impressed with all of the
was sipping her coffee while waiting for her boyfriend to show up. blogs and vlogs “out there” that cover the wide range of ideas and
Late as usual, she thought. The bell atop the door jingled and she opportunities that beauty evokes. The youth of today really have a
looked up, hopeful that he was perhaps changing his bad habit, grip on their bodies and what they accept and define and redefine
when she was struck by the most beautiful moment. as beautiful. And, the music industry supports this shift and change.
Walking through the door was . . . errr! Ethnicity has now been included in our society’s definition of what is
beautiful. Thank Gawd! Because I grew up in the sixties and
Wait. How would you define that beautiful moment? Would it have seventies when beauty was defined by models who had bleached
been a tall dark and handsome, or a pregnant mother with her tod- blond hair and looked as if they suffered from rickets.
dlers, or maybe a gorgeous model with the light shining off the care-
fully place tints of color in her hair? I guess it would really depend For me, I would have to say what best defines beauty is honesty.
on what you define as beautiful, wouldn’t it? That unedited moment that one is privileged to witness where there
is pure honesty. For instance when a child looks up at their parents
What is beauty? Much like art, it is subjective. It’s a personal with absolute love and adoration in their eyes, or the gentle nudge

San Diego Woman

experience. What one person thinks is beautiful another does not of a parent’s hand in the middle of their back encouraging them to
and so it goes. We try to put labels on it such as Coco Channel or move forward. This to me is a moment of beauty. 35
Gucci. We even try to bottle it and sell it to those less fortunate than
others who do not have that esthetic quality that may be popular I remember when I was a young girl, my father would carve wood by
today but not tomorrow. And yet, I’ve seen some people who lack hand, using a planer…seeing the repetition of that beautiful old tool
said esthetics look beautiful and some incredibly beautiful people moving down the plank of wood, the smell of the shavings as they
look , well, ugly. Why is that? You can do all the right things to be became detached. The sound. The rhythmic movement and the
a size two Barbie Doll with loads of makeup, but if you don’t have beauty of creativity transitioning from my father’s eye to the piece of
intrinsic beauty all your actions will be for nothing. Audrey Hepburn wood, as if he could already see what it would become. That to me
once said, “Make-up can only make you look pretty on the outside was a moment in beauty I was privileged to witness. It was as if all
but it doesn't help if you’re ugly on the inside. Unless you eat the was forgotten except the act itself…as if we got out of the way as
make-up.” the beauty in that moment unfurled.

By definition, beauty stirs the senses or the mind. I feel it is What I would like to support and invite you to support is that we
essential for both the beautiful and the witness to share and define beauty by our honest and truthful way of being. We realize
appreciate the experience. It doesn’t come in a bottle or a dress. that true beauty, comes from within where honesty meets up with
Can we think about this for a second? It comes from deep within us intentions and sets the pace for beautiful moments to be experi-
all, the act or the moment that someone or something is enced. Look into the nooks and crannies of life and find the beauty
evoking and another is witnessing. Beauty has to be experienced in that exists there. I invite us all to find that space within ourselves
order for it to be defined and that it is witnessed before it can truly that is fully accepting of who and what we are and that we celebrate
be appreciated. This idea calls for the person witnessing the beauty and recognize it in others. No more competition set by standards
to incorporate and then translate what they are seeing or designed by the few who wish to attain whatever they want through
experiencing. So now beauty is being experienced beyond its self tactics that are less than honorable. We define our own beauty. We
and is dependent upon another’s perspective to be further defined experience beauty by that definition. Not the media, not power
and it’s this interpretation that can be a little tricky. Depending on hungry megalomaniacs. We the teachers of love and life, we define
who the witness is and how they want to experience that beauty. the standards of beauty. We should stand firm on this. Find beauty
in all the unusual places and begin to celebrate it together.