The Bigger Picture:Each of us is born completely and wonderfully beautiful. When you look across at someone in the street or at yourself in the mirror, and you don't see it, it isn't that they aren't inherently beautiful, but it's what has happened in the years since birth, writes Shalini Sinha.
Indeed, you, they, we were all born magnificently beautiful, brilliantly charismatic and intensely attractive. Just notice how a newborn baby catches and holds our attention. Their gaze is magnetising. He or she looks deeply into our eyes, and we look back, captivated.
A human is born with the inherent components of beauty and attractiveness within us. They are our survival skills to bond with and connect to each other. And yet, many of us struggle to express it and believe it is there inside us.
Despite the fact that the beauty industry pours inconceivable amounts of money into the development of products to "enhance" or "protect" our skin, hair and colouring; what has the greatest impact on our beauty is self-esteem.
Worry, doubt and uncertainty eclipse our "inner light" - our freedom, spirit and essence - that when nurtured and unleashed, not only attracts others but is dazzlingly beautiful to see. While worry makes us hesitate and retreat - the opposites of attraction - reaching out, connecting and expressing compassionate love radiates. This shows off a true beauty.
Just as worry does not attract, neither does fear, judgment or criticism. While the harsh treatment of others is obviously not endearing, it is our harsh treatment of ourselves that leaves its mark on our faces, skin, posture, colouring and overall health. To worry about "who we are" - whether we are good, loving or loveable - is in itself painful. It causes us stress, showing itself in how we carry ourselves and respond to others.
There need not be any worry of our true nature. The fact is that humans are born wanting love and connection. We are good and innocent, and look to enjoy each other and be close.
Any places where we hurt each other comes from some other agenda - usually the result of confusion and disconnection which create "blind-spots".
Indeed, this hurts us as much as those around us. When we choose to act in accordance with what is genuinely meaningful to us, and so can see for ourselves our heart's work in action (regardless of what others might say) we find peace of mind. This is beautiful.
It is not a coincidence that internalised fear and worry also cause us to mistreat ourselves. They make it seem easier to watch TV, be lazy and eat things that "make us feel good" than to connect with what matters to us - because if we connect, we'll feel.
These behaviours take their toll on our inherent beauty: they make us unfit, lacking in energy and nutrition and, most of all, lacking in courage and charisma.
I find it alarming how common and normalised cosmetic surgery is becoming in society. I'm not talking about surgeries performed as part of the treatment and healing of injuries and serious illness. I'm talking about the industry that promotes the sale of surgery to people wanting to change their normal, well-functioning bodies because they can't see their own beauty.
Notwithstanding the fact that surgery is both dangerous and invasive to our bodies, it is the lack of self-love driving these decisions that disturbs me.
I have a dream: that we celebrate the wonder and diversity of the bodies of the human population. I wish that every human born will get to hold onto their sense of magnificence, right through their life. I wish for us to seek help from each other through difficult times so that we become able to live in ways that nurture, encourage and make ourselves shine. Only then will we find ourselves to be a genuinely beautiful population creating radiant societies.
Do our cosmetics give us the opportunity to feel better about the bodies we are born with? To feel better about our own hair, natural colouring, height, shape, legs, breasts, arms and skin?
My personal experience from a time when I wore make-up regularly was that I increasingly felt my own face looked plain without it. Stopping wearing it, while difficult, opened up the possibility for me to nurture my natural radiance. When we are covering up who we really are, we lose opportunities to shine. I was born like this. I'm entitled to feel joy about it.
The messages, pressures and images of the beauty industry are powerful. Rather than increasing our self-esteem, they confuse and hurt us. Not only do they narrow what is celebrated as beautiful, but they leave little room for us to be genuinely happy about ourselves as we have been made.
Challenging them requires an equal power: it is for us to stand side by side with each other, and create and send new messages about what we experience as beauty. Get in touch to join me in doing this!
Shalini works as a life coach for clients in Ireland and inter- nationally, and practises the Bowen technique in Dublin and Wexford.