Be-YOU-tiful: Flip the Script and Celebrate Your True Beauty

How Ugly Are You?

She was born with a mole above the corner of her left lip. From the time she became self-aware at all, it bothered her. Her sisters told her that it was an ugly mark because beauty marks can only be on the right side of the face.

On her first day of high school, a group of senior football players made fun of her, laughing that she had chocolate on her face. Many times during her childhood she asked her mom if she could have it removed, but always got the same reply: You know what your mole looks like. You don’t know what a scar will look like.¹

When she was a junior in high school, she got a job working at a local clothing store as a brand ambassador, a role that required a fashion show and photo shoot for the local newspaper. As a result of the exposure, another local photographer asked to take her photo for a university newspaper. He introduced her to a stylist to do her hair and makeup for the shoot. That stylist encouraged her to attend a beauty show where hairdressers cut and styled models’ hair on stage. She signed up, thinking it would be fun.

The hairdresser that day ended up being a successful New York hairdresser. After giving her some pretty waves and good advice, he gave her her two agent names to contact. The first modeling agent had nice things to say and booked her for a test shoot; however, she suggested she have the mole removed. That only amplified her insecurity about it. She went ahead with the test shoot with the mole intact.

The hairdresser from that shoot showed some of her Polaroids to Marie Anderson, an agent at what eventually became Elite Model Management in Chicago. Marie saw potential and requested a meeting. When they met, Marie never said a word about the mole. The meeting resulted in one professional photo shoot, then another, and another—the jobs kept coming. A few times the mole was airbrushed out of printed photos. One time a makeup artist tried to cover it—only to have it look like a giant pimple. But as the modeling jobs increased, the mole simply stopped being mentioned at all.

Eventually, she appeared on the cover of the American Vogue magazine. At that point, she decided that if she looked good enough, mole and all, for the cover of arguably the most relevant fashion magazine, then she was good enough for everyone else. Some years later, as she reflected on her struggle with feeling insecure about her appearance, supermodel Cindy Crawford said, Isn’t it ironic that the very thing that made me most insecure turned out to be my trademark?²

Cindy went on to be featured on a record-setting eighteen Vogue covers and countless others. This girl who grew up insecure about her looks nearly let the perspectives of other people define whether or not she was beautiful.

United by Ugly

It’s hard to believe that at one point in her life, Cindy Crawford, a supermodel who was the face of beautiful for decades up to and into the new century, thought she was ugly. But the ugly truth is this: every single person on this planet—supermodels included!—has at one time or another felt ugly. I get it, ugly feels like a strong word, but it’s the harsh word we often use when talking about ourselves to ourselves. Even if we don’t say it out loud, deep down we may think it.

Have you ever looked in the mirror and seen something you didn’t like? It’s okay to admit it. You’re not alone. Crow’s feet. Nose bump. Freckles. Rosacea. Pimples. Grey hair. Thinning hair. Turkey neck. Droopy eyelids. Forehead lines. Thin lips. Big ears. High forehead. And that’s just looking at the face!

Age spots. Breasts too big (or too small). Belly pooch. Fat rolls. Moles. Cellulite. Knock knees. Weird toes. Cankles. If I haven’t already mentioned something you’ve criticized about yourself, I’d be surprised—and there are probably a few other things I didn’t mention that also bug you about how you look. Across the world, regardless of culture, age, race, gender, or any other category we use to divide ourselves, human beings are uniquely united in this one way: we have all felt less than beautiful at one time or another. The question is, Why?

As a plastic surgeon specializing in scarless rhinoplasty in Beverly Hills, California, I’ve had the privilege and opportunity to help a lot of people change their lives through surgery. But don’t worry, this book is not about the merits of plastic surgery. We live in a culture where plastic surgery has become common because so many people are doing it. However, some of the most rewarding work I do is having frank conversations with people about just how beautiful they already are and explaining why they do not need surgery to make them beautiful. I know talking people out of surgery is, unfortunately, not a common practice for a plastic surgeon, but it is often the right thing to do.

Throughout my many years of practice, I’ve interviewed over ten thousand people from all over the world and all different walks of life. They meet with me because they think they want to surgically alter something about their appearances and are willing to accept the risks inherent in doing so. As people share their greatest insecurities with me about their physical appearances, our conversations often get deeply personal and usually reveal a deeper story.

One woman hates her nose because it looks just like the nose of her father who abused her when she was young. Another was bullied at school every day because of the bump on her nose and thinks if she can make the bump go away, all the hurtful memories will go with it. For some people, it’s just a matter of wanting to look like someone they admire. Every situation is unique. Sometimes I can change their lives with my scalpel; but often I can change their lives with a conversation about beauty and confidence.

The truth is there are a lot of ideas out there about what beauty is and what it is not, who is beautiful and who is not. Unfortunately, too many people, perhaps even you, have fallen into the trap of thinking the question is not, How beautiful am I? but Am I beautiful? Ironically, feeling less than beautiful tends to leave us feeling isolated and alone when, in fact, we’re all united in wrestling with the feeling that we may not be as beautiful as we wish at times. All of us, even supermodels, feel ugly at some point in our lives. In the pages to come, I’ll share more stories from other celebrities, influencers, and people just like you and me who’ve all struggled with feeling beautiful in some way, because I want you to know you are not alone. Fighting that feeling of ugly is a universal human challenge.

Ironically, feeling less than beautiful tends to leave us feeling isolated and alone when, in fact, we’re all united in wrestling with the feeling that we may not be as beautiful as we wish at times

Taught to Be Beautiful

Our concepts of ugly have been programmed into us by our cultures. Our perceptions of beauty have been unconsciously shaped by voices around us. We’ve all been trained to think we have to look a certain way to be considered beautiful or good-looking. This is all taught to us, often at a young age.

Depending on where we live, we’re taught different things. When we compare Asian cultures to Middle Eastern cultures to South American cultures, we see their concepts of beauty are dramatically different, not because of natural programming, but because of the way they were taught about beauty. Likewise, if we go to an African jungle culture where tribal leaders expect the females to elongate their necks using stacked rings, they’re not doing that for fun. They’re doing that because they have been taught that is how to become the most beautiful woman in the tribe.

These varied concepts of beauty exist for a wide variety of reasons, but the bottom line is that they are simply made-up, completely fabricated by social constructs. When we understand that those constructs exist and see them with a heightened self-awareness, we become empowered when it comes to how we think about our own appearance. For example, as you read these words, why are you wearing the clothing you have on right now? Why have you styled your hair the way you did today? Are you wearing make-up, or did you engage in some sort of personal grooming? Why? I suggest that those choices you made today about your appearance have been shaped by the social constructs that taught you to look a certain way.

Each of us has been shaped by these constructs. It is this struggle to look and feel beautiful that unites us, but we must see the voices that shape us for what they are so we can free ourselves to be beautiful just as we are. Unfortunately, when it comes to assessing our own beauty, we tend to blindly follow the perceptions of others. For example, a young, twenty-something female once came to me for a consultation. She showed me pictures of people she follows on Instagram. She was obsessed with the shapes of their noses and wanted hers to look like theirs. But all the pictures she showed me were of girls who were pretty but had no relevance to the way this patient looks or should look.

Her example spotlights a problem we’ll revisit later. Social media can be a dangerous place for beauty perception if you overexpose yourself to concepts of beauty that are probably filtered and not necessarily a natural fit for your personal genetic makeup. Depending on who you follow, you can create a social media landscape that is more inclusive to yourself, or you can make yourself feel more isolated and alienated.

Your closest real-life friends probably have similar interests and look a lot like you. You enjoy hanging out with them and feel like you belong when you are with them. You feel comfortable with them and experience positive energy from your encounters.

Contrast that with how you feel if you follow only the beautiful celebrities on social media with whom you have virtually nothing in common. You see them only after they’ve been worked over by their glam squad, perfectly positioned on their yacht, or flying around in a private jet—so you’re not going to feel like you measure up. It can easily leave you feeling a little inferior, even ugly, when you compare yourself to someone else’s perception of what it means to be beautiful.

But the reality is this: Ugly is only a perception. You are not ugly unless you think so. So, how ugly are you? That is entirely up to you.

Perhaps a better question is this: How beautiful do you want to be? Because the truth is, you already are.

It can easily leave you feeling a little inferior, even ugly, when you compare yourself to someone else’s perception of what it means to be beautiful.

What Bothers You?

I realize it may seem odd to hear a plastic surgeon from Beverly Hills telling people they don’t need surgery to be beautiful. But a lot of what I believe about telling the truth about beauty was shaped by my own story.

My dad grew up in a village in Rajasthan, India that had no electricity. One of eleven siblings, getting an education and a good job was the only way to escape poverty. He studied hard and became a gold medalist, the equivalent to being a class valedictorian in America, but even more difficult to achieve. After he came to America and earned his engineering graduate degree, he returned to India to marry the woman who would become my mom.