In depth

Life: The heart of the issue of abortion.

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I have heard someone say “if your opinion is right than why do you feel the urge to get upset about someone else’s?” But as good as this sounds, I was disturbed about the example he had used: abortion.

I have to say, I was with him until then. But I can’t condone that because it is something to get upset about. In fact, anything you perceive as very wrong is okay to get upset about. That is the healthy reaction. It is not that I am in favor of knee-jerk reactions. (I’m not and I’ve thought this article out.) There are plenty of subjects this guy’s advice applies to–but never abortion. You cannot talk lightly about such an evil. Yes, I called it an evil. I don’t do that lightly. I have a reason for making abortion exempt from his advice and this is it: If this guy had said to be calm about the issue of domestic violence, homicide, or even arson, (any of the clinically insane, or wicked crimes,) there would have been no debate about whether it (the crime) was the wise choice, or the best one. No one would claim those things should be made legal, unpunishable, or considered harmless. Or helpful to society. Even the most tolerant of political persons would not say that. (Publicly anyway.) They would not advocate homicide.

How has abortion been reduced to an issue even in the minds of Christians? Just introducing it as a political issue has effectively got everyone’s minds off whether it is an evil or not, and onto simply what their individual rights are…How dare we? Since when is it okay to justify any other crime by the person’s individual rights to commit whatever felony they wish? How can you have a right to do wrong? In their heart of hearts, I believe everyone knows it’s not right; whatever they may think to the contrary. But that is beside the point.

Even so, the pro-life campaign often lacks gusto, or is far too angry. (Not always.) I am sick at heart when I listen to other Christians or conservatives speak so “logically” and “rationally” about it. It is not that we shouldn’t be rational. It is that we are so used to the idea. What has happened to us? One word: desensitized.

I have a personal example: A couple of years back I took it upon myself to do something pro-life. To be a good Christian. And to my dismay; my first wall I had to crash through was the apathy and indifference I myself felt. Sadly, my passion had more to do with a teenager’s desire to be up and doing, and to shake things up, than because I had any real sense of the value of life. I realized I didn’t have much. Only the barest hint that  I ought to. And a disgust with the whole abortion process. Anyone can have that.

It is to my shame that I admit this, and that even today I am no expert on how valuable life is. But back then I did what I do ultimately with every problem, I took it to God and asked Him to change my heart. Whether everyone would agree that it is Him who did so, I don’t know. But it is true that I have learned some things about valuing life

The first one was this: Our lack of value for these babies’ lives actually reflects a lack of value for our own lives. Do you really think it’s coincidental that suicide rate has sky-rocketed right along with abortion rates? Not to mention the aforementioned homicide, and less obvious things like self-induced health problems, cutting, and depression have increased also. It can all be traced to an undervalue of our own lives and bodies. If you will not care properly for yourself, how can you care for someone else? As a pre-teen, I spent a lot of time wondering what I was even alive for because I was so miserable. Over a period of a few years God began to show me that I had value simply because I was loved by Him. (What else gives anything true value?) And that my life was a gift from Him; both to me and to the world. God loves every baby and every person. And He gives each of us His gift of life.

“The Thief comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy; I came that they might have life and have it more abundantly.” John 10:10

Secondly. Faith of our Fathers. I like to read about the American Revolution and the prelude to it. And in reading the writings of our founding fathers, and about their actions, it was quite clear to me that they put a high value on human life. In fact, at that time, it was generally accepted that human life had immense worth. They respected their own lives and each others more than our most celebrated people of today respect theirs. Why?

It was their belief in God. I delivered a speech a couple years ago about abortion. At the end of it I concluded. “Life is what we would call ‘sacred’ something that is important to God.” Holy. King David actually prayed that God would deliver him “because I am holy.” That is such an unusual thing for someone to say in the Bible that it caught my attention. What was David onto that we are not? In the Bible it says God began human life and made Man according to His own likeness. It also refers to God’s commands as the path of life.  Finally Jesus himself declared. “I am…the life.” God takes life very seriously. In Proverbs it warns of seven things God calls an abomination. One of them is this: “Hands that shed innocent blood.” Note the word innocent. Innocent means the person has done nothing wrong. Existing is not a crime but a privilege. (A friend of mine says “there are no illegitimate children, just illegitimate parents.”) Thomas Jefferson so famously called it “a right.” Unalienable. That means you cannot negate it. You cannot take it out of context. There are no loopholes. No exceptions. The race or age or upbringing of the person does not matter. When Jefferson said all men are created equal he was referring to our three rights. Folks, there is no inequality of life. Either you are alive, or you are dead. End of discussion.

Before I give my third thing I want to share a story.

Once a long time ago, there was a girl named Mary. There was nothing notably special about her, save that she had immense faith. One day Mary was going about her business, never dreaming there was anything unusual  afoot. And then out of nowhere an angel appeared to her. Greeting her as the favored of God. To her amazement, he proceeded to tell her she would become pregnant with the Son of God. Mary of course was astounded. And asked how this would happen since she was a virgin. I’m sure she was probably thinking “Not to mention I’m engaged!” The angel told her the spirit of God would come upon her. Okay–weird. Being pregnant out of wedlock would get a woman stoned in those days, not a fun way to die. But Mary said “Let it be with me as you say.”

Imagine if Mary had lived nowadays. What would her friends have encouraged her to do? Quite possibly to have an abortion. Can’t you just see it? “Oh Mary, yeah, you screwed up, but hey, no one has to know. Having a baby will ruin your life right now. Think of what your man will say? Your parents will kill you. Literally.” And so on. Am I the only one the idea of aborting the Son of God is freaky to? It’s absolutely horrible to think of doing that. But every life is God given. That horridness is just as poignant with every other human child.

Thirdly. Life is beautiful.  Books and nature mostly are what helped me to realize this. Reading The Enchanted April or The Secret Garden reawakened my imagination to what a fine thing it is to be living. Living things are beautiful and human life is beautiful. The things we experience, the obstacles we overcome, the joy we spread in each others lives. Life is not a convenience. It is the second most valuable thing we have. (The first being the love of God which gave us life.)

My reason for writing this is to inspire people to discover life’s value for themselves, and then to protect it. And fight for it–everywhere. We need those who will speak up and stop treating abortion like a mere issue. It is not. It is literally a matter of life and death. If you are a Christian, I implore you to take a few moments to pray about this, asking God to open your heart. Lastly, be thankful for this most precious of gifts–life.

Natasha.

How to handle disappointment

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I usually post about positive things because I hate being depressed, but let’s face it, not everything that happens is happy.

If you’ve seen The Princess Bride you might remember two of Wesley’s lines, one being one of the most depressing in the movie. “Life is pain, highness, anyone who says differently is selling something.” The other, said to Inigo in reply to a question is “Get used to disappointments.” I don’t like either of these two lines, they reflect a view of the world that bugs me. Whether Wesley meant them or not is really beside the point. many a cynical laugh has occurred because on the first one. and even the second is rather dismal when you think about it.

Should we “get used” to being disappointed? it can’t be denied that we are often enough. Our plans don’t ever pan out the way we expect; people make promises to us that the don’t keep; we resolve to change and we stay the same.

Sometimes it takes people their whole life to come to the very obvious conclusion that we are just not smart enough to control our lives. If a person could make money by sitting at home, watching TV, not talking to anybody but the made up characters (we all do that,) then there are plenty of people who would give up on life and do it. But even if they were surrounded by plexi-glass with air conditioning and ready made meals, one earthquake, one bad storm, one disaster… and their whole world would fall apart. We’re really good at building intricate card houses. Even card castles. We’re geniuses at lining up domino bricks in our lives, each activity leading neatly into another; but the more work we go into the more fragile our homes are, and one little blow knocks the whole thing down.

Jesus once used this example: The wise man built his house upon the sand and when the rains cam and the floodwaters rose his house collapsed; but the wise man built his house upon the rock, the rains poured down, the floodwaters rose, but the house on the rock stood firm. Sand may be anything we pick that’s unstable. You can build your house out of the finest materials this world has to offer, but it’s still a house on a bad foundation. Now we seldom build with good materials anyway.

Maybe I’m alone in this but I feel like in America we’ve given up on what really matters. Family and friends are too much work, so we’ve made them a side, and who’s number one? Us and our needs. Who cares about the other guy? Let him do all the work and we’ll get by with as little as possible…and we wonder why we feel like losers who have no joy in their life.

Did we choose this because life disappointed us? As kids, so much seemed possible, we could do anything and be everything, but along the way we found out people expected us to be a certain way. We were compared to other kids and found lacking, so we tried to measure up or we rebelled, neither way seems to have helped. We’re still part of the statistic as adults or teenagers. More so than ever in fact.

Well I hate to break it to you, but you will never be safe in this life from statistics and people who put you in a box. The best thing you can do is to stop doing the same thing to yourself and others. when life disappoints you don’t accept defeat as your inevitable goal. You aren’t a percent, no one can tell you that this is how far you will go and no further. No one except you.

Life is not pain. Pain is a signal that something has gone wrong and is not as it should be. You didn’t always feel it and you don’t always have to. But facing disappointment takes courage folks. In the words of this song:

You believe in freedom, but you don’t know how to choose;

You’ve got to step out of you feelings that you’re so afraid to lose; 

And everyday, you put your feet on the floor, you’ve gotta walk through the door, it’s never gonna be easy;

But it’s all worth fighting for.

You can’t control your life. Period. So stop trying. Disappointment if often the result of false expectations. You had no right to expect your plans to work out if you made them for the wrong reasons and based them on the wrong goal. Your mind can’t figure out life, you can’t even figure out yourself for crying out loud. Your plans are a house built on sand.

The good news is Jesus is the rock. Psalms 138 states “The Lord will work out his plans for my life.” God alone can successfully plan our lives. You may not like me coming to that conclusion, but tough luck, it’s the truth. If it helps, God’s plans for us are way better than our own. “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11.) I know someone reading this may scoff, a lot of us have doubted God’s good intentions. To that person I would say this, you don’t even know yourself, you don’t know everything about you house, you car, your neighborhood, your country or anything close to you. But God does. How then can you claim to understand what He is doing? I guarantee that whatever your grief is, it is not what you think. That doesn’t mean it isn’t horrible, or painful, and you shouldn’t grieve it. It’s okay and healthy to mourn over our pain, but don’t be stuck in it, don’t think you see all of it. It takes awhile to get to the point where you can see past you hurt and disappointment, but if, for now, you can at least believe that you will get to that point, then you’ll be okay. I do speak from experience.

If it would also help, know that God feels our pain and is right there with us even when we can’t see Him. He doesn’t despise us for feeling that way, but He won’t pity us more that He should. He won’t lie and say we ought to have set our hopes on anything other than Him. He’s God people, wouldn’t you take that over a house of cards? I hope the answer is yes, but even if not keep watching for more posts, I may be more cheerful in the next one. Honestly though, I do hope this helped somebody. Have a good day–Natasha

Go one more.

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Sorry for the long time with no post, I’ve had Author’s fever and have been busy writing other stories.

Today I want to write about something I want to learn personally. Which is to never quit.

A little known (or little practiced) secret to success in any area of life is to never give up trying.

I’ve sure felt like giving up. On myself, on other people, even on my faith. I think some people never realize that being a Christian is not just an opinion, it’s a fight. Anyone who thinks it’s easy isn’t one. To be fair, in some ways it’s easier in America, but in other ways it’s harder. I’m not writing this to complain though, I’m glad to live in a country where I won’t be killed for believing in God and Jesus.

But there are many who aren’t so fortunate. (At least what we would call fortunate.) If I may be so frank, I’d like to say this article isn’t about persevering at a job or in a class. If I may just speak from the heart…last year was a difficult year for me in my faith. I suppose a non-Christian won’t understand this, but I felt distant from God for around six months, straight. I’ve never been through anything quite as painful as that experience. But what it proved to me was that my faith is about way more than feeling good, because I didn’t. I felt depressed most of the time, last September was the worst of it. I would get up and just feel this weight on my soul, and I couldn’t understand it, I’m supposed to have the answer for getting rid of weights and sadness. Right?

Actually Jesus never promised us a painless life, He didn’t promise us an easy one; He promised us an abundant life. Abundant means to have plenty and not be lacking. Even to have more than enough for just us, enough to share. sometimes you have to hurt to know how alive you are, and you have to face death to realize how precious life is. Or you won’t want more of it. Ever meet someone who’s life is no bigger than their job and their TV and cellphone? Or whose life is so choked with activity that it’s more of a slide show than a life? one thing I learned is that nothing in this world can possibly take the place of God in my life; it’s a joke to think it can.

Even knowing that, it is still hard to resist those feelings of worry and discouragement that come when a fight is not being won as fast as I want. But I have a reason for not quitting, if I quit on this, I quit on everything.

There’s a song by the band Superchic called “Go One More,” and the lyrics pretty much sum up what I’m talking about:

It feels like I have lost this fight, they think that I am staying down, but I’m not giving up tonight, tonight the wall is coming down. I am stronger than my fears, this is the mountain that I climb. Got 100 steps to go, tonight I’ll make it 99.

I have everything to lose by not getting up to fight. I might get used to giving up, so I am showing up tonight. I am my own enemy, the battle fought within my mind. If I can overcome step 1, I can face the 99.

A lot of things cause us to give up, folks; fears, failures, injuries; I’ve had them all. But what keeps me going is knowing this: It is so worth it. The Bible actually says that Jesus, for the joy set before him, endured the cross. That joy was us. If He endured all that for us, then we can live through this life for him. That’s my take on it anyway. And one year later I can definitely say that I have joy in my faith now. I wouldn’t change what I went through. And I believe God never left me, actually my problem was I stopped trying to see Him and was only trying to feel Him. When I write about things like never giving up, on this blog, I mean it. Even if there seems to be no reason to keep going, don’t stop trying; because often we don’t know the reason for continuing until we’re on the other side of it.

We are stronger than we think, giving up in a choice every time, not something we’re forced to do. Being stubborn can be a really good quality.

One more thing, giving up on some things is okay, if it’s not going to affect most of your life. But when it’s important, you have to decide just how much it really matters to you. Some things are worth dying for rather than losing, others just don’t matter that much. Which is obvious sounding, but we don’t live like it. We live as if things that will break in four or five years, or four or five months, or even will be gone in four or five days, are so important. And the things that may be here the rest of our lives, we neglect in the name of not having enough time. Prioritize, Persevere, and keep Perspective. That’s my advice for the day.

Having it both ways.

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In my previous article I talked about different views on life and how to live it. Also on whether we’re stuck with living out something other people have chosen for us. The thing I didn’t address was if it seems like our moral obligation to do what they want. I want to talk about when it is and when it isn’t.

There are times to do what our families or friends want us to do. Sometimes they see what’s best for us when we don’t. But when someone else asks us to do something  we need to ask ourselves a few questions.

Firstly, is what they’re asking morally right?

Secondly, is it truly beneficial to them?

Thirdly, will it hurt us to do it, and is it worthwhile? Case in point, suppose you mom or dad wants you to take over the family business, or take up the same profession as them; maybe that’d be a good idea; maybe you’d like it; maybe you have the talents for it; maybe it’s a great opportunity… or maybe not. There are other examples. Listening to the people close to us is a good practice, but this occupational area of family and friends’ influence is very limited at best. The more important and more subtle influence is over our morality and world view.

Even as a preschooler you know that when you go to your friend’s house there are different rules and you have to follow them, and likewise your house has different rules that they have to follow. Some are clearly just a matter of preference. One house lets you eat in front of the TV, the other does not, etc. But when it comes to the intangibles the contrast becomes much more apparent. In my family we don’t lie, that’s a rule. But in other families lying is an accepted fact of life. The trouble is, we think lying is wrong for everyone. If you are only going by what your family thinks is best, than sooner or later you’ll hit a situation like this. I trust my families judgment but if they tell me to do something that I think is wrong, I won’t justify it because everyone thinks it’s right.

But here’s the catch. When I’m deciding whether something is right or not, shouldn’t I go by what seems to work out the best for everyone. Lying to get myself out of trouble is wrong, but what if I’m lying to protect a bunch of my friends or my family? Is it still wrong? What if it’ll damage them more if I tell the truth? Now, two people could argue back and forth over this for hours and not find a resolution, my point is that you need a third-party; but not a human third-party, because as mere humans our reasonings are all equal just as our brains are equally capable (usually.) Hence the popular belief of humanism that morality is just our opinions. Well, I’m not going into that, but suffice it to say that nothing is resolved that way.

As finite, limited, human beings, we can’t see the future and the ultimate result of our choices. We don’t have the knowledge to make wise choices in our own reasoning. There is  a verse about this “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.” (Proverbs 14:12.) That being said, I think the need for God is clear.

God can work out the toughest situations to the benefit of both parties, but it doesn’t always look like it to us. He has ways we don’t understand. Which He tells us bluntly. (Isiah 55:9) The paradox I’m trying to show with this article and my previous one is that we do, in a sense, choose our destiny. You see God has set before us life and death, He will not force us to choose either; so we do indeed have our choice. We should be thankful; imagine a world where you had no choice, either live the way you are told to or cease to exist. But God makes it clear that there is only one right choice, therefore He knows the right way, and if you choose Him, He will work out the rest. (Romans 8:28.)

In a moral dilemma sometimes you have to choose God over the person in question, but it is better to choose God who knows what will happen than the person who only can guess what will happen. At least that makes sense to me. It’s summed up in this last verse “in his heart a man plans his course (his path of life) but the LORD determines his steps (the things that happen to him for him to react to as he chooses.)” Proverbs 16:9, personal paraphrase.

So that’s my take on choice. My conclusion is that if I trust God with my life, than the pressure is off me, but I am still responsible for whether I choose to do what He says or not. I hope you enjoyed this article and it didn’t come across as too preachy because it’s really just what I’ve been learning  in my own life. Until next time–Natasha

The choice is yours.

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I talk a lot about choice and I write about it too. And lately I’ve been watching a show called “Ever After High.” I don’t usually watch shows about teenagers going to some special high school. But I ended up really liking the plot. The main point is this: Can you choose your destiny or are you born into a lifestyle that you can’t control? And I feel like that’s a question that is so relevant right now. What I mean is, we don’t think about it, but the authority figures in our countries tell us a lot of things about our future. Scientists have told us that hang-ups and mental conditions are handed down to us from our parents, which is partly true. But does that mean we can just blame our parents… or worse, what if we want to be different, but we can’t be.

That’s the idea that has scared me. I have an alcoholic grandfather on one side, an uncle in prison, and my dad was once on drugs and into a ton of bad stuff. He’s not anymore, since becoming a dedicated Christian, but if I listen to science, my chances of being a drug abuser went up. Anger issues run in my family, bitterness, insecurities, and I could just accept that all that falls to me…but should I? Is it true that I have no choice? Perhaps I may never pick up a bottle of alcohol but if I ever do, do I have to be addicted? Do I have to try drugs when I feel empty inside? Do I have to be angry? Do I have to end up in jail? I bet everyone is thinking “No! How ridiculous.” At least I hope you’re thinking that. What about the smaller and more subtle ideas? Like do I have to think I’m ugly or unlovable. Do I have to complain? Or eat too much? Do I have to live in fear? Big things or little things, the thinking creeps in. And we make excuses.

It can be difficult to take responsibility because it means work. You may have to actually think and not let the media ad Hollywood think for you. Are we just cruising through life or are we here for a reason? I’ll give a few examples from the show, see if you can find yourself in them:

Briar Beauty: This girl is the daughter of sleeping beauty. She is resigned to the fact that she’ll have to sleep away 100 years of her life, which is almost the same as dying because she’ll miss out on all the people she lives around now. Briar wants to party it up (in her own words) because she wants to enjoy what little time she has, but as the time to seal her fate approaches she doesn’t feel like she’s really been fulfilling her time. Parties are fun, but her friends are what she’s really going to miss.

Ashlyn Ella: She’s the one who finds herself in a Romeo and Juliet situation. I don’t have much to say about it, except that she does have to consider the price of following her heart, which is often downplayed in movies as not really being much of a price, but for her it is. Is the good everyone else agrees on always the one you should go with?

Dexter Charming: Ever feel like you were born the odd one out in a family? That’s Dexter. He isn’t common hero material. And he is so blinded by the expectations of the world that he can’t see that being a hero is really the matter of your heart and there he has what it takes.

Duchess Swan: What if your only reason to exist was to carry on someone else’s story? And not only that, but you knew for sure that story didn’t have a happy ending. If someone told you that you had to work this job to keep your family alive, but you would end up poor and homeless on the streets, you might not be too happy. It might be noble to do it, but isn’t that a waste of your life? does it matter? Aren’t our families the most important thing in the world, who better to sacrifice for.

Apple White: There are those who like society’s role for them. The lucky few who have the body to be on a magazine and the personality to make everyone feel important, and maybe that’s not bad. But is true heroism all in running things smoothly and making people feel important? Or is it in actually believing other people are more important than yourself? Apple will be on your side as long as it fits with her plan of what is the best good for everyone, but dare to suggest that another option might be better and you will find her as close minded and stubborn as a mule.

Raven Queen: This is my personal favorite character. Raven Queen does not have all the answers, and she may end up having to live a life which she hates the idea of. But is that gong to stop her from being the best friend she can be now? No. Raven’s attitude is that if she only has a little time to live the way she wants, then she’ll spend that time being the best person she can be. Pursuing her creative interests and helping her friends and fellow students. Raven is also not going to blindly accept that a life of repetition is all she can have.

Which is the most noble way to go? Everyone wants to have a good life. Not everyone is willing to have it. Most people will choose Briar’s path of having the best time they can have because they have so little they can’t waste it in doing boring things, a serve me type of thinking. Or they will fall into Dexter’s rut of thinking they don’t have the skills to make it so why try? Then there’s the smaller group of people who will decide to break the rules, but only as far as it suits them and makes them comfortable. There’s also a group of people who will sacrifice their lives to help those closest to them, but they themselves end up unhappy and alone, and the people they sacrificed for don’t really respect them. In the much smaller privileged world of celebrities; those talented individuals whom people like, they make their mark, but rarely do they pay any price to do good things and somehow all their goodness reflects back on them, which is no different than if a person went around telling people “I’m awesome” 60 times a day. (Enough said.) Then there are the very few people in this world who are committed to doing what’s right no matter the cost. They are the ones who face the tough questions and find answers and aren’t afraid to get help. They don’t need to be in the spotlight all the time, but neither do they reject it if they can use it to do more good. These people don’t do just what they feel like doing, they do what they think they should do.

Newsflash: Each of these ways of life is a choice. No one forces you to accept them because no one can. They only way anyone can make you be anything is if you let them. I’m not a drug addict, or a person who is always angry over something, I don’t gorge myself on food, and I don’t live in fear. It’s not because I’ve never been given the message that I should; believe me, I have; but it’s because I finally realized that the message was a lie. I am a bit sorry that this article ended up being so long, but I hope it was worth the read. I meant every word. But there’s one more component to this that I haven’t covered and I will in my next post. Keep reading!

Natasha

Mirror, Mirror, on the wall.

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My mirror is literally on the wall. I guess this is a problem every girl in America and all over the globe has: Our appearance.

You know, it’s not even about thinking we’re ugly at this point. Deep down, I think we just don’t like our body because we don’t like ourselves. You can be a beauty queen and feel ugly. Because you want to have true beauty on the inside. One of my grandmothers was a model in her day, another one was a stewardess; now, even in their seventies, they still hang on to the memories of that, they still want to be beautiful.

And the reason the mirror is our enemy is because we’ve put a curse on it. Whenever we look into it we are looking for the flaws in our outfit or our make-up. It’s gotten so bad I think even the guys have caught it now.

It’s really captured pretty well in this song “Mirror, mirror, on the wall; have I got it? ‘Cause mirror you’ve always told me…who I am. I’m finding it’s not easy to be perfect. So sorry, you won’t define me.”

How is it that we can hear we are beautiful, pretty, smart, nice, and talented; again and again, and we still don’t believe it?

I’ll tell you one reason, we’re afraid. The song “Let it go!” was an instant hit. I have listened to it probably hundreds of times. And it’s not the music, which is nice, but not really my style. (Though I love the piano portion in the beginning.) It’s not even the cool animation or catchy tune. What grabbed me about the song was the mingling of beauty and being fearless. In the book of 1 Peter in the new testament, verses 3-6, Peter gives women some beauty advice, not to rely on gold, hairstyles, and fancy clothes; but on the inner person of the heart, on having a gentle and quiet spirit; which is precious to God. Later he says not to give way to fear. To give way means to let fear run its course in you life and not resist it, to give in. You can like jewelry (I do) and nice clothes, but the trap is liking them for the wrong reason. (Like because they’re popular.) Not that popularity makes something bad, but is it popular with people you respect? Looking like a fashion model is fine if you respect fashion models, but do you? It’s not wrong to imitate how someone else looks, a little bit, but it is wrong to try to become that person. The mirror tells you anything unique to you has to be ugly or boring because it’s you. The mirror always tells you to change what it’s hardest to help. (Like the shape of your face, what else is contouring for?) The mirror tells you you’re not thin enough. (Define thin enough, different weights are appropriate for different people.) But it’s never enough change to make you feel pretty, or hot, or stylish.

Often true beauty is something people talk about but don’t believe in enough to risk trying it. And it is risky. I fell like no one tells us the price. The price is that no one may notice, no one may commend you for trying to be more natural and to be yourself. The price is that you have to choose to lay aside the standards of the world, all of them. The price is that people may think you’re weird for being confident. The price also is that if you don’t meet the regular standards of beauty not everyone will think you’re pretty. But it is so worth it to know that you are beautiful.

I think we need to get a little attitude with the mirror and tell it off when we’re feeling ugly. But I truly believe only God can fix the thing in our hearts that makes us doubt. I’ve never been able to cure myself of it, only God ever breaks through. Though self talk is important. So, beauty is inward, and it is a belief and an attitude. Not a look or a number on the scale.