The Black Swan in you...

When Indiblogger announced the Real Beauty blogging contest, I was very excited. I thought, this’ll be a piece of cake. This is not rocket science, I just have to write, and god knows, that’s the one thing I’m good at. So I opened a word document, words and ideas tumbling over one another in my head, eager to be let out.

Ten minutes later, I was still staring at the blank word document.

Maybe I had too many things to write about, or maybe I had nothing to write. Who knows. All I know is, this was one of the rare times where I was at a loss for words.

So I decided to close the word document, and took out my trusty notebook and pen. “My notebook won’t fail me”, I thought to myself. “Maybe the real beauty lies in writing it directly down on paper and not typing it in the computer”. (See how I managed to connect the topic to real life? Sheer genius, I know).

I scribbled my signature a couple of times, doodled for a while, read the other things I had jotted down in the notebook, and then finally came to terms with the fact that real beauty, after all, is not so easy to write about.

Why is that? Is real beauty non-existent, or so elusive that writing about it is this difficult? Or have I just failed to recognize it whenever I’ve seen it?

I abandoned my efforts for the time being. I didn’t want to force myself to write just for the heck of entering it into a contest. Because if I have to force myself to write, the real beauty of my writing will get lost between the lines.

Then last night, I happened to watch Black Swan, the Oscar-winning movie, starring Natalie Portman. No no, I’m not going to give you a review of the movie, because honestly, I’m still a little dazed. It’s a powerful movie- it’ll make you cringe, shiver, and best of all, it’ll make you move your body involuntarily when the dancers glide across the screen. I’m not sure if it’s a good movie or a bad one- I might have to watch it again to figure that out- but it sure is a powerful film.

And that’s when I realized, I was so busy looking for beauty elsewhere, that I didn’t see the truth- Real beauty, lies within each one of us. There is a Black Swan in each and every one of us, and that’s what makes us unique. That’s what makes us special. It is easy to accept the White Swan in you- the pure, angelic, fragile beauty who epitomizes everything that is good, because at the end of the day, we all want to be good. But it is not easy to accept the Black Swan in you- no one wants to accept that there is another side to you that is not so pure and angelic. No one wants to show their evil twin.

But without your evil twin, you are incomplete. And the sooner you accept it, the easier it will be to understand yourself better. Be happy about the helpful side of yourself, but do not shun the side that is selfish once in a while. Celebrate your perfection, but do not criticize the side of you that wants to break free and dance wildly. Yes, shout out proudly to the world that you’re a topper, but do not be ashamed to admit that you also drink and smoke. Preserve your virginity, but do not hesitate to let go of it if you find the perfect person to give it to, because you need to know at least once in your life what true passion is.

And most importantly, do not let anyone else decide for you what you are- good or bad. Because no one knows you like you know yourself.

Let go of yourself. Embrace the Black Swan in you.

And you will then see, real beauty.