A scar that begins at my navel and travels downward is a memory of becoming a mother of twin girls during an emergency C-section. The tiny scar on my nose is a flaw that tells me the MOHS surgery I had for skin cancer was successful. My life isn’t flawless and neither am I, which is good.
A colleague of mine who has visible laugh lines shuns any thoughts of fillers. She says she likes her lines because they show she has laughed quite a lot in her 42 years. That, she says, means she’s enjoyed life. Another friend tells me she wouldn’t trade her imperfect nose because it is a distinctive reminder of her heritage and who she is.
But there is a stigma attached to not being perfect. We’re surrounded by perfection all the time. Society exalts the beauty of celebrities and model-perfect media images. We’re told in a not-so-subtle manner that perfection of face and form is the desired Holy Grail. There’s something seriously wrong with anyone who doesn’t strive for outward breathtaking beauty, we are told, and somewhere deep in our souls we believe it.
That already miraculously working machine we call a body isn’t good enough? A marvel of perfection as it is, it still gets poked, cut, stretched, bloodied, stitched, and changed to become what we think it should be. We starve it and belittle it to please ‘others’. Unless there is a medical problem, most of us show it no respect for years.
At a recent barbecue I met the mother of a 2 month old baby. She had a new mother radiance about her. Everyone around her was complimenting her on how lovely she looked. Yet later in the evening she was telling a group of us how upset she was about gaining weight and how she had decided to have a tummy tuck as soon as possible to get rid of the ‘ugly flab’. Truth be told, her weight gain was minimal and had simply given her a more womanly figure.
Perfection is overrated. A little imperfection is good for us. Look at a beautiful face in any airbrushed picture and you will see that something is missing. It doesn’t look quite right, there’s nothing unique. There’s a certain amount of perfection in being imperfect, flaws and all.
Renaissance artists such as Michelangelo and da Vinci created masterpieces with flaws. A rounded stomach, a slightly skewed nose showed character and life. Beauty was celebrated in many forms.
Happiness shouldn’t be based on being perfect. A big part of happiness comes from loving your body as it is now. We need to find the ‘perfection of imperfection’ in the road map of our bodies and understand that the slightly flawed is more beautiful than the flawless ever could be.
© copyright 2023 Kristen Houghton all rights reserved
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kristen Houghton is the author of the best-selling series, A Cate Harlow Private Investigation, which has been named Best Series of the Year by WNYC Book Clubs. Her latest novel, TEETH: The Haunting of Dansbury Plot, has just been released.
Her writing portfolio includes The Huffington Post, Thrive, interviews and reviews for HBO documentaries, The Style Network, and OWN, The Oprah Winfrey Network.
A storyteller from childhood, she has always felt that “Words, in any language are pure magic”.
On a personal note, she is crazy about tennis and, just like her fictional character Cate Harlow, tries to play as often as she can.
