You should see my bathroom counter right now. A girlfriend who sells skincare has given me samples of their entire new line, designed to make me look ten years younger than I am. (Oh, please let it be so!) There must be 8 -10 different products sitting up there. Stuff for my eyes, serum for my face, even a special cream for my neck. Last night it took me forever just to figure out which stuff to put on where. JP just kept shaking his head in disbelief.
Getting older has it’s upsides. But, the truth is, it also has it’s down sides. Like wrinkles. And age spots, for goodness sake! Seriously. Age spots? I thought those were for old women. And let’s not even get started about the various body parts on which gravity has taken it’s toll. Heavens! When did my knees get wrinkles?
So I am counting on whatever it is in the stuff sitting on my bathroom counter to turn back the clock and make me gorgeous. Ok, well, maybe gorgeous is a bit overdoing it. But wrinkle-free would be nice.
And since I’m on a roll… you want to know one more thing? I heard a friend mention she swears by taking fish oil. She’s ten years older than me and her complextion is beautiful. So what did I do the next time I was at the drug store? Bought a bottle of fish oil, of course. Which, for the record, is sitting in my medicine cabinet right above the bottles of beautification products my friend gave me.
Does all this sound just a bit crazy?
It does to me – and I’m the one living it!
Listen, I’m all for looking my best. We should take care of ourselves. It’s important. But looking at all those products on my bathroom counter made me think about the amount of time we women spend on making our outsides beautiful in relation to the amount of time we spend on making our insides beautiful.
My mentor – the author of the Christian classic “Disciplines of a Beautiful Woman” – Anne Ortlund, thought about this too. She was younger then. About my age now. She calculated how much time she spent on making her outside beautiful and told God she would spend at least that much time each day making her inside lovely.
Today she is the most beautiful 85 year old woman you will ever meet – outside and in!
So how about it girls? Can we take as much time cultivating our hearts and souls as we do our faces and bodies? Both are important. But only one lasts forever.
“Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last;
but a woman who fears the Lord will be greatly praised”
(Proverbs 31:30)
