“Love thy neighbour as you would love yourself” is how the saying goes. But apparently, we love our neighbours more than we love ourselves. A new campaign by Dove has made it quite apparent that women in general view themselves more critically than others. Asked to describe their facial features to a sketch artist who had not seen them, each highlighted the flaws in their features predominantly (and I am guessing, subconsciously). When others described the women, they gave positive details about the same features the women themselves disliked. The resultant two sketches, although of the same woman, were radically different, with the one developed with the help of other people’s description turning out prettier and more beautiful.
I have always had this perception of beauty, so to say. I would try to define which features others would find pretty or which kind of looks would be described as beautiful by most. Time and again, I have irritated my husband until he snapped back at me that I am wrong, there is no concept like a universally beautiful person... Everyone is beautiful in their own way... And I would be like “Yeah, right!” I have had this thing with beauty... Figuring that coloured eyes, fair skin, awesome figure and a smile that would kill makes a girl beautiful. I mean Aishwarya Rai would turn heads if she walked down the road, wouldn’t she? However, I have often had trouble getting people to agree with me. Some of them have the audacity to say Mrs Rai Bachchan is not that pretty (including, I suspect, that hubby of mine!)
But that campaign from Dove touched a cord in my heart, which I think has happened with women all over the world, from the looks of how viral it has gone. It has shown me that people notice and remember the good over the bad. They will probably not remember that your eyebrows were skewed, but will notice that the colour of your eyes was light brown, and your eyes lit up the moment you talked about your passion.
I remember sometimes pestering my hubby over how dark I was, secretly wishing for his reassurance that I was okay. Every few weeks, I keep asking him to explain why, out of a million others, he selected me to spend his life, exasperating him. But I guess it comes from a deep rooted perception of beauty I have had. Rating myself on the features I described above brought my score to zero most of the times.
However, this campaign has made me realise that I am beautiful in my own way, and that the perception I had was horribly wrong and distorted. I should probably see myself as my husband sees me; as my mother describes me to others; as my father remembers me always; as my child will see me in the coming future.
Maybe now I can accept compliments with grace rather than brush them away as exaggerations like I always do. Maybe I can believe my better half when he says that I am looking awesomely pretty (invariably when I am having a good hair day, but shhhhhh!) And most importantly, maybe I will be able to focus on the better aspects of my features than the ones I dislike.
Here’s a toast to all the beautiful women out there, each and every one of them. May you discover your beauty and slay the beast within that prevents you from doing so. And may you find people that remind you that you are beautiful every day of your life J
PS – Click here for the video if you haven’t seen it yet.
