Why Aging Shouldn't Scare You
Words by Andea Beims // Images by Jessica Collins Photography
Sitting across the table sat a woman of utter beauty. Upon meeting her, I gasped, "You are beautiful!" Though startled, she smiled and wrapped her cardigan around her slender frame. I’m sure she had heard this before, and her beauty radiated even more gracefully accepting my compliment yet humbly denying the truth. Withholding the compulsion to ask her age, I felt encouraged by her intense gaze. Her beauty was not due to the escape of time’s reflection upon her face. It was her grace - her dignity, her strength veined with kindness that precluded her age telling her story with every line, every trace. A living road map of wisdom.
Timeless beauty in a face.
Her story revealed service that could not be returned, sacrifice too numerous to be quantified, and grace upon grace upon grace. Introduced by a mentor and friend, she left a mark on me that day - she and countless other women in my life who have done the same. I tried to blink slowly, writing on the back of my eyelids for memory's sake. “Might I live and grow in beauty in such a way."
Aging. A term often paralleled in our society as weathering or withering and given fast the color gray. Though by definition, aging is the natural process of growing old not fearfully withering. However, as a western society, we reveal a definition that elevates the physical effects while possibly depleting the inward growth taking place, with many viewing the aging process as something to be grieved, ignored, or even reversed instead of displayed.
Last year alone the anti-aging services market was valued at $23.45 billion. Talk about putting up a fight to save face! It is expected to increase and more investment and technology put forth as society continues grasping at the seemingly promising but always elusive fountain of youth. Nonetheless, aging and its effects, especially the end, are inevitable. We will grow old. Therefore, the question is how rather than if or when, and I can’t help but wonder what if we leaned in rather than away?
This said, I have accepted my fate. I am growing old, and I like it. In fact, I feel great! Don’t get me wrong, I’m not running around like a child with limitless energy, but I am eternally grateful to be 38. I wouldn’t trade this time in life with any other. I am comfortable in my skin, and I have this fantastic feeling this will only increase as I age. Though I will admit crow's feet take a bit of getting used to, but my white hairs - I think they are fascinating! I am increasingly curious as to what these white siren sopranos in a dark sea will show me. And I hope I may look into a mirror and admire the change with gladness, celebrating a life well lived rather than preserved.
Listen, ladies, if you want to change your diet (do it), color your hair (though I think gray is gorgeous and on trend), use your serum (this girl uses Beautycounter antiaging serum, twice a day), sleep on that satin pillow case (who doesn’t like a little luxury), add in a yoga routine (I’ve even looked into face yoga; it’s a thing), by all means do it, but do so as a proactive measure giving value to the choices you make, leaving fearful insecurity in its place. One will help you grow, the other will actually potentially hasten that which you are running from in the first place.
Obviously I am not opposed to certain regiments of health or even aesthetics, but it struck me early on that the most beautiful qualities of the amazing women in my life that I wanted to emulate were their laughs, their wit, their fire, their depth, and yes, even the acknowledgement rather than dismissal of their age. And while I might tilt my head and gaze upon women in the aesthetics of their youth, I have also grown to admire the lines of time, even my own, and the stories they tell.
I can hear it now… But what about arthritis and dementia? What about all the potential ailments and changes that come with the passing of time? How is that something to embrace? I admit, I do not look forward to the things out of my control, but I can honestly say at this point in life, I am unafraid. I know what it is like to walk through a storm and still remain. And if the definition of aging is true, I may grow internally in strength though my body is externally weakening.
In the future, I will know how to ease into the wave or let go and be swept away. I can trust what is to come, and I feel no compulsion to pretend or keep grasping for a past I wouldn’t want to relive anyway.
I am growing old, and it’s okay. I will one day become a person who once was, but timeless beauty never fades.
** Editor’s Note: This essay first appeared in Issue 20 of Holl & Lane Magazine. **
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