Being a Single Girl in a Sexualized World

“You’re not worth anything unless you are beautiful.”

“You're not beautiful unless someone loves you.”

No one has said these words, but every girl has heard them.
This is the world I live in- the world I have been single in for twenty-two years. It's a world where the most most beautiful teenagers will sit before me with tears in their eyes because they hate what they see in the mirror. It's a world where the most kind and compassionate girls ask me if anyone will ever want to marry them because they don't dare hope for it. It's a world where athletes and artists and writers and readers wander down cold school hallways, watching the girls who are in relationships and wondering what those girls have that they don't. It's a cruel world.

This world measures waist size and breast size and those numbers put a girl on a scale from one to ten. Scales: the demise of the female spirit. Scales, that weigh their value. Scales, that compare their complexion. Scales, that measure their beauty. Scales, that see the external only.

Friends, let the scales be removed from our eyes. Let us measure new things. Can we measure the moments where laughter stole our breath, and treasure the girl who sparked the frenzy?  Can we measure the masterpiece resting on the wall, and treasure the girl who designed every paint stroke? Can we measure the monologue bringing tears to our eyes and treasure the girl who performed it?

What if a girl’s worth has nothing to do with beauty? What if her worth has nothing to do with the number of boys who've loved her?

What if it has everything to do with a Creator who carefully constructed every corner of her mouth and crevice of her character? What if it has everything to do with her willingness to jump into everything He has for her and embrace who she was created to be?

Twenty two years of being a single girl in a sexualized world, and I think I'm starting to get something. I'm not a reflection in a mirror; I'm a reflection of my Creator. Girls, please step off the scales.

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