My angel girl you will hear time again through tired people that beauty is only skin deep. I want to tell you right now how wrong that is, and pray that you will be the face of change.
My baby girl, I call you beautiful every time I look at you. It flows as easily as I say your name. Because you are beautiful my angel, you are stunning in every sense of the word, but it has nothing to do with your looks.
Sweet baby, right now you can storm the playground with mud on your face and spaghetti in your hair. You extend that dirty little hand to the closest friend you see and confidently march around the playground like you own the place. You dont care that your friend's shirt is on backwards, or that her mom cut hair at home, and the label on your shirt is nothing more than an itchy inconvenience whose words hold no meaning. When you laugh you do it with all of you heart, your nose scrunches up, your eyebrows come together, your eyes become so squinty one could question if they are even there, and you snort while you laugh loud enough for everyone to hear, and you my baby, are beautiful.
Baby girl as you grow up society will tell you that your hair has to look a certain way, and your makeup has to be done to perfection for you to have value. There may come a day that if you have so much as a blemish on your face you will avoid eye contact with anyone you encounter because you will feel in your heart that you are not worthy of talking to others due to this horrendous, tiny blemish. You will conceal that nose scrunching laugh of yours and you will pick your friends based on how well they dress. So in order to give you the best head start in life my baby, I want to teach you right now how to be beautiful.
Beauty is made up of several extremely important things, and none of them have to do with makeup. Baby girl, the most important things you need to be beautiful are these: independence, humility, kindness, compassion, forgiveness, wisdom, and perseverance.
Independence: While a damsel in distress may be the cute thing in Disney films it is not something to aspire to my angel. A beautiful woman accepts help graciously but never expects it. She is perfectly capable of standing on her own two feet, and does not need others for her daily survival. We all appreciate a shoulder to lean on now and then, and could use a helping hand when the going gets tough, but diamonds are formed when carbon withstands the earth's pressures on its own.
Humility: Baby girl, you may be the fastest, smartest, best, at any and everything you do, but none of that matters if those around you think less about themselves because of your words. A beautiful woman knows to listen without comparing. Someone else's accomplishments are just as big and important as yours. There may be times that by holding your tongue the person you talk to may make it seem as though you cannot do what they have accomplished… do not take this as a challenge, when we begin the battle of who's better no body wins. Simply congratulate them on their accomplishment, know in your heart what you are capable of, and move on. The most beautiful girls do not need to convince others of how beautiful they are, it just shines through.
Kindness: There is a saying “if he is nice to you, but not to the waiter, he is not a nice guy.” There is nothing more true than that. Kindness is not just something you express to those you want to be friends with. There is not a stranger on this earth who is not deserving of your kindness. Baby girl, in the age of facebook and cell phones it is easy to forget there is a human behind the screen with a life and a story and feelings just like you. Your words carry great weight my angel and it takes 100 kind words for every hurtful one. Causing someone else pain, will do nothing to ease yours. So be kind my angel. To everyone you meet.
Compassion: You may think that kindness and compassion are one in the same but they are not. Anyone can be kind but it takes a truly beautiful heart to be compassionate. The ability to see someone else's pain and give them your love to help ease it, is not a quality anyone can possess. Unfortunately our society likes to try to discourage you from using compassion wherever you go. If you give a homeless man a dollar, you will be told that he is going to use that dollar to buy drugs. If you help a friend get on their feet, you will be told they are using you. Do it anyway my angel. Their disapproval of your compassion only proves that the world needs you more than ever. No matter how many times you get burned, no matter who looks down on you, Never. Stop. Caring.
Forgiveness: This one is probably the hardest out of all of them. This world is harsh baby girl. Especially to those who are beautiful. People will see that you are independent and call you a prude, or worse. People will notice your humility and say you have no backbone, they will notice your kindness and compassion and accuse you of ulterior motives. Forgive those people. Forgive them for letting the world make them hard. Forgive them for what they cannot understand. Forgive them for not knowing that cutting you down will not build them up. Baby girl sometimes the people with the meanest words have the saddest hearts. They need your forgiveness, even when it isn't asked for or deserved.
Wisdom: This one is for you my love. This is the one where you take everything I have said and throw it out the window, but only when the time is right. If you do everything I have taught you with your heart, you will know when to use this one. There comes a time when someone has hurt you too many times. When the wound is too deep, the pain is too much, the comments unending. That is when it is time to walk away my angel. Do not slam doors on your way out, just walk away. Show yourself the same kindness you show others every day and remove yourself from a hurtful situation and have the wisdom to never look back. You are better than that my baby. You are a rarity and you deserve to be treated as such.
Perseverance: The final quality to a truly beautiful woman is to Never. Ever. Ever. Give up. There is absolutely nothing in this world you cannot do. Do it with gusto my baby. You will be told you can't, that you are too young, too small, too inexperienced, the list goes on. Do not listen to those words. You fight like crazy for your spot. There is no one in this world that got to the top by listening to those who wanted to keep them down. You are just as deserving, just as important, just as amazing as those you idolize, and the only thing standing between you and where you want to be is the amount of fight you are willing to put in to get there. Never give up my beautiful girl. This world needs you.
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