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So what is the secret to achieving real beauty,
not the kind that changes day to day, but the kind
that stays with you all your life?
I think the secret is simple: make your whole life
as good as it can be. Start beautifying your
inside and worry about the outside later.
Joy and Passion
Finding something you love to do is a good start
to increasing the moments of joy in your life, and
your passion for living. Today's pace of life
prevents too many people from finding what they
love to do because they feel so tired. But when
you give in to the urge to take photographs or
make your own clothes or do woodworking, or become
a first-class baker, you're giving yourself a
gift. It takes energy, but it also creates energy
in the passion you find for a new activity. You
may or may not be able to change careers, but
doing something you love even as a hobby brightens
you up. You'll look forward to getting up in the
morning, you'll feel more interested and alive,
and other people will be drawn to your energy. If
schools really wanted to increase the quality of
kids' lives, there would be a place in the
curriculum for finding things you love to do and
working at them, attaining a level of expertise
that lets you express your creativity. As adults,
we can re-educate ourselves about joy and passion
by skipping the night class in business management
and studying sculpture instead.
Kindness
People remember striking physical beauty, but
people appreciate kindness. Stress is one of the
killers of kindness: when we feel pressured, we
tend to pull away from others in a misguided
attempt to save ourselves from more pain. In fact,
this protective measure is exactly the opposite of
what we need to do to reduce stress. When you
reach out to people, it invariably makes you feel
good. You don't read much about kindness these
days, and it's a real shame, because it's one of
the few things that really count.
Kindness can take so many forms, it's hard to know
where to start in describing it. Sometimes being
kind just means not pressing an advantage when you
could. Letting someone in front of you at the
supermarket is a small gift: so is taking a minute
to talk to someone who's sad. Kindness is more
than doing things for other people, though. When
you're kind to someone, you are stretching a set
of mental or spiritual muscles, growing your own
capacity for compassion. It’s a no-lose
proposition.
Health
Physical health is often expressed in glowing
skin, bright eyes and a toned-up body. Mental
health is an important component of physical
health, because your mind and your body are
inextricably linked. (Western medicine is still
grappling with this mystery, but we don't need
to.) Your mental health rests on your ability to
be happy, on your having harmonious relationships
and on your capacity for creative self-expression.
There might be a few other things, but I think
these are the most important ones.
If you're dealing with anxiety, depression or
relationship problems, your quality of life will
suffer until something can be done to change what
ails you. There are a variety of ways to reduce
mental suffering, and I'll name a few, but they
all rely on your being willing and able to get
help, and to try more than one method if the first
one doesn't work. Making a commitment to your own
peace of mind is the first step in changing your
life for the better.
Some problems really can be alleviated with
medications. A few problems can only be addressed
with medications, so if you suffer from bipolar
disorder, clinical depression, schizophrenia or
debilitating anxiety, the chemical solution may be
the best first step. If depression or anxiety has
an underlying mind-based cause, such as traumatic
memory or a recent loss, medication may relieve
enough of the highly distressing symptoms to make
it easier to get to therapy.
A good therapist can help you work through things
that are keeping you stuck, and can be an
excellent ally when you have problems with
relationships or career issues. Working with a
therapist is a good way to check out your beliefs
about the world and about people, and to make
changes in behavior and thought patterns that may
be making you unhappy.
A vital part of mental health, spiritual health is
infrequently addressed by doctors and therapists.
Ignoring your need for quiet, for peaceful
meditation, for pondering life's mysteries
depletes your consciousness and impacts your
mental health by increasing stress. Whether you
believe in a particular religion or not, taking
the time to consider and meet your spiritual needs
is an important part of keeping your overall
health.
Courage
Jean-Paul Sartre pointed out that you can't have
true freedom without taking responsibility for
your actions. In general, the existentialists
turned out to be a pretty optimistic bunch, since
they primarily opted to live after deciding that
life is intrinsically meaningless. Great minds
have said that the only thing that makes life
meaningful is to live as though you have purpose,
and (having a great mind of my own), I'm inclined
to agree.
In the same way that it takes courage to keep
plugging away at creating a meaningful life
despite life's setbacks and intellectual
red-herrings, working on your inner beauty takes
some nerve. It's more difficult to build character
than it is to get glossy hair, and there are no
guarantees that building character makes life any
easier or more pleasant. Courage (from the French
word for "heart") means being willing take
important risks. The risk is that inner beauty
will, in the end matter more than outer beauty. I
think it's a good risk, don’t you?
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(1) Cleanse skin no more than twice daily with a mild cleaner that doesn't over dry you skin. Be sure to use a cleanser meant for your skin type (2) Gently exfoliate your skin on a daily basis to remove dead skin cells and expose newer, healthier glowing skin underneath. (3) Apply a moisturizer. A moisturizer with sunscreen of at least SPF 15 should be applied during the day.
