One night my cousins and I got together we
began arduously searching through all their movies and none seemed to satisfy our
current mood (mind you it was five girls trying to figure out what to watch,
THAT is always a mission jeje!). We found
nothing that caught our attention, so we began to flip through the channels,
one show after another and yet we seemed to find nothing. Boy was it getting
interesting… After quite the search we stumbled upon a show called “The Price
of Beauty by Jessica Simpson”… hmmm now that sounded interesting! We watched as
Jessica visited France and submerged herself in French culture trying to
discover what beauty meant to French women. The episode ended and then came the
Philippines. We watched intrigued at what beauty meant for each country and how
drastically different each countries beauty standards were. (Might I add, we
all loved the show; it was interesting and exploratory) So we all began to
watch the season, we all wanted to know what beauty meant to each country,
there was; Uganda, USA, Japan, France, Brazil, Philippines and Morocco. All
were intriguing BUT Morocco’s definition of beauty was one of my favourites
because it had so much meaning! Beauty for
Moroccan women (& men I guess) was all in the eyes, they said they covered
up and what you saw was their eyes.
Hmmm…
I thought how so, why just the eyes? Then I remembered a quote “the eyes are
the window to our soul”. Eyes have a huge significance! I once was told by a
guy friend, you’re smiling but your eyes aren’t. I thought that was the most
intriguing thing (of course until after, at the moment I wasn’t too pleased);
you see your eyes reflect what you are or are feeling deep inside, there is
something about the eyes, if you’re sad they show it, if you’re happy they do
also. I once watched “America’s Top Model” and one thing I heard the camera
people repeated over and over again was smile
with your eyes. It’s all about the eyes… interesting*… Oh yes, & I sort
of paid much attention to one thing… I noticed (on public transit) that when a
guy wanted a girl to notice him; his mission was to get her to look at him, to
catch her eye. If she was not interested she simply did not look at him, she
looked at everything else but him (it was a few that I saw loll… use your life for good n’est pas?). If he did catch her eye then
he’d conquered part of his mission.
There
is a story in the bible about two sisters named; Rachel and Leah. The bible
goes on to describe that Rachel was beautiful BUT it stops at Leah and all it
mentions is her eyes, Leah’s eyes were delicate, but Rachel was
beautiful of form and appearance. Genesis
29:17. There
was something in Leah’s eyes that Rachel did not have.
The
perception of beauty in North America is far off & very different to that
in Morocco. While in Morocco it’s about covering up and letting your eyes do
the talking, in N.A .it’s all about being exposed and letting all eyes be on
you. Now I am not saying you have to cover up. However there is one saying I hear
often “why is he looking at me like that, why can’t he look at my eyes or into
my eyes”. Women want to fall with a man who gazes into her eyes and will tell
her he loves her… but is it possible when your bringing so much attention to
other areas?.. The question here is what are you emphasizing?
That’s
where modesty kicks in! I was once talking to a group of my close female
cousins and friends about how our faces really count, because young men when
they meet us will go by whom we are and how pretty our face is jejeje! They
look at our faces and not all else because we are dressing modestly, making the
focal point our faces… our eyes… You see modesty promotes you being looked at exactly for whom you are;
personality and character. Not at what you have to offer. The young man who
will love you will fall in love with the ~WHO~ you really are as a person and
with those eyes, as Jacob did end up falling in love with Leah and spent
eternity with her! (from the book Cheated- DO READ!!)
The
last story I’d like to tell you… so you may see how important modesty is; about
one of my young aunts. She mentioned she had been discussing modesty with some
female colleagues at work but she said she wanted to investigate further; she
wanted to know what the men thought about modesty, so she went to ask one of
her friends at the office. When she asked him he mentioned to her these words
“you think you’re not attractive the way you dress, you are, men wonder what
you look like, good gifts come well wrapped”. I mean his words aren’t the
easiest to soak in, a bit blunt much!!!! BUT they have a great truth! Modesty
is beautiful, not ugly! It makes you stand out in a crowd and shine with great
difference. As he said, which is true... GOOD gifts come well wrapped!!
Something worth keeping is beautifully kept and packaged!
In
essence… Beauty is in the EYE of the beholder, beauty is not about what your
showing and what you have to offer, it’s about YOU, who you are inside. With
age we all change and the beauty of youth leaves us, but who we are inside
& those eyes you have stay with you forever. In youth Modesty makes you
shine in a different light and makes you stand out in a greater way, not just
for men alone but for our God, who loves us even more!!
