Don't Hate Me Cus' I'm Beautiful- Or Homely - Or Ogarish

 I watched Shrek today, in Spanish, and may I say that it was hilary (short for hilarious- as one of my favorite friends would say-in this instance making it way too long because of this extremely long explanation. But it saves you one syllable, applicable elsewhere. Okay the end). I enjoyed all the Mexican culture puns and the play on words. I laughed, I cried, okay maybe just the first, but most of all it made me think~

Princess Fiona: is afraid of being "ugly" so she automatically thinks that her curse  made her an Oger at night. At the end of the movie we find out that her True Love's Kiss revealed her true self. Her once "pretty" appearance disappeared and we see that she becomes the, all-the-time-ogeresque, beauty.

Shrek: Describes himself as an onion who is deep and misunderstood by the WORLD. He pretends to be something he is really not, to feed into the "image" that others portray him as, so people will just leave him alone.

So here's what I think (and this is just my opinion, you might have a different one, and guess what. That's okay).

We as people tend to always want to blame others for things (myself included). Simply put. When someone is mean to us because we have a "disadvantage" or we are "different",  it is so easy to blame them and anyone else who thinks like them for our bitterness. Deep down we are just hurt that we are not being accepted the way we want to be, by those people. In some cases most people can brush off a couple encounters with these people I like to call, Negative Nancies and Debbie Downers. But there are other people that have a little more sensitive soul that get stuck. They can get so stuck that they themselves become the N.N.'s and D.D.'s. They themselves become bitter and Ogeresque.

Just because someone is beautiful (and take mind that beauty is in the eye of the beholder), does not mean that they have it better in life. Just because someone is homely does not mean that they are a trapped oger mad at the world for their looks. To me, someone who is aesthetically pleasing, can be the ugliest person I know, based on their heart. And someone who is not so cute, can quickly become a beautiful swan in my eyes if they have a heart of gold. I think for the most part we KNOW this to be true. Why our society puts so much emphasis on looking a certain way, I have no idea. BUT the point I'm trying to make here is that, if we go around ourselves blaming the WORLD for our actions and our sadness and bitterness, it's going to be one long and lonely life.

Take the rains of your life and chose to be the most beautiful person from the inside regardless of what your shell looks like. In the end we ALL get saggy and wrinkled anyway and then what. Do you want to spend the rest of your life treasuring your good looks and wishing you had youth? No, that's another way to have a long and sad life.

Think about it.

Stay blessed and stay saucy!

-Libby Lu

I Want To Be Like Audrey Hepburn

Did you know that Audrey Hepburn had a crooked tooth?! Neither did I! Why is that at all interesting you ask?Well.. I have a crooked tooth and for the better part of my existence I've plotted how I'm going to make it straight. I try pulling on it. Wishing on a star. I have even considered having dental work recently. I look in the mirror constantly and analyze its positioning and wish for it to grow (for it's a little baby tooth, didn't quite grow as all my other teeth did) and wished for it to get straight. I look at my teeth and think, man, if this ONE tooth was straight, my teeth would be perfect. But that's not where I stop when it comes to my insecurities. If only I had this person's legs, I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I was a baller, I wish I had a rabbit... Oh wait never mind, just got caught up in my head. Any who, you get the point. I'm constantly picking on myself and the "flaws" that I see in me. Focusing my energy on something so negative that little by little I destroy my spirit and make myself  feel worthless.

How does this all tie in to Audrey? Well I've always loved her for so many reasons. She was fashionable, beautiful and a famous movie star. This is why I bought a coffee table book with a butt load of pictures of her to give as a Christmas present to my aunt Sharon. As I was flipping through the pages, there were many many pictures I had never seen. One in specific revealed. HER crooked tooth.  Did it change the way I saw her? NO, it made me fall in love with her even more. She's an Icon of a woman, thought by millions as one of the most beautiful women in the world and here she had a flaw. WOW. That goes to show that we are many times our worst enemies. We look at ourselves with such a critical eye. God sees us so differently and I am sure it pains him to see how judgmental we are of ourselves. As I flipped further down the book, I saw pictures of Audrey as an older woman hanging out with kids in Africa (she was a huge humanitarian devoting much of her life to UNICEF helping children in need!). She looked even more beautiful to me in those pictures where she had clearly aged than in any other picture I've ever seen of her. Her eyes were so loving and joyful. That kind of beauty only comes from the inside of someone's soul!

If I were to write a list of all the blessings that God has given me, it would super-exceed any list of "flaws". I KNOW this but some days it's just such a difficult concept to grasp. God made me exactly the way he made me for a reason. I should not be rude and Judgy McJudgerson to the creation He so carefully crafted.

Everyone is insecure about something. However, the more aware we are of the fact that our "looks" are only going to go so far, the more at peace we shall be in this world. The only way I can ever be at peace with who I am, is knowing that I was created for a purpose. There is a difference between wanting to have a healthy body, playing with makeup or loving fashion and obsessing with the physical appearance that we have. If you're always wanting to change something about yourself, it's never going to end at that little nip and tuck. You're always going to want more because you're going to be chasing an image that is different than the one you INTENDED to have in the first place.

It is by no means way easier said than done folks. I somehow believe that the more accepting of each other we are the better we'll get at accepting ourselves. We are all in need of one another. So go on. Love on who ever is next to you right now and tell them all the wonderful things you think about them! And YOU write down a list of all the wonderful things you think and feel about yourself. You'll see that you are a flawed perfect package!