13 Ways to See Yourself as Beautiful
Downward is good. So is squinting. Delia Ephron considers self-reflection from many angles.
By Delia Ephron
![girl in front of mirror girl in front of mirror](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-1-284x426.jpg)
Illustrations: Oliver Jeffers
Definitely not naked from the back.
![toes under blanket toes under blanket](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-2-284x426.jpg)
Downward. At my feet. Crimson nails poking out from under a sheet, saying hello. Very sexy.
![reflection in shop window reflection in shop window](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-3-284x426.jpg)
As I catch a reflection, walking by a shop window. Unexpected encounters with oneself are always risky: Am I slumping? Am I prepared for a candid glimpse? But my legs never let me down. It seems unfair that after a certain age, a woman with good legs can't walk on her head.
![dog in lap dog in lap](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-4-284x426.jpg)
With a dog on my lap.
![scarf around neck scarf around neck](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-5-284x426.jpg)
With a scarf around my neck. The only good thing about whiplash, a friend of mine said after she was rear-ended, is that you get to wear something that conceals your neck.
![sunglasses on sunglasses on](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-6-284x426.jpg)
With sunglasses on. The other day I was having lunch with my sister. I was wearing my new very large Italian sunglasses, and she said, You should never take those glasses off.
![mirror squinting mirror squinting](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-7-284x426.jpg)
While squinting. A doctor once told me this. A male doctor. I was in for my yearly checkup and might have mentioned how I was slightly freaking out about aging and he said to squint. Whenever you look in the mirror, squint.
![blow dry blow dry](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-8-284x426.jpg)
After a blow-dry. I am obsessed with blow-dries. My hair is curly. If I don't have a blow-dry, I look like a tulip. The only person who gets more blow-dries than I do is Michelle Obama. I go twice a week to Eugene at Ted Gibson on Fifth Avenue and 22nd Street. If Eugene buys a Manhattan co-op, I feel pretty sure that I will be the reason he can afford it.
![ipad ipad](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-9-284x426.jpg)
Not on the iPad. There's a feature called Photo Booth that lets you take a picture of yourself looking at the iPad. Never, ever on that. Unless I want to terrify myself.
![hands in picture frame hands in picture frame](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-10-284x426.jpg)
At my hands, from any angle. I have the best hands in my family. Everyone knows it.
![woman walking woman walking](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-11-284x426.jpg)
With a bra on. I was walking out of a Japanese restaurant the other day and passed an older woman going in. Okay, I don't actually know if she was older, but she had gray hair (which, thanks to the miracle of dye, I don't), so she looked a thousand years older, in my opinion, and she wasn't wearing a bra. Her breasts looked like balloons three days after the birthday party. At that moment I decided, I am going to wear a bra for the rest of my life. I will never again be a woman who doesn't wear a bra. Fine for your 20s, okay for your 30s (depending), but after that... I'm not someone whose breasts can sit in her lap or anything; far from it. Nevertheless.
![chin chin](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-13-284x426.jpg)
Not from the side anymore. Either side. This has to do with my chin, which I used to love. I can't even talk about it.
![Dressed in black Dressed in black](/g/image-resizer?width=670&link=https://static.oprah.com/images/201111/omag/201111-omag-body-image-14-284x426.jpg)
Dressed. Well-dressed. In black. Lime is Los Angeles, pink is the South, red is for women senators, turquoise belongs in Florida, brown is all those states with horses. I haven't any idea what Chicago is, but I know that black is the New York woman. So, black. But with a little pop of color—like my bright green ballet flats that draw attention to my legs.
Delia Ephron's novel, The Lion Is In, will be published in May 2012 by Penguin.
Delia Ephron's novel, The Lion Is In, will be published in May 2012 by Penguin.
From the November 2011 issue of O, The Oprah Magazine