Balancing the value of character and great brows
[Applause]
the set
ideal of beauty changes
depending on where you live when you
live even your age
trends and perceptions change the
traditional concepts of beauty
have been historically inconsistent
in the 1800s the ideal was having the
fairest palest skin
this is transformed to having a
sun-kissed bronze glow
another example in just a decade we’ve
gone from an ideal of plucked
pencil-thin eyebrows of the 2000s to a
polar opposite trend
of big fluffy brows it’s no surprise
that it’s hard to follow these trends
and yet we can each spend hours studying
our reflections
and trying to match the ever-changing
ideal think about what you do
when you walk up to a mirror do you scan
analyze pick yourself apart wondering if
you match up with the current beauty
trends
if you look beautiful why is it that we
can only see
flaws in that mirror all of us know we
should be nicer to ourselves
and yet this doesn’t change much we
would never
criticize another person like we do
ourselves
and no this isn’t because every other
person we come in contact with
is some perfect 10 on a subjective scale
of attractiveness
it comes down to this simple truth we
really don’t care that much
what other people look like
think about it what’s the most beautiful
thing
about your mother what about your
grandmother
oh wait just a second were you about to
pull out a picture from a few decades
ago
and highlight their perfectly on trend
permed hair
and blue eyeshadow oh maybe not
but were you about to highlight their
wrinkle-free skin
or their small waistline of course not
because this isn’t what matters most to
you it isn’t what you find
most beautiful we are far more impacted
by a mother’s kindness
and a sister’s forgiveness it isn’t her
flawless complexion
that makes an impression this is the
type of beauty
that lasts and resonates far more than
perfect eyebrows
or the latest cultural idea of a perfect
size and a perfect
shape this is the beauty that we care so
much more about
in the people around us so then why is
it
that we can’t impress upon ourselves it
isn’t our looks that matter
that others do care so much more about
our kindness and our generosity
about our empathy and our compassion
this isn’t a new issue it isn’t a new
question
why do we place our own perception of
our appearance
so much higher on our list of critiques
why can’t we connect our perception of
ourselves and others around us
this double standard is deceiving
this disconnect between what we judge
important in ourselves and others around
us
is incredibly harmful by the age of 13
53 of american girls are unhappy with
their bodies
this number grows to 78 by the time
these girls reach 17.
and this isn’t just a teenage issue
little girls as young as five
talk about needing to go on a diet
because they are fat
a recent study asked women in their 60s
are you happy with your body
and 68 percent of women said no
from our mothers to our grandmothers
to our aunts and our sisters and our
friends
this is a horrific beauty trend that
persists throughout the ages
seven in ten girls believe that they are
not good enough or that they do not
measure up in some way
they don’t measure up because they’re
holding themselves to a standard
they can’t recognize is impossible
and these aren’t just statistics these
are real people
meet my best friend mirabella is one of
the kindest people that i know
she is understanding and compassionate
adventurous
and hilarious she has a ray of sunshine
to every single person that she meets
and yet for a long time she struggled
with feeling she was even worth talking
to
when mirabella was 12 she had the
chickenpox for an agonizing two weeks
she was covered in red
itchy pock marks these marks scarred her
face
long after the virus disappeared this
event had devastating consequences for
mirabella
day after day she would study her
reflection in the mirror
and criticize her face but not only did
she decide she wasn’t beautiful
she decided that she just wasn’t enough
my best friend thought that because she
didn’t have a perfect complexion
somehow that meant she wasn’t worth
talking to
she tied the entirety of her worth into
her perception of herself
she thought that in order to have people
love her and want to be around her
that she would have to hide the scarring
on her face under layers of foundation
and concealer and mascara she says it
that way because she’s from australia
now i was best friends with mirabella
throughout all of this
but i had no idea the mental and the
emotional struggle
her self-image was going through
i was clueless to the months of anxiety
the months of depression the months of
suicidal thoughts
all because she was convinced she wasn’t
beautiful
mirabella truly began to believe that
unless other people saw her as beautiful
that they wouldn’t care about her that
if she didn’t have a perfect complexion
that other people would just discard her
if she couldn’t be beautiful
she was worthless
this is my best friend the person that i
see is beautiful
for so much more than her face if you
were to ask me
if i thought this person was worth
talking to
worth caring about worth loving
i think the answer would be pretty clear
can list attributes and stories for
hours about what makes mirabella
beautiful
stories of her selflessness and her
bravery
of her compassion and her understanding
but none of that actually mattered when
she couldn’t see or
believe it for herself she struggled
alone
and couldn’t recognize what other people
were really seeing in her
and this isn’t just a story about
mirabella
would you ever want your best friend
your mother or your sisters to hold
themselves
by such toxic meaningless standards
of course not and yet we all do this to
ourselves
we hold ourselves to standards that we
don’t want to live by it’s exhausting
but what can we do to change it
mexican-american actress salma hayek
once said
people often say that beauty is in the
eye of the beholder
and i say one of the most liberating
things about beauty
is realizing you are the beholder
in between a sunrise and a sunset is a
wonderful world
full of beautiful places and things and
people
to behold recognize and give weight to
what you were beholding
you have the power to decide where you
will place your emphasis
what is it that you truly value
what type of beauty do you care about
yes
it is possible to value compassionate
generosity
and still want your eyebrows to be on
point
of course you can adore blue eyes
without being a shallow person
what type of beauty do you value
when you recognize what beauty you value
you can choose to give it weight
and you can emphasize what you are
beholding
because i want to live in a world where
my best friend knows i appreciate her
selfless service
so much more than a perfect complexion
i want to live in a world where my
grandmother knows that there is so much
more that i care about
than a wrinkle-free face when we
recognize what we behold
we can help our best friends to know
their worth and we can help our
grandmothers
to feel appreciated we can begin to
close the disconnect
between how we view ourselves and how we
view the people around us
how will that change the next time you
face yourself
in this mirror in the ways that you
interact with the people around you
in the ways they view themselves in the
way you view yourself
what are you going to behold
thank you
you