I’ve had a few epiphanies lately. The first one came a few months ago on one of those rare good hair days when my eyeliner was straight, and my lipstick went on smoothly. I looked in the mirror and pronounced myself beautiful.
Immediately something inside me told me, “You can’t say that. You can’t tell yourself you’re beautiful. Anyway, who do you think you are to be beautiful?”
Why can’t I be beautiful? Fear welled up within me. Why isn’t it OK to be beautiful?
“You just can’t,” the voice said.
I looked back in the mirror and liked what I saw. I shook the voice from my head, and I went right ahead being beautiful anyway.
I spent the rest of the day telling myself, “I am beautiful and it’s OK to think so.”
Since that day I’ve caught myself being beautiful more often. There are even days without make up that I feel beautiful. I tell myself, “I am beautiful and it’s OK to think so.”
A few weeks after my BEAUTIFUL ME epiphany I realized that I like being happy. I like telling people I’m happy. My world is not perfect, the world in general is not perfect, but I AM HAPPY. AND it’s OK. It is OK to be happy!
At first glance this might sound obvious, but really read the news, read social media, try talking to people about being happy. How many people refuse to see the good things going on in the world? How many people are holding on to a story that says life is hard? How many people think you are bragging when you say you are happy?
Years ago, I read Rhonda Byrnes’ book Gratitude. Since then, the power of gratitude has been exploding social media and overflowing bookstore shelves. Those of us who are ready to be happy have grabbed on tight and aren’t letting go of gratitude. It feels good!
Once you get to this side of happy you look back and wonder why so many people refuse to be happy. Holding on to anger and resentment seems to be more important. Being happy is so much better than being bitter and resentful. Why do people fight being happy?
I guess it’s fear. Fear of not being good enough for happiness. Fear of letting go of old ways of viewing the world. For me, it was fear of admitting that the way I saw the world wasn’t working. But who wants to admit that the way they are playing this game of life is a losing strategy? I mean geeze, I had to admit I was wrong, and when you’re scared, admitting that you are wrong is a big no no. I could go into a long dissertation on unworthiness here, but this essay is about my epiphanies, so I’ll wrap up this epiphany by saying, It’s OK to be happy!
In the last few days, I have gone back to dreaming. I have revisited favorite dreams and rolled around in the possibility of new good things in my life. I have decided to enjoy life and trust the Universe to figure out how new things will happen. Just dreaming of fun things feels good. Epiphany three, it’s OK to dream!
To sum it all up here are my mantras for 2023:
- It’s OK to be beautiful!
- It’s OK to be happy!
- It’s OK to dream!