You hear it all the time. Be yourself. How hard is it to be you? And what exactly does that mean? Is it okay to throw a filter on an image and crop it so that you look a little prettier? What about when you ask someone to re-take a picture cause you forgot to suck in your belly? I don’t really have the answer. In fact, I only began to question this recently. Being myself in photos has always been pretty simple. Until I learned one day how easy it is to present a different version of me. A Photoshop version.
A few weeks ago, I needed a professional picture for my book. I contacted my neighbor, Mr. LeeVon, a professional photographer. One Saturday, we walked around our shared apartment’s backyard and took a few shots. Here’s the one that I chose:
Looks okay, I thought, until Mr. LeeVon said, “Okay. Gimme a minute and I’ll touch these up for you.”
“Oh wow,” I said, “You’re gonna make me all fancy!”
A couple of hours later, my phone vibrated while I stood in the Target checkout line. It was my Gmail. Mr. LeeVon had sent the Photoshopped picture.
“Oh my gosh!” I showed my husband. “I look like a celebrity!”
He squinched up his face and said flatly, “He needs to try it again. That looks fake.”
My eyes dropped. And then my smile.
“Show K—,” he directed.
I couldn’t stop staring at the transformation. “Look at this!” I said hoping for some semblance of validation.
“Oh no, mommy. It looks…I don’t know. It looks…plastic. That doesn’t look like you.”
At this point I was a bit annoyed. All I had said was that I looked like a celebrity. “Well, what should I tell him, then?”
“Give you some natural lines. Make your face look more real,” my husband offered. “It doesn’t look like you,” he reiterated. And then, “You can’t have a book about being yourself and the picture doesn’t even look like you.”
Okay. He had a point. How could I promote the idea of “being yourself” and not look like my-self. I had a brief internal struggle. Why not just use the original picture? Why have a touched up image at all? I asked Mr. LeeVon to try it again, repeating my husband’s words almost verbatim.
My husband liked it. My daughter liked it. I liked it. And so did 100 other Facebook friends. Secretly though, I felt a little fake because picture number one is how I really looked, even if there is very little difference. I also began to understand how quick it is to become filtered and phony. All it takes is one slightly altered pic and a little external validation.
Natural you is beauty you. Markups and enhancements are a desire for all but when they deviate from God’s creation and our spiritual growth it is plastic. You are gorgeous from the inside out-Shine, naturally!
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That’s what I decided girl…sort of lol I still throw on the occasional filter, but nothing to this magnitude 😉
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Exactly! Natural beauty wins everytime♥️
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Hhhmmm
Still a beautiful you. If it were a painting or an artist’s sketch would the touch ups have bothered you or them? Photography is an art as well. But I understand. I guess. On being yourself is it your, “I woke up like this” self? Or being yourself spiritually and soulfully? When we add make up and suck in are we still being us?
All three pictures are lovely.
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That’s an interesting thought…I guess that’s what I’m wondering too…what is being yourself. Can you be yourself spiritually but be made up and sucking it in at the same time? Is it a paradox or two separate types of being oneself? Idk the answer. And thanks for the compliment 😉
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