JOY. Having received a postal invitation from one of the top fashion house/beauty brands to go and trial their very latest foundation, it wasn’t too long before I found myself in their boutique store checking it out. But as the beauty assistant applied the foundation, a creamy blotch of pale colour stood to attention upon my olive brown hand.
Seeing the funny side of this I queried the complete colour mismatch, enquiring if there was a darker shade, but my humour instantly fell on deaf ears with the assistant’s reply:“the universal colour is white” and without hesitation went to fetch a sample, handing it to me to try at home.
What I found curious wasn’t that it was clear to see my mixed complexion, nor the fact that this had happened in Singapore with all its great melting pot of skin tones and shades including ethnic Chinese, Malay, Indian and expats – but more so that a darker shade of foundation was available to purchase . . . yet not as a take home sample, because of the assistant’s reply.
It also made me consider that in the automatic or default choice many company representatives and their organisations make to stock, select or suggest a single colour, in this example, the colour white, that however slight or innocent the remark, racism continues to be deeply rooted in the psyche of our everyday shopping lives.
When daily customer service, beauty products and services are being designed, marketed, often as ‘free gifts’ or samples, and sold with the purpose to lighten, brighten i.e. whiten faces, armpits, even a woman’s vagina, this says to me that exclusivity is in; inclusivity of all is out.
In other words, separation is created, reinforced and sold. Even a hint of preference of colour reinforces this separation, whether it be for a whiter than white skin shade or a tanner than tan – no matter which way we look at things, embedded are illusions of betterment, improvement, privileged comfort, arrogance of differentiation, and cultural superiority.
Is this kind of marketing what we truly want?
I ask this question only because it can seem puzzling as we ethnically mix ourselves up with the increasing numbers of inter-racial partnerships and families and/or adoptions. Is it likely these increasing numbers highlight that on some deeper level we feel and know we’re all from ‘the same place’? And with this, feel the natural pull and desire to be the same i.e. part of one humanity, and not separate or exclusive to this as determined by border, colour, race, religion or background and so on.
Isn’t our natural inherent way as a human race of beings one of unity and oneness, and not separation?
By design, we are naturally loving and good people, not intentionally harmful. But when we celebrate different multi-racial, ethnic origins, cultures or backgrounds and say we enjoy all this because of their ‘uniqueness’ or ‘difference’, might we also reflect that such celebrating only really devolves us as a race because it fosters the ideal of separation? In other words, doesn’t this celebrating go against the truth of unity or oneness that we feel on a deeper, innate level?
‘Being the same’ in this case is not about one’s ethnicity or race, but more about being love. In other words, the presence of equal love is the ingredient that unifies us as being ‘the same’ and surely it’s about celebrating this.
If there was acceptance and celebration of an all-encompassing and unifying love, wouldn’t it make it not natural for us to champion, favour, sympathise, like, uphold differences of the outer shells of background, colour, nationality, ethnicity, race, caste, class, religion, tradition, culture or custom?
In other words, it’s the absence of love that’s brought the latter afflictions that have then brought discomfort, exclusion, war and atrocity we suffer as mankind. Love unites and harmonises. Difference divides, separates and excludes.
If we stood unified as a race of human beings identified not by our differences of which country, geographic region, area, or ethnic race we are from, but instead by the universal truth of the Love that we are equally, how then would things be?
‘Being the same’ is about equality with another. Choices to support or promote any particular outer shell because of the shell doesn’t ever do anything to truly support because promotion without any presence of love only further fragments or causes division, exclusivity and inequality.
Just imagine that if we each learnt to discard identification or being owned by and invested in our outer shells as being who we are as a determinant of our worth in the world, and instead carried acceptance of the innate Love we are – would this then mean we’d be able to let go of offense, reaction, or resentment to racist comments or ideals… which only further adds to the instigating separation that we have been hurt by?
To know and experience racism or division on any level is to equally know and no longer deny the urgent necessity to return back to the core and inclusivity of the Love we are from: living and knowing that this Love is colour-less, race-less, that it has no border or region and belongs to no country or one organised religion.
Surely LOVE is the real identity to celebrate – this is the ‘universal (make-up) foundation’ that can be applied to everyone, regardless of skin shade or colour.
With this love, the unity of our one multi-mixed race of human beings together in harmony and brotherhood shows the beauty and wonder of our diverse world: it shows a true religion not of the organised shells of man but of God and the oneness, divinity and Love being where we are truly from. This religion is Love.
Eternally inspired by the Ageless Wisdom and Philosophy as presented by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine
By Zofia Sharman, Asia
Further reading:
Colour and Class Distinction – Where Are You From?
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
To me Doug what we fail to understand is that we are fed these thoughts and yet we believe the thoughts we think are ours when they are not. This to me is the biggest lie that we sell to ourselves every second of the day. The worst thing is how we readily abuse ourselves in such a disregarding and disrespectful way because we think we think. We think we want the tan or we think we want to lighten our skin but have we ever stopped to consider where these impulsed thoughts are coming from to do this?
“Surely LOVE, the real identity to celebrate – this is the ‘universal (make-up) foundation’ that can be applied to everyone, regardless of skin shade or colour”. What a bold and yet true statements as underneath we all have that same makeup. Just because it can’t be visually seen does not mean it can’t really be seen or felt either, we just need another pair of spectacles to receive it. Somewhere along our lives, we will one day be able to come to a realisation that we are made of love and the world is going to look, feel and be a different place to live in.
What if rather than defining inclusivity as gathering everyone with differences together, we saw everyone as equally having the same essence? Thus you are included because you are already the same as another. It’s gonna take a while for that to happen but separation can only run for so long.
When we don’t know who we are by the essence, the image becomes the identifier. And the image is of creation whose sole purpose is to discriminate and separate, and not unify.
Fumiyo, yes totally agree. We are so identified by images that we become lost in the unreality of illusions, that cannot and will not keep up with what is truely and equally inside of us. That call which cannot be denied as this is what is calling us home.
“the presence of equal love is the ingredient that unifies us as being ‘the same’ and surely it’s about celebrating this.” No cosmetic cover-up required.
Thanks Zofia, I hadn’t thought of it this way before, but so true – why do we not celebrate the core and essence – the love – that we all are?
I’ve been to a bunch of Livingness 1 presentations by Universal Medicine and there’s an exercise that is repeatedly offered whereby you partner up with someone (preferably a stranger), stand in front of each other, close your eyes and feel that other person. I’ve done this with people from all different cultures and backgrounds. Even doing this in my everyday life at times and each time I find everyone feels the same in their essence.
Leigh I have also attended The Livingness 1 course and find it fascinating that as we stand opposite people we have never met before with our eyes closed how we naturally want to lean in towards each other and that to stop ourselves from lurching naturally forwards into each other we have to curl our toes to stop the forward momentum. When we feel from our hearts and do not allow our minds to rule our bodies we are shown a completely different way to live. Our hearts know more than our minds can ever know so why is it we rely on our minds and not what our hearts tell us?
We yearn for all being the same, and this is a good thing because at heart we are all the same but we need to understand that the world we are living in in the outer appearance we all look differently thus it is never about achieving the same look, the same colour of skin etc. but listening to our hearts and living to the beat of their truth.
I agree Richard, Zofia reflects the simplicity of how we all can be and live as the one we are from.
So much on earth is designed to keep us looking out at what we are not, what is different, comparing to each other and the excitement of being an individual. Connecting to the love that we all are is the only way we will re-unite as the one we are from.
Connecting to the love we all are, and living that makes much sense.
It is true, that no matter how much racism there may be, we continue as a human race to mix ourselves up with each other, so there can be no real distinction between us and we all just become people.
People long to belong to oneness. You can see it in many segments of life. Yet, oneness is not a homogeneous thing. It is about movement. This is its true ‘foundation’.
“Surely LOVE is the real identity to celebrate – this is the ‘universal (make-up) foundation’ that can be applied to everyone, regardless of skin shade or colour.” So true Zofia, when we come from love there are no barriers to divide us, no borders to cross, no one skin colour better than another, we are all equal in the eyes of love, love is the universal (make-up) foundation…absolutely.
“exclusivity is in; inclusivity of all is out” – The Way of The Livingness presents a livid way practically to turn this on its head.
I guess as long as we are in a physical body, our infatuation with the way we look is to continue. Swapping and changing the vocabulary and devices does not change this fact. Not accepting our identity in truth will always drive us to seek something outer to give us one.
When we make life about Love it would not matter we have to provide 10 different shades of a certain foundation for a take home sample. Love loves to go to the details in making sure everyone is included, this is not a effort but a joy.
Love includes everyone, true Lieke.
Racism and bullying are both hideous examples of the extreme of living a life where our own individual wants are perceived to be greater than those of another. Nothing but a deep division of society can happen in an environment where this is not only allowed, but fostered. Why? Because to do the opposite, to love and honour all has to begin with holding a deep love and understanding of one self.
This is what I am trying to come to terms with this morning Leigh the utter disregard that we are willing to put ourselves through in order to resist and reject the offer of evolution which is all about oneness and true love to take us back to where we belong. We are resisting the law of the universe and in our arrogance and ignorance we are pulling in a huge disharmonious and brutally ugly force, with little understanding of what we are truly doing we as a human race pride ourselves on our intelligence when actually this same intelligence is so incredibly harming.
WOW that is shocking to read. I know it goes on – I know there are countries who actually want to whiten their skin – but as you say – this actually makes us less. This says that we should all be the same when there are so many gorgeous skin colors that exist in the world.
In today’s world I wonder if we focus far too much on the external appearance of everything rather than the actual integrity and quality of it.
Much can be said in relation to this comment.
Until we again value the integrity and quality in which we go about our tasks, before anything else, nothing will be adjusted, owned and understood.
So true Leigh.
Quality of energy and integrity are always super important.
What we all need to deeply appreciate is that until Serge Benhayon started to present on these subjects we humanity were completely devoid of any true understanding of a quality of life or had any understanding of energetic integrity. Serge Benhayon constantly reminds humanity that we cannot do anything without God first, we live within his Atma which is the universe and yet we go about our lives pretending he doesn’t exist. Have we ever stopped to consider if we didn’t have the Sun to warm the earth we wouldn’t survive, have we ever stopped to consider why the sun is positioned exactly where it is? In our arrogance we take so many things for granted as we cling to our individualistic way of life, devoid of any true appreciation of what we are being shown and what we are all here on this plane of life to do. Instead to me we feel completely out of control playing with silly things like the colour of our skin or fighting over borders and nationality. We will literally do anything to distract ourselves to avoid the true responsibility of why we are here.
The colour tone of our skin is ‘only skin deep’ and within we all come from the same foundation.
The problem with a make-up foundation to definitely alter one’s look is that it reveals a lack of self-worth foundations that drive people to try to become what they are not. It is true that if there is demand for something, there will be marketing to support the meeting of that demand. Yet, supply will also incentive demand as well. So, instead of healing a problem, many women choose concealer to deal with it. That is the real issue at stake here. This reveals that banking on these unhealed issue is irresponsible, although it may profitable.
We celebrate and re-enforce cultural and ethnic diversity when all along we could be celebrating what we have in common, underneath the colours of our skin and the differing rituals and customs that we perform in our ‘own’ countries, religions or anything else that separates us. Great blog, thank you Zofia.
The quality of the colour of the Universe is Love.
You have my vote for a true LOVE festival, which celebrates the fact that we are all LOVE and actually celebrate what unites us all.
YES we are all one in LOVE, we are all one in TRUTH, we are all on in JOY, we are all one in HARMONY, we are all one in STILLNESS – these are the qualities of the Soul and what count and they add up to ONE!
Without doubt love is our make-up and the one that looks the most beautiful on everyone equally.
I love that Nicola; there are many models I know that wear this makeup called love, and there is no doubt that it looks and feels so amazing on that more people are trying it out.
Love is the make-up that supports us all to feel and look amazing.
It’s a great question ‘Is this kind of marketing what we truly want?’ If marketing is about supply and demand, in some way we are asking for this, we are asking for separation. You blog is glorious in the way that shows if we connect back to our true beauty we would not demand the separation but instead pull towards unifying.
I agree Kim it is an important question as it is to look at the supply and demand. Most of us would agree that it is ridiculous and offensive for a darker skinned person to have light make up applied in this manner and be told that white is the universal colour, so that does pose the question as to why we invite and accept as normal so many separative things in our society?
Acceptance of our innate love, of the huge love we all are would be a great foundation, ‘Surely LOVE is the real identity to celebrate – this is the ‘universal (make-up) foundation’ that can be applied to everyone, regardless of skin shade or colour.’
I have often wondered if the purpose of having people in the world with different appearances is so that we see and come to know that on the surface we may seem different, but this difference is an illusion. When we get to know people we see that they are people just like we are and that we are all from the same source, that of love. I wonder if the great movement of people we are seeing around the world is making this more and more possible?
A beautiful piece of writing Zofia Sharman captured from a simple interactivity of daily life — the “organised shells of man” = “illusions of betterment, improvement, privileged comfort, arrogance of differentiation, and cultural superiority;
as determined by border, colour, race, religion or background and so on; intentionally harmful, multi-racial, ethnic origins, cultures or backgrounds
fosters the ideal of separation; nationality, caste, class, tradition, or custom discomfort, exclusion, war and atrocity we suffer as mankind; country, geographic region and area.”
That pretty much ‘nails it’. We have the outer shell of inequality Or we have the inner-most connection of Love and ALL of the above is a choice. “‘Being the same’ in this case is not about one’s ethnicity or race, but more about being love.”
A great question to ask, and a fact that many forget, ‘Isn’t our natural inherent way as a human race of beings one of unity and oneness, and not separation?’
Today at a Well-being group for Women, we were asked to explore and finish the sentence, ‘Did you know that women…’ We came up with a multitude of descriptive words like divine, gently, powerful etc. But then came the question – how many of us believe that of ourselves and live confirming those qualities? There is much for us to discuss when we scratch beneath the surface.
I think it says a lot about women’s self-worth in general also that the grass is so often greener on the other side as in many with light coloured skin wanting to get ‘that tan’ and others opting for bleaching to try and make their skin a lighter colour. When we don’t value who we are there will always be another picture of how we think we should look, just out of our reach, that we need to attain in order to think we are ok…
As individuals through inter-racial and cultural partnerships we show that we believe we are all the same. However systems and bureaucracies appear to be in resistance of this but this does not prevent individuals making their own choices. Hence power lies not with the systems but with the individual, if we only exercise that authority.
When we look to the outer to identify ourselves we are confirmed in our own created beliefs that we are all different. If we looked from within, from our inner heart at each other, we would all know that there is no separation only divine love that resides within us all.
“Surely LOVE is the real identity to celebrate – this is the ‘universal (make-up) foundation’ that can be applied to everyone, regardless of skin shade or colour.”
If this was the title of a beauty products marketing they would have my attention and consideration that there was possibly products with integrity being offered that supported us to celebrated who we are.
Beauty is not just ‘more than skin deep’ – it is vibrational. True beauty comes from an inner emanation that goes way beyond colour, shape or form.
As human beings we tend to champion and forever try to improve on our outer shell when, as you describe, it is taken care of by what we hold dear and make real from the inside. Judging each other by our outer shell is fraught with danger and doesn’t reflect our divine origins. Our outer shells go to war and abuse each other, they wear themselves out in the pursuit of perfection and can’t get on top of the continual unsettlement and discontent.
And when we pass it is very clear that we leave behind our outer shell – it is the vehicle that our inner being has used to simply get around.
Yes gabrieleconrad, we have a huge investment in our outward appearance, but until we place more value on how we feel inside, and make the relationship we have with ourselves a priority, we are fighting a loosing battle.
Reading this tonight I can feel the essence of us all, and in that there is no desire to live in brotherhood. What is there is the knowing that we all naturally hold this ability within, the choice then becomes that of each one of us to live in line with our natural essence, and brotherhood with all.
We are all naturally loving people who have allowed ideals and beliefs to get in the way of truly loving each other and living without the ideals and expectations placed upon us by society, life would be very different if we accepted everyone as they are with no judgments or conditions.
We are never and can never be unified by the image of our physicality, for our unity is found deeper within, where the quality of love is what truly reveals who we are in essence. A quality that cannot be measured and as you say when we begin to look within and we will come to live and know ‘… that this Love is colour-less, race-less that it has no border or region and belongs to no county or one organised religion.’ Yes, and it is from here that we will begin to live the way of true Brotherhood, celebrating the unique expression of the love that resides within us all.
Just as we can never find unity in celebrating difference. On the surface it may seem that way. But if in truth there is no difference then what is the purpose of celebrating something that is not true, other than to keep us separate from that truth and from each other.
The very thing that upholds this plane of life is separation/indivualisation. You raise here a great point, Zofia that I hadn’t thought about before – that celebrating our obvious difference is adding to this whole set-up.
I’ve often found it strange how westerners tend to like their skin to be darker while in the Far East and Africa there can be a desire to be lighter skinned. But you raise a great point from a simple make-up sample, Zofia – and it’s something we all know deep down: that it’s what is on the inside, Love, that counts.
Beautiful Zofia, this blog is showing us universality and the absolute exposure of all that is separation in our world – simply because of the withdrawal of the universality we come from. Hence we can live like everything is overcoming, or see as our responsibility. Which of the two will make us truly change for good?
‘Surely LOVE is the real identity to celebrate’ very much so Zofia, and anything else celebrated is in fact a division or a differentiation.
The world is consumed by choices that promote and glorify the outer shell at the expense of what lies beneath. The inequality and separation that is caused from this lies at the heart of much conflict around the world for people are choosing to only see with their eyes and not their hearts… for from place of love, regardless of the seeming external diversity, we are all equally and beautifully the same.
Even though I’ve read this blog before it still shocks me that people would want to change the colour of their skin, it brings a whole new meaning to the term “feeling comfortable in your own skin”, and it totally negates the fact that every single part of us and every single cm, inch and cell of our bodies is perfectly designed to support us to evolve in life.
“If there was acceptance and celebration of an all-encompassing and unifying love, wouldn’t it make it not natural for us to champion, favour, sympathise, like, uphold differences of the outer shells of background, colour, nationality, ethnicity, race, caste, class, religion, tradition, culture or custom?” When I was 18 I was teaching some five-year old children – one of whom was black but who didn’t turn up for one class. .Another child, who didn’t know her, enquired what she looked like. Another child told her that she was the one with pig tails. Her blackness was not the thing that stood out for her – in a class of white children. Forty years on this has stayed in my memory. Racism is taught – not inherent.
Having spent much of my life feeling dissatisfied with my very pale skin I now recognise how much this reflected my lack of acceptance of myself generally and what a distraction it was from being true to myself.
Love is the universal ingredient in all our foundations so it makes no sense to constantly champion our differences but it feels like the marketing industry has a vested interest in keeping us all desiring to attain a certain look so that they can sell more products. It is only when we embrace all our similarities beneath the superficial appearance of skin colour, ethnic origin etc that we will truly celebrate the Love that unites us all.