I’m aging every day. If you met me today, I’d be older than when you’d met me before. That’s just a fact of life. No one is ever going to age backwards or get younger as days and years go by. So, why do we keep trying to do it?

I remember a few months ago when I received the daily reminder from google photos of a picture I’d taken a few years before. You know the ones where it says, “7 years ago on this day…” – that one! It got me on the phone to my mother whining about how much older I look compared to all those years ago – how much older I looked, how much weight I gained, how much of my youth I had wasted on doing nothing that I loved, and how it was all gone down the drain and I couldn’t get any of it back.

It’s not like she’s someone who just sits around and lets nature take its course. She does her work to look her best in every way. But she told me something that day that made me see things a little differently. She made me see me how she saw me. And the perspective change was quite refreshing.

She reminded me about how I’d become who I am today, the paths that I had been on, how I had reached where I reached and how none of that should be considered unworthy by demeaning the person that I became because of it. The regret of missed opportunities can only lead to more sadness, if I choose to let that be the focus of the present instead of considering the growth and the experiences I have acquired over time.

I may not have appreciated who I was when I was on that path, I may not have seen the beauty or the talent or the person who endured all the things that I endured. I was just surviving then and today I have the time and the energy to sit back and see the journey. I am in a place where I can start moving past survival – toward living. And this makes it possible for me to see the past as it was. This should also help me see the present as it is, if only I allow it.

This body of mine, the strength that it has built, the lines and the creases on my face, and the rest of me are all proof of the tremendous journey I’ve been on. And I should be able to embrace it.

Loving myself has become easier over the last year once I took the time to acknowledge what I have achieved – the struggles, the pain, the sacrifice, the compassion, the growth, the unseen and the unheard. I cry over things that I had to give up for the greater good which I believed made me a lesser person that I thought I’d be today. But is that really true?

Just because I chose to put my dreams on hold to care for my family and be there for them when they needed me to be, does that make me a lesser person that the ones who refused to do so?

Just because I barely have anything to show for all the work I have put in and the struggles that I have borne, does that make it any less worthy?

Just because my choices have not helped me become an accomplished individual in worldly terms, does that mean that I have achieved nothing?

I’ve gotten older each day. I have learned something new every day, week, month, year that I have lived in this existence. It may be something that might be deemed useful or maybe it’s worth absolutely nothing. But it is worthy of me. And I am worthy of it.

I have come to learn and accept that in a family that consists of more than one human individual, every member has a role to play, and those roles keep shifting and changing to accommodate the changes in circumstances and situations. And sometimes those roles stay stagnant till a change is required or forced. Just because I chose another at a certain time in my life, does not mean that I cannot choose myself when that need changes.

So, what if I have a few grey hairs on my head when this shift happens? Just because it’s happening a little later than the initial plan, does it mean that it shouldn’t happen at all? Is the value of grey hair any less than the value of black or any other commercially qualified “younger” colour? Maybe this was the fated time. Who I am I to judge?

The way the world has us convinced that slim equates beauty, youth has also been idealized and aging has not. Times have changed to a more accepting and inclusive space. And yet, when I go to the store and see the number of anti-aging products available on shelves and sales staff convincing me to try out things to look younger, reverse the effects of aging, it makes me wonder, why is getting older so wrong and difficult to accept?

I’d like to meet the person that decided aging wasn’t beautiful and see if life stood still for them so many years later.

And when you think of it, the world is so contradictory. Little children are taught to act older and age quicker than they should, while adults are forced to believe that the older we get the less value we hold and so we need to find ways to maintain our youth. Like, come one, where is the middle ground here?

I remember when I was younger and someone mentioned to an older person, “but you’re old”, it was not received very well. The response was, “You will become old too one day, just wait and see” And I thought to myself, “Isn’t that the truth?” I mean, isn’t that what will happen to everyone? Just because we use some age defying creams and serums, doesn’t mean we won’t age. Maybe we’ll age differently, but we nevertheless will continue to age, right?

I have eventually and with a lot of effort learned that, with age has come so much growth. What I truly struggled with was acceptance of it. I have noticed that the more I fought aging, the more I struggled with the process. The better and sooner I decided to accept that it is a natural part of who I am and my chosen path, I am learning to acknowledge the genuine beauty of it.

I admire the youthfulness of my children as I watch their little faces crinkle and stretch and all of those expressions that they can make because of their youth. I know that I could do all those things too when I was their age. Today, my expressions are more controlled, my smile may not stretch to the limit that it could before without looking like I’m in pain, but they don’t have to be limited. They can still be the way they want to be – wholesome according to their time.

There’s nothing wrong with aging or getting older and looking it, if we do it with as much grace as we can muster and practise compassion for self.

One thing to always remember is that you’re beautiful just as you are, wherever you are in your life’s journey no matter what the numbers add up to.

This picture holds two important things for me – the aging process that I admired then and hoped to achieve for myself and the youth that I missed to acknowledge and appreciate.

This person in the picture with me was someone I absolutely adored and respected for who he was. I understand that he was a handsome man in his youth from the stories I’ve been told, but his personality that I knew of added to his beauty as he aged. The kind of life that he lived and the person that he became despite it and because of it will always be how he is remembered by those who loved him. He was admired for the way he spoke and the compassion he held. When I was younger, I always looked at this man and wondered how someone so old could look so good still behave so youthfully. And as I got older, I wondered how someone who had endured so much could be still filled with that much love and joy and share of that same joy and life with everyone he met. That amount of compassion and wisdom can only come with age so, how can aging be wrong or despised or frowned upon? It’s beautiful in its own special way as is everything else in life.

So, enjoy the process. Accept the growth. Embrace the journey. And just be you!

Love always,