In the Eye of the Beholder

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

True enough.  But as we age, things change.  Sometimes it seems like things are changing more quickly than I can process.                  

The physical imperfections that come with aging can be . . . challenging.  I want my face to stay smooth!  My hair did not used to be thin and I’m losing the battle to keep the underside of my upper arms taut.  Like I said, it’s challenging. 

On the other hand, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life worrying incessantly about the lines on my face and my skin’s lack of viscosity so much that it dulls my happiness and robs me of my joy. 

Of course, I'll continue to fight the good fight with the food that I eat and the way that I move.  And you can bet I’ll do about anything this side of surgery to feel like I’m fighting the clock.  But in the end, we’re all going to age.  If we’re lucky, we’ll live to a ripe old age and – spoiler alert!:  we’ll look old as the hills when we do.  Again, if we're lucky.
 
I imagine my future self (I'm talking decades) looking in the mirror and seeing someone who looks nothing like the younger version of me and I try to believe that by then my focus will have shifted and my attention will be flowing in another direction.  Maybe then I’ll be free of the dread I feel now when I notice yet another reminder that I’m aging.  Maybe by then my world will be unencumbered by the distraction of caring how I look to other people.  

In the meantime, maybe it’s okay to go down fighting for our youth – as long as we also find the time to start accepting the older versions of ourselves.