Dealing with Natural Attractiveness

HAVING DROPPED ONE OF MY DAUGHTERS at the train station recently—hi ho, hi ho, off to work she goes!—I couldn’t help notice the small throng of fifteen year old girls (roughly the same age as my daughter) perfumed, made up and dressed up, ready to go.

Flash. A vision to write on. Love it. First a change of tack...

We can sometimes never really tell when someone finds us attractive. And being ‘found attractive’ is a nice feeling in anyone’s language.

I recall working for a previous employer and working occasionally with a particular HR manager. I never caught on, but after she left her personal assistant confided with me that this manager found me ‘the most attractive guy’ in the company. (I wonder how many workplaces have similar chats taking place. Like in a playground situation, the PA and the manager comparing ‘the boys.’ It’s the playful child within all of us, taking to the park.)

How did I feel? Pretty good, really. It’s always nice to be acknowledged, so long as it goes no further. Indeed, even if I did find out earlier, I was married.

There’s a real blessing in seeing our attractiveness. The girls I mentioned previously are coming to the fast realisation, as they venture through adolescence, that they have a growing and commanding power—their looks. This is a fascinating power that buoys the confidence.

Yet, with all power comes an emergent responsibility. What to do with this power?

It’s all too much for some, as they take this power—its potential—and use it without care or restraint, revealing their character flaws (which underpin all our power) in the process. And I don’t know many who don’t come off second-best in the process. It wouldn’t be many. Indeed, it’s generally a ‘lose-lose’ situation.

It’s one of the golden blessings of life that we’re generally all blessed with some attractiveness, whether it’s natural physical beauty, a charitable personality or a spiritual blessing of some special sort. We all have beauty.

When people notice our beauty or handsomeness, our self-esteem and value of self-image tend to skyrocket. And this is good.

The message from God is enjoy. Enjoy the confidence and the esteem and thoughts.

What we do further with this information is entirely another story. Enter (please) wisdom.

© 2010 S. J. Wickham.