Aging “Gra(y)cefully”

This week I came across a show on The Learning Channel that I’d never seen before called “10 Years Younger”.

They placed a 47 year old woman in a plexiglass box in the middle of the street and had people guess how old she was. (Ok,that’s just not right!) The average age guessed was 54. She did not have gray hair nor did she have on makeup and she was dressed very frumpy. Bless her heart, you could see what self esteem she had slowly crawl from her smile and under the nearby planter.

The show ended up giving her new teeth, getting rid of her crow’s feet, cutting and coloring her hair and putting her in new clothes,(that btw, made her look like a middle-aged woman trying to dress like a teenager). When they placed her back in the plexiglass box her average guessed age was 40.

Ok, my point is, who cares what everyone else thinks? Apparently her husband loved her just the way she was and the only problem the woman had with herself, (before she was subjected to the opinions of total strangers), was her teeth and that’s the biggest thing she gushed about (her teeth did look much better bless her heart).

Personally, I think if they would have put her hair back to her natural color, gray and all (if she had any), with a new classy haircut and classy clothes, that were age appropriate, her guessed age would have been her own age or close to it. And if they still guessed age 54, so what? She would have been a classy 54!

Have you ever noticed that the people who do the makeovers on those kind of shows are younger than your oldest child? What do they know about “growing older GRACEFULLY”? Their idea of “gracefully” is throwing low-riders on you and coloring your hair. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find it “graceful” for a middle-aged woman that is not built like a 20 year old, to be wearing pants that allow the middle to “bulge”, and yes I mean bulge, over the top of the pants. What’s graceful about that?! And, I’m sorry, but if you are blessed with facial wrinkles, don’t dye your hair jet black or yellow blonde. That just accentuates those “blessings” dear.

Ok, back to the subject of this blog. Why is it “un-graceful” to cover up gray hair? Think about it…”grace”… “gray”…hmmm….when you say the word “grace” you say the word “gray”!

So, that brought me to God’s Word. I looked up the word “grace” in the Strong’s Concordance and found 25 scriptures that dealt with grace being found in the eyes or sight of someone or God, from Genesis to 2Samuel. And in all those verses the orginal Hebrew definition of Grace is this: pleasant, precious, well-favored.

LADIES! Shouldn’t we realize that this is the complete opposite of what society is trying to make us feel? Society wants us to think that aging with “grace” is to look young. Ding-ding…Wrong! In God’s eyes when someone looks at us with grace, gray-hair, crow’s feet and all, they are to see us as PRECIOUS, PLEASANT and WELL-FAVORED!

So, my gray-haired friend,(even if you’re still covering it), you are PRECIOUS and your “gra(y)ce” is pleasing to God!

“…Now I pray thee, if now I have grace in your sight,…I have seen thy face, as though I had seen the face of God, and thou wast pleased with me.” Genesis 33:10

Copyright 2009

My Gray Hair Story

creeping gray

 

It all started when I was in college at the age of 21 that I discovered my first “stray gray”. Shortly thereafter I was coloring my hair on a monthly basis.

In my mid-40’s I felt God was telling me to stop coloring my hair. “What?! Are you sure God? I mean, why would you care about my hair?” I decided not to listen to Him. Until…my dear, bald but sexy husband, asked if I would stop coloring my hair so he could see what I really looked like. Really looked like? “OK Lord, I’ll do it, but I’m not happy about it!”

Within 2 weeks my “crown” starting appearing. You know when you stop coloring or you let your color lapse and a ring of gray slowly creeps out into a crop-like circle along your part line? I even started photographing my “graying” process so I could look back someday and laugh… when I had color again.

I believed this was only going to be a temporary thing just so my hubby could see what I “really looked like”. But, once again, God started talking to me about my hair…again. “Goodness Lord, why is my hair so important to you?” So, He quotes to me from His own Son’s (Jesus), word,
“Because the very hairs of your head are numbered. So do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.” (Matthew 10:30,31)

Fear? Whoa, He hit the proverbial nail on the head. I was afraid! I was afraid of “looking old”. Uh-Oh, then that means… I’m vain! “Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord shall be praised.” (Proverbs 31:30) OK…I was getting it now, I had some repenting to do! Not only was I convicted of my vanity, but He also convicted me that by not going to the beauty shop to cover up my “crown of glory” I was saving $60. a month, $720. a year!

It’s been two years now since I’ve stopped coloring my hair. And you know, I have discovered a kind of “freedom” with being gray. A sense of non-pretentiousness, a feeling of dignity with showing who I really am.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I believe God wants me to be the best I can be by not “letting myself go” and caring about my appearance. But the difference now is that I’m comfortable in “my own hair”.

I have to be honest though, there are days that I struggle with my gray and have to lay my feelings of vanity down at the feet of Jesus. But then God reminds me that gray is OK, and that He created me, and I am valuable to Him… gray hair and all.

 

copyrite 2009