We all have an innate ability to recognize something beautiful, our Happiness Formula columnist writes
I agree with the phrase “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”
The word “beauty” has a definition — the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind — that allows human beings to understand it. But for all its gravitas, beauty can’t exist without an observer. Is beauty there, when there’s no one there to witness it? Does a falling tree make a sound when there’s no one in the forest to hear it? In any case, isn’t it amazing, to have such power as to declare something or someone beautiful because you believe it to be so?
I love having the freedom and sublime audacity to witness beauty exactly as I see it. No one needs to explain, persuade or argue about its existence, its characteristics or its form with me. The act of observing and finding something beautiful is totally subjective and biased. Think about it: such a rare thing these days, to be partial without causing any harm or prejudice. Beauty does that for us.
Another thought comes to mind — or maybe to heart, since beauty doesn’t need logic to be present — do you remember when you first saw something beautiful? When you first said or felt — yes, from the heart — that something was beautiful? Did someone tell you it was, or did you just know? Seems to me feelings came to us before any words of explanation or vocabulary were mouthed.
The four-year-old me remembers my dad swinging on a swing with me in perfect rhythm. I gasped with delight and laughed out loud. I felt beautiful. The setting was beautiful. My dad was beautiful, but I didn’t call it as such at the time. There was no need to name this happenstance for the feelings in me said it all.
A question arises: where did those feelings come from? They weren’t taught to me. I wasn’t yet in school. There weren’t any “beauty” books at home. It’s here that I look internally and declare that I have an innate sense of beauty — of what beauty is to me.
Let’s take another example. I’m wading into the water after an early morning run. It’s seven and the sun is rising in the summer sky. I deke the shaded areas as the air’s still cool, and the water has reached my thighs. Counting down — I’ve done this since I was a kid — I plunge in, feeling the cold overwhelm me. “How awful,” you say. “How beautiful,” I say.
That example aside, I’d venture to say that you, too, have a sense of what beauty is without having to “look it up.” A sunset, a smiling baby, a teary reunion, a couple holding hands, a victory lap, a rose in bloom… are any of these memorized to ensure you don’t forget their beauty? I think not. Each time, at least for me, the feeling wells up from that secret place inside that tells me: “this is beautiful.” And my heart sings — even in cold water.
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