being strong and beautiful

Spiritual resource to share: new views of strength and beauty

Taew performing traditional Thai dance at international youth conference

As one of the host parents to our newest daughter, Taew from Thailand, I have been amazed and inspired at how much our new daughter has taken on. The more I talk with her, the more I realize the vast differences in cultures that she has bridged, and just how courageous she is!

I've been inspired while seeing how wonderful it is to blend our lives with those whose cultures have previously been unfamiliar to us. The bottom line of what is learned may seem trite, but it is true. We are one universal family - incredibly diverse, but each one of us expressing qualities that are universally beautiful and strong.

Just today, we had a wonderful example of this! Taew ran in her first track meet ever. Prior to the meet we talked about the beauty of women also being expressed in strength.

Taew wasn't very familiar with girls in sports. She claimed that she was not an athlete (which her track coach readily confirmed), and she spent most of track season on the sidelines, not wanting to get too involved for fear that she wasn't good enough. When she told her mother that she was doing this, her mother was concerned because it might mean that she would become more muscular and turn darker in the sun. (Paleness is preferable to the sun kissed faces here.)

Perhaps it is the whole ideal of beauty here that is different than in Thailand, or the whole expectation of what girls can or should do that was so different. She told us how she almost cried when the coach said that she was going to do the 400 meter run. But, she said emphatically, "My coach told me 'Yes, you can do this!'" And so she did. She went on to say that she got second in two races and last on the 400. And although her overall showed her more at the bottom than at the top, she just beamed and laughed when telling me this.

This was a huge step for Taew. She just soaked up the confidence her track coach had in her, the camaraderie of other girls cheering her on, and her own personal victory in doing something she never thought she would ever do!

Taew was able to experience a little more of her strength and her power. She was so happy, exhilarated even, that she proved she can do things WAY out of her comfort zone, and proved to herself that strength can be a very beautiful thing!

The inspiration is obvious. We can go beyond our accepted definitions of beauty and strength that we are comfortable with, and push to new heights: a more spiritual and lasting idea of what it means to be the infinite expression of an infinite Mind*. Taew rocks.

*Immortal man was and is God's image or idea, even the infinite expression of infinite Mind, and immortal man is coexistent and coeternal with that Mind.







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