Letter to my daughter

I wrote this a year and a half ago, after quite some time agonizing over what to teach the preschooler about her birthmark. After reading AGK's essay about beauty, confidence and her daughter, I decided to share this.

Dear one:

Some day, you are going to come to me, upset over the way you look. It might be because of your birthmark; it might be because of your chest measurements, or your weight, the color of your eyes and hair, or even just the fact that your hair is really fighting you that day. You'll want so desperately to be beautiful, to have people look at you and admire you, to have men want to be with you because of your overwhelming beauty. At least, I'm guessing you will, because that's what I've felt on more than one occasion, and most of my friends have felt that way too.

And when that happens I'll tell you that you are beautiful, that your hair and your eyes, your figure and your complexion are all lovely, even though right at that moment you are only seeing your flaws. And you will then say, "Oh, mom, you have to say that, because you're my mother." Or you'll say, "Of course you think I'm pretty. You love me," as if my love for you annuls my judgment of your appearance. You might think that I am not being honest with you for fear of hurting your feelings because I love you so much.

You know what? That fact that I love you, and therefore see you as beautiful is the whole point, and part of one of the greatest truths I can ever teach you.

You see, the people who love you are always going to see you as beautiful. The people who hate you are always going to see you as ugly. What that leaves is all the people in the middle - the people who don't know you yet, or the people who are too shallow to see past your outer surface to your heart. Those are the people who will judge you by the way you look. As they come to know you, though, they will find their opinion of you changing. Some will like you, even love you, and they will see you as a lovely woman whose company they enjoy very much. Others will dislike you, and nothing will ever convince them to see you as beautiful, even if you were Miss Universe.

The secret to all this is the inner beauty you cultivate. You need to make yourself first and foremost beautiful on the inside. As you choose to act in ways that are true and kind, with virtue, honor and integrity, showing forth kindness and compassion to those you meet, your true nature will shine through, and those who meet you will not be able to help being charmed by you. They will not notice your appearance flaws, might not even be able to give a good physical description of you, except to say that, "Wow - that girl there? Isn't she something else?" And they will smile, because it will give them great joy to have met you.

The exception will be those that are for some reason offended by things of virtue and beauty. There will plenty of those, I'm afraid. There are many people like that in the world, people who prefer the safety of shallow judgment and petty malice, who try to destroy what they can't control. Their rejection and cruel treatment will undoubtedly cause you pain. You might want to change to try to please them, trying to find some way to look or act or be that will win their approval and smiles.

You will never gain that approval. If you try, you will only twist yourself into knots, and eventually they will lead you so far away from your true self that you will wind up not even recognizing who you are anymore. Those people are of a world that uses our human desire for approval and acceptance to destroy us. No matter what, they will always raise the bar. Nothing you do will ever be enough to please them for more than a short time. So don't try. Run away from their snares, and avoid their traps by staying far away from them. Stay close to those who love you already, and you will be happy, because you will be free to be your true self, and will be loved for the beauty of that true self.

It's hard writing this to the woman you will be. I don't know what you'll be like, or what our relationship will be. I probably sound preachy. I hope not - I hate it when people preach at me. If I do sound that way, please forgive me. I was just reading some things tonight written by people with birthmarks about growing up and coping with the mean and dumb things people have said to them, and I was wondering how best to handle these situations when they come up in your life. I thought of what I wrote down, and decided I'd better record it, because I will have forgotten it by the time you're old enough to be worrying about all this.

I worried about my appearance for years, afraid that I was too unattractive for any man to find me desirable or to love me. I thought I'd probably never get married. As I thought about this, though, and worked out over the years how I felt about that and how I wanted to react to it, I came to the conclusion that I didn't want someone to love me because I was beautiful. I didn't want someone to love me in spite of the fact that I wasn't beautiful. I wanted someone to love me, and to see me as beautiful because of his love for me. Not long after I worked that out is when I met your father, who did love me before he ever met me in person, and who still thinks I'm beautiful because of his love for me. I hope you meet someone like your father someday, someone who is good and wise and gentle, capable of seeing the heart like he does, who will love you and see you as beautiful because of that love.

I love you so much. I'm sending you a hug across the years - now go and collect a real one from the current me.

Your loving mom