37. Be at peace with yourself

Growing up in such a materialistic world where beauty standards exist but are different depending on where you are, it was a long journey as a young girl whose world was even further defining beauty standards through the birth of social media. The wave of American beauty was going in one direction, while the wave of Korean beauty was going in the opposite direction, and the wave of my own personal beauty was nonexistent in my mind. My awkward adolescent pubertal years represented my experiential seasons of discovering the various identities that I could manage to pull off. My even more awkward late teenage years represented my self-pragmatic fortitude of flaunting what I believed was my identity. But all of these years- now that I reflect back- were so valuable and precious. I had not known at the time, but now I realize that these amateurish and inelegant years formed the woman I am now. After undertaking whatever identity that appealed to my young self, I now know exactly who I want to be as an individual, how I want to be defined as a person in relation to the people around me, and how I want to live as a citizen of my community and the world. Outer beauty was important to me and it still is, but I found myself much more attracted to the inner beauty of people as I aged. Hence, I worked harder to form my inner beauty over my outer beauty, and in doing so, I found myself appreciative of my outer beauty by gaining confidence that I had lacked in my awkward years and thereafter acquiring a sense of gratitude and appreciation for both my inner and outer beauty I came to develop. One day when I look back at my 20s and 30s, I’m going to feel this way again, holding dear to the precious beauty (inner and outer) that I once had. So, I now tell myself, “Live your fullest potential and don’t hold back because of the worldly standards that society has imposed! You are beautiful, and you must love yourself for who you are and what you stand for! Be the best version of yourself! Everyone else is also beautiful and you must love them for who they are and the influence they bring upon you!”