Striving for Beauty & Authenticity

Philippians 4:7-9 (The Message)

Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life!  Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

January 5th 2010

It is day 5 into Project 365 which is taking a photo every day…. and it’s probably a bad sign that I am already struggling in this.  There’s not much exciting or beautiful in my life right now… Now, don’t feel sorry for me – I do have wonderful kids.. But they are all I take pictures of and I’m trying to get away from that! my back has been out since the 1st of the month so we haven’t been able to get out – so it makes my 365 project…well…challenging…. to say the least!

So, want to know more about this picture?  I have a lot to say about it!  Click “Read More” to keep reading!

This photo is of some red roses in my bedroom…fake red roses.  When I took this picture, I admit, I was grasping at straws in order to get a picture for today… But it made me think.

Initially it made me really wish I had my new camera by now because my pictures are so lousy right now – I want to achieve so much more and I need a digital SLR to do that as opposed to the really nice digital point and shoot that I have now.  So, then I ask, “Why do I want this or think it would make a difference?”  And the answer was simple:  Beauty.  The beauty I hope to capture in future photographs as I learn about digital SLR & new, better photography techniques and photo composition.

Beauty.  Took me back to my my fake flowers.  I am not even sure a fancy new camera will make them beautiful – even if I actually dusted them (hehe – inside joke for my friends who know me best!).  Why?  Because authentic beauty shines through – even when flawed.  But fake beauty just exudes… nausea.  A fact I was reminded of when I digressed and watched the first episode of this season’s The Bachelor the other night.  (Run, Jake, Run!)

A goal I have this year is to transform our house – whether it is this one or another one we move in to (which I hope we move somewhere else before Kade starts school) into a beautiful refuge/retreat.  It is about as far away from that as one can get at this point.  It’s livable… but chaotic.  And it’s not that I am not inclined in interior design; I’ve actually taken interior design courses and enjoy that sort of thing.  I live with two pre-schoolers and a husband who…well..aren’t.  My husband insists he wants to live in a peaceful, clutter free environment but he creates chaos in the his definition of what that is – so much so it becomes overwhelming for me.  It takes him all of 2 minutes to transform the entire house to “clutter free.”  And even less than that to forget what he cleared and where he put it!  It just creates more piles, boxes of stuff, etc. to go through.  And it’s frustrating going through all of that for someone with ADHD who is easily overwhelmed with normal everyday chaos that life brings – not to mention yesterday’s, last week’s, last month’s, last year’s stuff all meshed up together on top of that to go through to find something like say, a birth certificate… which mine has gone missing.  I have spent hours and hours going through and transforming our home into a retreat on more than one occasion and within 48 hours both times everything I did was completely undone by other people I live with.  Oh, to live by myself!  hehe  Just kidding!  But, as big as the chore will be and knowing it probably won’t last, I will endeavor to do it yet again.  Because right now – it’s just not working for me.

One of the aspects of this beauty I want to create around me at home is real flowers.  I try to get a fresh bouquet from Wal-Mart when I go – a reward to myself for making/surviving such an undertaking as Wal-Mart often is!  But during Christmas – their normal bouquet displays were moved and obviously not in a spot where I’d see them and pick one up!  So, I’ve slacked off in that endeavor I started last fall.  Eventually, I’d like to have a florist like my friend Kerry create an arrangement for me on a regular basis… But I’m not ready for that yet!

I recently saw someone on Facebook discuss pet peeves in their status – and one person said their pet peeve was fake flowers that people set out in front of their house instead of planting a real flower garden…They opted for the plastic one.  I do have to admit I was tempted to do that until I had actually driven by a house in the middle of winter when snow covered everything in sight… Beautiful, white wintry scene… and there it was… Brightly Spring-colored tulips standing at attention as if it were Spring on a bright, sunshiny day!  They didn’t belong there.  They also disturbed the beauty around them.  There was nothing authentic about them and they were an assault to the senses. I imagine a similar experience if one of those 25 girls from The Bachelor the other night was plucked out of that scene and put into a small gathering of some of my greatest, genuine friends.  The “bachelor” girl would stick out like a sore thumb and be an assault to the scene and senses around them.  Nothing puts fake in the spotlight faster than surrounding it with genuine beauty.

Why do we opt for the fake, plastic flowers?  Easier up keep?  (My dusty fake roses in my bedroom might disagree with you!)  Money goes further since they don’t die!  That’s a plus in my book!  We can pick and choose and match colors, varieties, etc… instead of leaving it up the nature of a planted seed or bloomless plant.  And no flaws! They are without blemish (unless your two year old decided to stir his spaghetti around on his plate with one – but we will save that charming story for another time.) and stand in for the real thing just as they were created to.

The trouble with fake/replica type scenarios, they are made to stand in for something that once was original, beautiful, authentic, and unique in its flaws as much as in its perfection.

I have been both fake and genuine in my own life.  I can certainly see the appeal of fake.  Fake has a playbook, steps, guidelines, status quo.  You do this, this and this and you will be perceived as this… And as long as no one stops long enough to get to know you, you’ll pass for the real deal.  Fake has instructions!  I think this is why women deal with this temptation more so than men do…since men “don’t need no stinking instructions!”  With fake, you can create an illusion of you might want others to believe you to be out of fear of how they might receive you if they really got to know the real you.  Fake is a wall you build around the you that God designed you to be.  Fake robs the world of your true beauty.  Only God can create true beauty.  When you try to replace it with anything else, God’s beauty does not shine through.

A few years ago I set out to strive for authenticity and be genuine… The “What you see is what you get” mentality that draws me to others.  I bought in to it and jumped in with all limbs, body, soul, and mind.  I got burned big time.  Turns out that the people encouraging me in that authentic journey weren’t quite ready for the genuine “Mel” article.  Fake burning off from around you stinks just about as bad as burning plastic.  I have a balance now.  I don’t attempt fake – but I am not totally open either.  Some people think I’m too open but trust me, I’m not even close except with a handful of people I can count on one hand!  I have a journey in authenticity that I strive to continue.

Ever tried to plant and nurture a rose garden?  It’s a great lesson and metaphor for achieving authenticity in one’s life.  First, getting the rose bush planted and to take – wow!  I have tried three times and had no luck at all.  I followed all the instructions to a tee.  Took on lots of advice from landscapers, nursery people, etc.  No luck… I never had success with successfully getting a rose garden started.  I may need to add that to my dream list.  “Have a rose garden.”  (What is that?  #623 on my dream list?  lol!)  Rose bushes – once established – do pretty well as far as surviving.  They are a pretty hearty plant.  They will reproduce blooms again and again year after year.  However, if you nurture them, prune them, feed them, and so forth – you greatly affect not only the number of blooms you get but the vibrancy & beauty of each bloom.  To get those beautiful, prize-winning blooms takes lots and lots of care and practice and love and passion for tending your rose garden.

My life is my rose garden.  I don’t want plastic rose stems in that garden.  I want the real deal… thorns, bugs, bruises, upkeep, and everything.  Because when it’s real, even covered in winter, it’s beautiful… It belongs there…even when Winter comes.  That, in itself, is beautiful.  It’s a perfect picture of grace.  Right now, I need the grace.  I have more flaws, bugs, and thorns than I can manage at times… and I have more “upkeep” than I have energy on most days.

Hopefully as life goes on, you will see more vibrant blooms in my life than any number of thorns that might push you away.