Be your Best Self! Part IV: Beautify

Hope you are having a great week. Things are finally warming up a little around here after negative degree temperatures for several weeks and I feel like I'm finally defrosting a little. :) This week has been a great week for my New Year's goals. I've gotten up every day and exercised. Eaten healthy (and no sugar at all). Gotten plenty of sleep (to bed early and up early). I think I'm ready for part IV, how about you? If you haven't seen my other posts in this series, I've listed them below for your convenience.

Be your Best Self! Part I: Exercise

Be your Best Self! Part II: Eat Healthy
Be your Best Self! Part III: Sleep

Tip #4 for becoming your best self is beautifying yourself and your surroundings. Beauty is another thing that is misunderstood by a lot of people and warped and twisted by others. Beauty is something that comes from within each of us, as part of who we've been, who we are and who we are becoming. Beauty can be found in every person, young or old. In fact, some of the most beautiful people I know are weathered and worn by age. Although advertisers would tell you differently, beauty itself can't be purchased or found in a product. Outward appearance is only part of beauty, and often those that have it are missing the truest part of beauty, inward beauty. We radiate beauty when we act, think and feel beautiful. Beauty needs to be cultivated otherwise it starts to fade. Here's a few ideas to help cultivate the beauty in your life.

A beautiful flower from my garden. My garden is a lovely place where I go and am surrounded by beauty.

Beauty Tips for Busy Moms:

1. Smile - there's nothing as beautiful as a true smile.
2. Get ready for the day. Get dressed, brush your teeth, fix your hair, etc. Even if you're going nowhere. You'll feel and act beautiful when you look presentable.
3. Look past your imperfections. Don't beat yourself up over them. Look in the mirror and find something that you like and compliment yourself.
4. Keep your surroundings beautiful. I don't know about you, but I feel and think and act more beautiful when my surroundings are clean and orderly. Having said that I have to make a disclaimer that my house is never in perfect order. I have young kids. But we work at it. Even if it's just a little space, make somewhere beautiful and then spend time there. Maybe it's a room or a closet or a garden.
5. Act beautiful: speak kind words, see the good in others and in the world around you. Beautiful actions add to the beauty that you radiate in your life.

So who is your best self anyway? Who is that person that you are trying to become? I imagine that person is beautiful inside and out. A lot of us focus on outward beauty. And I think outward beauty has it's place. But don't neglect the inward beauty that comes from feeling, thinking, and acting beautiful.

What about you? Do you have any beauty tips to share with all of us? What makes your life more beautiful? Have a lovely weekend and remember to spend few minutes each day beautifying yourself and your surroundings this week.