On Aging, Beauty, and Coming Home

I plucked two grey hairs from my head this morning. Which is perhaps a slightly ironic way to begin a reflection on accepting aging.

I noticed them last night. I was going to pluck them then, but paused, thought about it, and asked myself, “Why?” What is so wrong with a couple of grey hairs? And I let them be and went to bed.

But this morning, there they were. And I didn't want them there, so I plucked them.

Oh lord, I sure do make myself laugh at times. Well, at least shake my head.

I know I think about aging differently than I used to. And yet, I still get caught up in the old cycle sometimes.

When I was younger, I had a pretty clear idea of what aging meant for a woman. I don't know that I consciously thought about it very much, but I had absorbed plenty of messages about what happened to us as we got older.

From my dear mom, who had also been conditioned to think these things over the years, as well as from many others close to me. And from films, TV shows, magazines, advertisements, and all the other places we absorb ideas without necessarily realizing it.

Skin became less smooth. Bodies changed and things started to sag. Hair went grey.

And we learned that these things were bad. That they needed to be covered, coloured, smoothed, lifted, or otherwise disguised.

Youth was beautiful, and aging was something you did your best to hide.

And of course, our bodies change as we get older. That's just part of being human. We don't stay eighteen forever, thank goodness.

But I've started to wonder about the stories we attach to those changes.

Because a wrinkle is a wrinkle. Grey hair is grey hair. Getting older is getting older.

The rest is the story we attach to it.

None of those things inherently mean that we are becoming less beautiful, less worthy, or less valuable. And yet, somewhere along the way, many of us learned that they do.

My partner's grandmother is 96. She is beautiful. Her eyes are still full of spark, her smile comes easily, as does her laughter. She is kind and generous.

When I tell her how beautiful she is, she turns away and says, “No, no, I'm old.

I find that really interesting.

Because somehow, in her mind, being old seems to cancel out even the possibility of being beautiful.

But why?

Why have we learned to see those things as opposites? Why does getting older have to mean becoming less beautiful? And who decides what a woman's beauty is supposed to look like anyway? Who decided it has an expiry date?

My favourite scene in Barbie was where Barbie is sitting at the bus stop and tells a visibly older woman that she's beautiful. And the woman replies, “Don't I know it.”

I loved that moment. I've thought and talked about it often. I don't recall too much else from that movie, but that scene is lodged in my head.

There was something about her response that felt so different from the way we are often taught to think about beauty. She didn't seem surprised. She didn't brush the compliment away. She didn't say, “Oh, no, I'm too old.”

She just knew it.

And I think that's what stayed with me.

But the more I think about it, the more I wonder if the question is bigger than whether an older woman can still be beautiful.

Why have we made beauty such an important measure of ourselves in the first place?

Beauty is, after all, a concept. A word we use to describe something we find pleasing or appealing. And yet we've attached so much meaning to it. We've created rules around it. We've decided which bodies, faces, ages, features and characteristics count as beautiful, and which don't.

And those rules change. Across cultures. Across generations. Across time.

The older I get, the more I notice just how expansive beauty actually is.

When I really stop and think about what I find beautiful, so much of it has very little to do with whether someone's skin is smooth, their body fits a particular shape, or they look a certain age.

It's in a genuine smile. In the way someone's eyes come alive when they talk about something they're passionate about. In someone's sense of style, or the way they express their culture, creativity or individuality. In the way someone moves through the world with confidence, humour, warmth or tenderness.

I think about the kindness of a stranger. Someone laughing so hard they can't quite catch their breath. The joy on someone's face when they see someone they love. Someone whose appearance draws you in even more because it doesn't fit conventional ideas of beauty.

The older I get, the more I notice that beauty seems to have very little to do with perfection.

And perhaps that's part of what is changing for me. Because I don't think I've ever loved my body as much as I do now. This love for it is still a newish thing for me.

I for sure didn't love it when it was perhaps at its so-called peak, when I was around eighteen. I was super slim, fit, toned, and probably much closer to the version of a woman's body that society tells us we should want.

I didn't appreciate that body then. I was too focused on picking apart all the ways in which it was not good enough in my eyes. I was always thinking it should be even smaller, even lighter, perhaps until I could disappear.

I was inside it, but I was never able to be truly at home in it. And I did have some valid reasons for that, so I give myself compassion for the pain of my past.

Now, as my body changes, I find myself relating to it differently.

I notice what it can do. I appreciate it more. I want to take care of it lovingly by giving it lots of water, delicious nourishing food, lots of fun movement, and opportunities to build its strength, so I can keep my energy and vitality and continue finding ways to enjoy myself in it.

And I also like to give it sweet treats, rest, and massages. ;-)

I spent so many years of my life at war with it. And now I feel like I've really gotten to know it. I feel more connected to it. I want to keep building that relationship. The more I know my body, the more I can notice what it needs and find little ways to care for it.

And maybe that's what has shifted.

I'm not necessarily looking at my body and deciding that every change is beautiful.

I'm noticing that I don't need to.

A body doesn't have to be beautiful to be worthy of care, appreciation, pleasure, or respect.

And I still pluck grey hairs from my own head, even though I think women who own their grey hair are beautiful.

Both things can be true.

I still hear the old programming. I still notice the messages about youth and beauty. I still have moments when I look at myself and see the things that have changed. I still envy all the firm booties at the gym.

I'm not sure we can simply think our way out of all of that conditioning.

But perhaps we can become more aware of it.

We can start to notice the difference between what is actually happening and the meaning we've been taught to give it.

When “I'm getting older” quietly becomes “I'm becoming less attractive.”

When “my body is changing” becomes “my body isn't good enough anymore.”

When “I have grey hair” somehow becomes “I need to fix this.”

And maybe we can get curious about where those ideas came from.

Because there is a lot of money to be made from women believing that aging is a problem to be solved.

There is always something else to buy, smooth, cover, lift, colour, tighten, or correct.

And I'm not suggesting there's anything wrong with wanting to look a certain way, colouring your hair, wearing makeup, taking care of your skin, or doing any of the things that make you feel good.

I do think there is a difference, though, between doing something because you enjoy it and doing it because you have been taught that you won't be acceptable without it.

And maybe that's the part I'm still figuring out.

I can care about how I look. I can colour my hair, enjoy clothes and makeup, and still question the idea that I need to look a certain way to be okay with myself.

As I get older, I'm becoming less interested in trying to hold on to the woman I was and more interested in getting to know the woman I am.

And perhaps that is one of the gifts of getting older.

Not necessarily loving every change. Not pretending we don't notice. Not convincing ourselves that aging is wonderful all the time.

But becoming a little less at war with ourselves.

A little more curious. A little more accepting. A little more relaxed around it all, as our bodies relax with gravity. A little more at home in ourselves and our bodies.

And maybe, eventually, we can all look at the woman in the mirror and think:

Don't I know it.

If this has you thinking...

These are some of the questions I explore with other women in my online workshop, The Relationship You Never Knew You Had. We talk about the relationship we have with our bodies, the messages we've absorbed about them, and what it might look like to relate to ourselves a little differently.

One of my favourite parts of these conversations is hearing the different perspectives and experiences women bring with them. We don't all see our bodies, beauty, or ageing in the same way, and I often find that someone else's perspective makes me stop and think about something in a way I hadn't before.

If some of the ideas in this reflection resonated with you, perhaps you might enjoy continuing the conversation.