Beauty at Every Age

When it comes to aging, the two words that come to mind are embrace it. There is beauty at every age! I have a saying, and it is meant to be funny: “Aging gracefully is a full-time job!” I can remember being at a girls’ lunch, and we started talking about the who’s who of doctors working in Los Angeles. Since I have a background in the entertainment business, this topic of discussion is typical: “What doctor do you go to for fillers?” “What products are the best?” “What eye cream works magic?” and “Who are the best trainers, nutritionists, and therapists?” The list is wildly long and is getting longer as we get older. While sitting at this lunch and listening to the ladies go back and forth on who and what is “the best,” I blurted out, “This is a full-time job!” In a funny way, it’s true. I have to have a sense of humor about this at fifty-eight. My goal is not just to age gracefully but also to embrace where I am at every age. I want to appreciate those laugh lines!

My Journey toward Beauty at Every Age

Every age is like a token of wisdom and growth. I feel sexier now than I did at twenty-eight. I am a different version of me. We have something to appreciate as we get older: wisdom! How I feel inside definitely shows on the outside, no doubt about it. A smile can take ten years off our age immediately. I have a young spirit. I play, laugh, and keep a sense of humor about this aging stuff.

Every stage of our life has a different kind of beauty. I looked completely different when I was a full-time mom. I had a uniform of loose jeans, a white T-shirt, and a ponytail. My biggest accessory was my red tennis shoes. I had no time for make-up or a blow-out, and sometimes just getting a shower was a big win. I had three babies in four years, so you can imagine how full my hands were. I looked tired and stressed some days. I curled my eyelashes and put on lip gloss and a glow moisturizer so I would not look so tired. That was my life for about ten years. This was a different kind of beauty—a busy mom beauty.

Beauty at Every Season

Beauty is tied to the seasons and our emotions. Beauty is loving every aspect of yourself—the good, the bad, and the ugly.

I had many awkward stages. I didn’t like several aspects of my body for years. But some of the things I hated about my body when I was young I now love as I am aging and heading toward my sixties. If you are young and reading this, know that we think differently about our bodies as we age.

The emotions that I have day to day show up on my face and body. The seasons play a huge part. For me, spring and summer tend to be great beauty seasons. It is interesting and fun to look at photos from different stages of your life. I did this recently: I looked at photos from modeling jobs I did when I was in my twenties and thirties. I have to say, for me, I like my fifties the best.

Looking at photos of yourself from different times and seasons, you will see the proof that there is beauty at every age. I found a photo taken during a time when I did not feel good about myself and my body. But when I looked at that photo, I saw that I actually looked pretty good! Our minds can tell us stories that do not match what we are seeing.

Finding the Beauty at Every Age in Other Women

Do not be hard on yourself. How boring this life would be if we all had the same features. We are all unique and have distinctive qualities. We have our own soulfulness. It is so beautiful.

I was just reading about Katharine Hepburn. I knew the obvious details about her, such as all her Oscar nominations and wins and other bits of trivia. When I read about her life and some of the trauma she had as a child, however, I began to appreciate her uniqueness, and not just as an actress. She marched to the beat of her own drum. Her beauty was extraordinary because she defied the standards of beauty during her time as an actress and Hollywood’s expectations. Her story inspired me. It is no surprise she lived a long and graceful life into her nineties.

I enjoy reading about women who changed the way we think about beauty. Katharine Hepburn is just one of many examples. Having gumption and marching to the beat of your own drum is sexy and beautiful! The most attractive women are the ones who laugh, smile, tell stories, and embrace their age, the lines, and the gray hairs that pop up out of nowhere. It is part of the process. The magic is not in a serum or eye cream. It’s in the fun we have. The most playful women are the sexiest. Look at Goldie Hawn! I follow her on Instagram because she makes me happy. She dances around freely in her workout clothes—no make-up, no filters, just sexy!

Beauty on the Inside

I think photo filters today are damaging. We are editing everything that is so sexy and beautiful. A happy life is a beautiful life. A smile is the sexiest thing on your body. Use it all the time! I’m not against fillers, products, brow lifts, or anything like that. I’m just saying that if you do not do the work on the inside, it will not matter what you do on the outside. Do both.

Aging gracefully is a full-time job because it requires a lot of work on the inside. It is an inside job. Beauty at every age does exist.

Your Beauty Homework

Your homework is to pull out old photos from different times in your life and examine them. Be your own detective. We all have photos that make us cringe, and we have others that make us say, “Okay, I look pretty good in this photo!”

I had this experience recently. I was with a friend I knew well in 1990. We were engaged, and he still had photos from our time together. I was so grateful that he had kept all those photos! It was shocking to see myself back in the day. I felt this so deep in my soul: there is beauty at every age!

Nothing is sexier and more beautiful to me than a woman in her fifties (or sixties or any age) who smiles and radiates with decades of stories. Life is too short. Do me a favor: whatever it is about your body that you’re not happy with—whether the wrinkles around your eyes or cellulite on your ass—I want you to close your eyes and send that part of your body love and say thank you for the imperfection. Imperfection is hot! Try it. It’s cheaper than getting fillers. Send love to the imperfections. And smile!