Who Is This Woman in the Mirror?

The mirror does not lie. But it does not tell the whole truth.

At 60 or 70, the mirror can become an interrogation. Who is this? I asked myself this question and I know many women do too. Since I don’t use social media much, I’m not in the habit of making comparisons… but self-criticism, I’m very, very good at that! THE question may arrive without grief, yet with a strange disorientation. The years have left their imprint on the face and body, while the mind still feels lively and far younger than the person reflected. It’s like our mind picked an age and got stuck there. The reflection hurts because the mirror only shows how time has caught up with us, not the way we see ourselves.

Self-Perception

I wish the mirror could display the entire truth of a life, what the person has lived, survived, loved, built… The way we see ourselves rarely matches what is visible on the surface. Self-perception develops gradually from our memories, experiences, relationships, the roles we have occupied and what other people have told us. Yet that inner portrait is not updated automatically. A person who was once heavier may continue to see herself as round after losing weight. The body changes continuously, but identity often changes much more slowly.

Another problem is that the image reflected shifts with our mood, self-esteem, memories, past criticism, trauma, cultural norms, and our level of fatigue or anxiety. On a lonely or exhausted day, the same face can appear harsher than it did the morning before.

Beauty as Social Currency

A few months ago, I wrote on my blog about Ageing in the Instagram Face Era (it seems like I’m so obsessed with this whole beauty and ageing thing) anyway… Twenty years ago, I stumbled upon Umberto Eco’s On Beauty in which he explored beauty not as one timeless truth but as an idea shaped by history, culture and power. I wonder what he would say today about this Instagram Face concept.

Beauty has become a form of social currency. A conventionally attractive woman receives countless micro-advantages: a quicker smile, gentler service, more attention, greater tolerance and easier social entry. Beauty can open doors, but it also comes with an invisible tax – the expectation that a woman will preserve it, display it and remain pleasing. When growing older, many actresses suffer terribly as a result of this invisible tax. And we all do too!

This Beauty Isn’t Real

From childhood onward, we learn who we are partly through other people’s reactions. Affection, criticism, silence and judgment become another kind of mirror. Social media amplifies this dependence on external approval. These platforms frequently reward appearance, youth and performance more than authenticity, inviting women to compare their real bodies with images that are filtered, retouched, carefully selected, medically altered or artificially enhanced.

In the past, a woman compared herself mainly with people she knew and celebrities in magazines. Today, comparison follows us everywhere. We are constantly exposed to filtered images, retouched faces, etc., but what bothers me even more are all these suggestions we get on how to improve ourselves. What’s the deal? Will I never be good enough? And for whom? Personally, I am not interested in an improved or corrected version of myself, digital or real.

My sociologist friend puts it this way: “The natural face begins to look defective simply because it is being compared with an image that has never existed.” Wow! How can our ordinary faces compete with the perfect beauty of retouched images? Through our vibrant authenticity and our unique history, I suppose?

The visual standardization changes what a human face is expected to look like. Texture, asymmetry, age become visual irregularities, but too much perfection makes people feel uncomfortable; they instinctively seek the warmth of a real person.

The Double Bind: Invisible, Yet Forbidden to Look Old

I was doing my Master’s degree in the sociology of communication when I first heard about Bateson’s double bind concept. The double bind is a communication trap where a person gets two or more conflicting messages at the same time. No matter what choice they make, they fail or get punished. It’s very prevalent in our society, one of my favorite applications of this concept is supervised autonomy!!!

Here, this concept represents the double penalty imposed on older women. If a woman does not alter her face, she may be accused of having let herself go. If she alters it a little too much, she may be mocked for looking unnatural or desperate. She is expected to age, but without allowing ageing to be visible.

The consequences can be serious: weakened self-esteem, anxiety about photographs, heavy spending on cosmetic medicine, social or professional withdrawal, a sense of becoming invisible, etc. The point is not to condemn women who choose aesthetic treatments, but to realise the pressure and the contradictions to which we are subjected.

And what about the disappearance of the male gaze? Well, that’ll have to be for a future article, because the more I write, the more aspects I find that need to be covered on the subject of age and beauty!

The Face as an Open Work

Eco’s idea of the open work offers another way to read the ageing face. A standardized, frozen face can be understood as a closed work: it aims to produce an immediate and predictable response: admiration, desire, approval, a like, a follower… Today everything is bought and sold, and the frozen face sells well.

But the ageing face is an open work, its expressions contain several lives. Its irregularities invite interpretation; every wrinkle and bodily change bears the trace of lived experience. Instead of the face as a surface meant to seduce, we are referring to the much deeper image of an archive of the life lived.

Love Your Wrinkles, They Are a Natural Map of Your Life!

Thanks, but no thanks! I don’t like my wrinkles and I never will; the same goes for the sagging skin on my upper arms. The answer to all this cannot be another command, imposing a new moral obligation on women: aging cheerfully, gracefully and without complaint. I think gentleness is the key. The discomfort exists, but we don’t have to turn it into a verdict or drama. Repairing our relationship with ourselves means changing the view.

Practical actions that help: healthy lifestyle choices, clothes that fit the body one has now, standing upright, positive self-talk, and working on what we genuinely want to improve. They are ways of inhabiting the present body with care and we should embrace what makes us different from the dominant cultural ideal. Today we are more grounded, more complex and more solid than our younger selves, and I think peace of mind and serenity are the starting points for achieving the best look.

I create artsy printed items to help women over 60 feel beautiful just how they are. Check out my store.

What Do You Think?

Is your mirror a friend, an enemy, or neither? What are your ways of maintaining a positive body image as you get older?