Well, I'm already both clever and good looking:) Or rather, I am neither, yet act like I'm both:)

Now seriously, let me first tell you about my journey with beauty and brain.

I was born a very pretty baby girl and as days passed I grew up to be a good looking young girl. I think what made me believe I was pretty was how my mother tried to build my self-esteem. She always made me feel I was both very pretty and very clever. She has always made me feel proud of my looks, while being grateful to God who created me in this picture. I managed to believe her and I was acting accordingly. I must admit, it felt really good to know and to be treated as a pretty girl. Compliments seem to come from every person you get to know. Everybody treats you like a queen whose wishes are commands. What else would a young girl want?

However, as days passed by, my good looks wore off. Putting on some extra weight, losing my thick and beautiful hair to more thin and grey ones together with "a scar in my tummy" as I call it after my C-Section, the pretty young girl became a chubby older woman with wrinkles. As much as it was a very pleasant experience to be pretty during my childhood, the journey towards the older person I am now was not easy and it has created a lot of psychological pressure on me. With every day that passed by, the number of compliments decreased and the number of grey hairs and wrinkles mushroomed. People tend to see these changes really fast. They spot every hair with microscopic eyes. It did hurt, but it also made me aware of those people who used to love me for who I am and not how I look. Thank God my husband is one of them.

My brain development was in the exact opposite direction to the path of my looks. I don't think I was doing all that well when I was young. Being not very clever especially in my childhood was not fun at all. I always felt I was out of competition; I was not capable of doing things. But thank God, once again due to my mum's persistence to make me feel good about myself and ability to seize every opportunity to make me feel proud of how clever I am, I managed to overcome that, I managed to develop myself and to challenge myself about what I can achieve. It was a bitter sweet journey, it started a bit difficult, but it was fun to see how I was praised by my parents and people who know me for doing better and better every day and as I was growing older I was becoming more and more intellectual. So from an even below average clever girl I grew up to be a much more clever person who managed to build a good career and prove herself wherever she was. I must admit I am proud of that.

So now that I've experienced both, being clever as well as being good looking at some stage or the other in my life, it is not that hard for me to choose. I choose to be myself! I chose my brain for this is who I actually am. I would choose my cleverness, because I am proud I managed to improve myself over the years and I am ready to further improve myself in the future. As for the beauty, I would also choose my average looks as it has never affected or lowered my self-esteem. The scar in my tummy makes me very proud of myself being a mummy and the few grey hair and wrinkles around my eyes show some of the wisdom and experience I have managed to build over the years. As for the extra weight, although I think I should get rid of it, I also must admit that I have managed to enjoy a lot of my favourite foods and I have grown up to be a very good cook myself:)

Learn more about this author, Yoya.
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