Life is like a bookshelf

Every age has its own distinct beauty. The vivacity that sparkles in the eyes and face of a twenty-year-old—touched by traces of adolescence just awakened from childhood—may not possess flawless perfection, yet it carries a certain kind of perfect beauty nonetheless. In those who have crossed twenty and stepped into youth, we see the marks of entering new youth: acne scars on their faces, small patches of inconsistent, freshly sprouted facial hair that possess their own unique beauty—just like the tiny dewdrops clinging to a rose that has just bloomed.

Those past thirty possess yet another kind of beauty. Within them unfolds an enchanting, silent revolution of correcting all the mistakes made in days gone by!

Gone then is the tendency to make new errors, gone the frantic rush of restlessness. In body, in dress, in countenance sometimes fatigue and sometimes weariness, sometimes melancholy and sometimes the taste of life's pleasures...like a semicircular rainbow of seven colors that rises after the rain when clouds have cleared away, where layer upon layer mingles with colors and moods of every kind.

Middle-aged people possess a different sort of beauty—that unbridled beauty like a rose in full bloom!

In the eyes and faces of elderly people, we find the mark of mature beauty—what a profound, dignified beauty that is!

Indeed, from its own place, every age has its separate sweetness. Every age is beautiful—just as a newly bloomed rose is beautiful, so too is a rose in full splendor—exactly like the stages from a tree's sapling to its transformation into a winter-bare tree that has shed its leaves.

Such changes of age are as pleasing to the eye as various ornaments on the same body. The person doesn't change, after all, so what does it matter that their outward form shifts this way and that! Everything about a beautiful person is beautiful.

At one age, red will look wonderful on you; at another age, black will look marvelous on that same you.
At one time, loose hair made you look incomparable; at another time, that same you will look exquisite with hair neatly tied back.

At one age, goddess-like in a sari; at another age, like a poet's beloved in Western wear.
At one age, punjabi and lungi; at another age, t-shirt and jeans.

Life is really like the overall arrangement of different kinds of books on different shelves of a bookcase. At every stage, at every age, you are beautiful and attractive. It's all of this together that makes you the person you are, isn't it? If you know how to present yourself properly, your charm will certainly be noticed. Charm cannot be hidden; and one who lacks it cannot express false charm even if they try.

To love an entire bookshelf, you must love each of its shelves—the same is true for life, because you are formed by every stage of life and the various characteristics of each stage. You are beautiful in every form, just as the sun that rises at dawn is beautiful at every moment until evening.