For me, true beauty has nothing to do with wrinkles and everything to do with the fact that my maternal grandmother raised five children just after the war and remained a fighter throughout her life. True beauty is the slick of red lipstick my paternal grandmother would put on before going to church on Sunday.
Interpretation
True beauty is defined by strength and resilience rather than physical appearance.
In this quote, Monica Bellucci emphasizes that true beauty lies not in outward features like wrinkles, but in the inner strength, character, and values exemplified by her grandmothers. She reflects on their experiences and the legacy they left behind, illustrating that the essence of beauty is deeply tied to life’s struggles and the grace with which one faces them.
In practice
This quote could be used in a speech about the true nature of beauty at a women's empowerment event.
In so many places in the world, women have been prisoners for so long that they feel they have to scream about their rights. But when you scream, nobody listens to you. Real authority comes when you no longer need to scream - and that's something we women still need to learn.
There is one order of beauty which seems made to turn heads. It is a beauty like that of kittens, or very small downy ducks making gentle rippling noises with their soft bills, or babies just beginning to toddle.
I still believe that everyone is beautiful in some way and by seeing the beauty in others we make ourselves more beautiful.
I grew up in a world where a woman who looks like me, with my kind of skin and my kind of hair, was never considered to be beautiful.
How I feel about myself is more important than how I look. Feeling confident, being comfortable in your skin - that's what really makes you beautiful.
When I tried to imagine being beautiful, I could only imagine living without the perpetual fear of being alone, without the great burden of isolation, which is what feeling ugly felt like.
Beautiful people do not just happen
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.