Spiritual and Emotional Themes

Beauty and the Soul

The Healing Power of Beauty

Recovery is a lifelong process.  We heal one layer of sorrow, resentment, and fear, then a deeper layer begs for attention.  At times, it feels exhausting. What keeps us going when our longing overwhelm us?

A morning glory flower amid the kale plant - beauty in the midst of the mundane
Beauty of the Morning Glory

There is no one answer, of course.  We need many tools, but one of those tools is the experience and the creation of beauty.

Our souls crave beauty.  The waving of a vine in the wind, the cerulean blue of the sky just as the sun sets, music, poetry, the softness of a baby’s cheek, the caress of the breeze.  Beauty throbs in all moments, if we can only see it, and these moments bring renewed faith and help us commit to life.

Where Is Beauty?

Though I live in a city, I am blessed to be surrounded by beauty.  Bird song, dragon flies, shadows, ripe blueberries, the joy I feel when my body moves, fragrant flowers, food whose flavor bursts in my mouth.  Every moment brings something wonderful for me to experience.

But what if your life is not so rich?

If our lives seem devoid of beauty, that may be because of how we look at things.  Kahlil Gibran, in his poem about beauty, cautions us to avoid confusing that which we long for with that which is beautiful. At noon, he explains, the people think of beauty as the sunset; in the night, the watchman imagines beauty as the sunrise.  The restless see it on the mountain, while the injured think it is gentle and kind.  Kahlil writes:

All these things you have said of beauty.
Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied.
And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand stretched forth,
But rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted. [1]

We experience beauty partly because of who we are.

Beauty Inside Us

Which sounds good, yet what if you are locked away in a cell where where the fluorescent lights heighten the ugliness; or you live on a street without flowers, where garbage stinks and the asphalt is cracked; or you live with abuse and chaos?  What if your mind is filled with punishing voices or you have so much anxiety you can barely think?

In that case, can you even begin to experience ecstasy and enchantment in your soul?  Without using drugs, I mean?

When our days exhaust us, our souls feel empty, and our nights are filled with fear, relapse seems so inviting.  And perhaps it is the only way we can survive.  It doesn’t help to judge such choices. Yet can we touch beauty, even in the midst of chaos?

Gibran suggests that we don’t see beauty with our eyes open, but with them shut.  The beautiful song we hear with our ears closed.  In other words, we experience beauty not with our physical senses, but with our souls. Perhaps this is why beauty heals our soul, for our soul is where it resides.

Gibran puts it this way:

Beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror. [2]

We are the veil that covers the holiness, yet we are also the holiness itself. We are eternity, and we are the mirror that beauty looks into to see herself, because we are beautiful.

Everyone Is Beautiful

There are no exceptions. Even in our sinful ugliness, our beauty is striking if we only know how to look. And if we can see the beauty of our soul, change becomes possible. Recovery becomes likely. The journey of healing won’t be finished, but we will have more energy for the step.

Albert Einstein said: “The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. . . . He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.”

Addiction, working too much, whatever we do to avoid pain, that is our deadness and our unseeing eyes. When we open ourselves to beauty, even if we can’t see it in our environment, but only in the sacred parts of our own soul, then we can find healing.

How hard to heal when we are in danger, when we feel sick at heart, when we are alone. To heal in the face of such struggle takes great courage and immense faith. If we cannot find our own beauty or our own strength, perhaps we can borrow some. My prayer is that we all find strength in someone else’s words and power in someone else’s hope. May we come to believe in something kinder and gentler than the world we know.

In the end, though, we are left with ourselves. We must walk own healing journey. Yet we are also eternity, the mirror, life. Lift the veil and gaze upon the beauty in your own soul.

In faith and fondness,
Barbara

  1. Gibran, Kahlil, “On Beauty,” The Prophet, New York: Knopf, 2011, 77.
  2. Ibid 78.