Beauty as the Bigger Picture
By Nita Gilger
July 10, 2026
As we stood gazing over the vastness of the Grand Canyon, we were spellbound by beauty and grandeur. It took our breath away to the point we could hardly speak. We just stood there and tried to comprehend what we were seeing with reverence and awe. It was in that moment that another tourist walked up to share our overlook spot. He boldly disturbed our peace and asked where all we had been on our trip. We mentioned other national parks like Zion, Capital Reef, and Bryce Canyon for starters. He said, "Yeah, I just went to all those places too and I am pretty bored with it all. One canyon just starts to look like another." My first thought was how could we possibly be looking at the same thing? I was stunned and, quite honestly, I could not wait for this guy and his negative energy to move along so that I could get back to my wonder-gazing.
The phrase, "in the eye(s) of the beholder" is a shorten version of the proverb "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Its exact modern wording was popularly coined by Irish novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford in her 1878 novel Molly Bawn. However, some among the 3rd century Greeks wrote a great deal about the transient sense of beauty in nature and in life. The perception of beauty can be subjective. People can have differing opinions on what is beautiful. One person might think of an event as ordinary or unappealing thing while the next person might see it as flawless, captivating, beautiful, and purposeful.
How we see life and others is as varied as we each are. None of us is exactly the same, are we? How boring life would be if we were. Our faith, philosophies, life experiences, families, friends, and education all play into who we become and how we view life. After seven decades and counting of trying to figure out life, I have arrived at a couple of ideas that guide my steps and hold my heart.
First, I learned from Anthony de Mello that it is important to let people be who they are. He cautions that sometimes we want other people to change so we will feel okay. De Mello also taught me a great deal about the value of living with a sense of expectancy instead of rigid expectations. It is a less stressful and far less judgmental way to live.
Thomas Merton said, "The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise, we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them."
The second area of learning and understanding life is that we are part of a bigger story. I don't and can't have all the answers as to why life is like it is. Saying that I am part of a bigger story means I choose not to limit God or the Universe. It means that my individual life, challenges and choices are connected to a much larger context. It shifts my focus from having self-centered, limiting goals to a broader purpose. I realize that I am participating in a spiritual journey in an interconnected, rippling collective. My life at this moment here on planet earth is a chapter in a greater narrative which helps to connect my everyday life into a purposeful, overarching plan full of possibilities and creative, hopeful living.
I gave a picture to a good friend a few years ago which has a quotation imprinted on a backdrop of nature. It says, "I'm part of a bigger picture." She looks at it every day and keeps it on her nearby bookshelf. We have both lived into this belief together and hold it dear.
Over our 42-year friendship, we have shared many stories, philosophies, and life events. Not all of our views are exactly the same but we both have the sense that not everything can be or needs to be figured out in this lifetime. Yet, we are here to learn, and the Divine essence and strength holds us through it all. It is absolutely reassuring that we are part of a bigger picture. That gives me peace, assurance, and hope that my life is purposeful and unfolding as it should with God's love filling and surrounding me. I have choices. But these ways of living with that larger sense of being help me to live with curiosity and joy.
I confess that there is a part of me that hopes that guy we met at the Grand Canyon has a more exciting and joyful sense of beauty and wonder by now. But guess what? His journey is not my journey and he is not me or a reflection of me. I guess beauty really is in the eyes of the beholder, at least in part. But it's also in the universe itself. Move over all who see beauty as in the cosmos itself - in the valleys and mountains, in the faces of friends and the eyes of animals - I am getting on the band wagon. The philosopher Whitehead once said that beauty is the very aim, the telos, of the universe. Sounds right to me! But whether and how we see it? That's in our beholding eyes and hearts.
Prayer: Help me to see with eyes that comprehend beauty, connectedness, and love. And then, guide me toward co-creating that richness of living with You. Amen.
The phrase, "in the eye(s) of the beholder" is a shorten version of the proverb "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Its exact modern wording was popularly coined by Irish novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford in her 1878 novel Molly Bawn. However, some among the 3rd century Greeks wrote a great deal about the transient sense of beauty in nature and in life. The perception of beauty can be subjective. People can have differing opinions on what is beautiful. One person might think of an event as ordinary or unappealing thing while the next person might see it as flawless, captivating, beautiful, and purposeful.
How we see life and others is as varied as we each are. None of us is exactly the same, are we? How boring life would be if we were. Our faith, philosophies, life experiences, families, friends, and education all play into who we become and how we view life. After seven decades and counting of trying to figure out life, I have arrived at a couple of ideas that guide my steps and hold my heart.
First, I learned from Anthony de Mello that it is important to let people be who they are. He cautions that sometimes we want other people to change so we will feel okay. De Mello also taught me a great deal about the value of living with a sense of expectancy instead of rigid expectations. It is a less stressful and far less judgmental way to live.
Thomas Merton said, "The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise, we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them."
The second area of learning and understanding life is that we are part of a bigger story. I don't and can't have all the answers as to why life is like it is. Saying that I am part of a bigger story means I choose not to limit God or the Universe. It means that my individual life, challenges and choices are connected to a much larger context. It shifts my focus from having self-centered, limiting goals to a broader purpose. I realize that I am participating in a spiritual journey in an interconnected, rippling collective. My life at this moment here on planet earth is a chapter in a greater narrative which helps to connect my everyday life into a purposeful, overarching plan full of possibilities and creative, hopeful living.
I gave a picture to a good friend a few years ago which has a quotation imprinted on a backdrop of nature. It says, "I'm part of a bigger picture." She looks at it every day and keeps it on her nearby bookshelf. We have both lived into this belief together and hold it dear.
Over our 42-year friendship, we have shared many stories, philosophies, and life events. Not all of our views are exactly the same but we both have the sense that not everything can be or needs to be figured out in this lifetime. Yet, we are here to learn, and the Divine essence and strength holds us through it all. It is absolutely reassuring that we are part of a bigger picture. That gives me peace, assurance, and hope that my life is purposeful and unfolding as it should with God's love filling and surrounding me. I have choices. But these ways of living with that larger sense of being help me to live with curiosity and joy.
I confess that there is a part of me that hopes that guy we met at the Grand Canyon has a more exciting and joyful sense of beauty and wonder by now. But guess what? His journey is not my journey and he is not me or a reflection of me. I guess beauty really is in the eyes of the beholder, at least in part. But it's also in the universe itself. Move over all who see beauty as in the cosmos itself - in the valleys and mountains, in the faces of friends and the eyes of animals - I am getting on the band wagon. The philosopher Whitehead once said that beauty is the very aim, the telos, of the universe. Sounds right to me! But whether and how we see it? That's in our beholding eyes and hearts.
Prayer: Help me to see with eyes that comprehend beauty, connectedness, and love. And then, guide me toward co-creating that richness of living with You. Amen.