There have been unmistakably beautiful moments in my life—overwhelming, heart-fluttering, tear-inducing moments. Moments in music. Moments in film. Moments in front of paintings. Moments whilst travelling. Moments with family.
In those moments, the feelings and experiences tap into something that evades the logical and analytical modes of brain function. But, I still remember and describe those moments as distinctly beautiful. But what makes them so? And if I know what makes them so, is it possible for me to manufacture more of them?
Whilst I know that each moment I’ve experienced as beautiful is individual and unrepeatable, I also know that they each share some common attributes.
Beauty is subjective
What is beautiful to me is not necessarily beautiful to someone else. There is no objective beauty, just objects or experiences that more people find beautiful than others (but it is not, it seems, 100% universal). I have been brought to tears by movies and music that most people have not. At the same time, I have lined up for hours for a glimpse of a Botticelli painting alongside hundreds of people from around the world.
Beauty is collaborative
Beauty emerges because of my participation in its creation. Each of us come with a story – past experiences and relationships that shape how we respond to the world in any given moment. So, when presented with a moment (bird song, gazing on a sculpture, watching our wife and child play together), beauty emerges partially because of what’s already inside us.
Perhaps I have fond memories of playing cricket with my brother in the backyard when we were kids. Then, as an adult, I notice 2 kids playing cricket in our street. It’s the combination of these 2 things from which emerges a heart-fluttering moment of beauty in me.
Similarly, I was brought to tears by Quo Vadis Aida, a 2020 film directed by Jasmila Žbanić. My partner watched the film with me. Sitting alongside me. Her experience equivlant to mine in every way. But, at the end, I was the one crying. Why? Because I bring family history to that story as a son of a Croatian immigrant. The familiarity of voice, familial relationships, stories and language struck a harmonic chord with my experiences as a child.
I suspect that beauty is subjective, at least in most part, because of this fundamental reliance on what each of us bring to any possible moment.
Beauty is a ephemeral
Every time I’ve experienced beauty, it has never lasted; the song ends, we leave the exhibition, a smile in the right sunlight fades as the Earth turns and the colour, the glow, the warmth changes. It is fleeting and, in it’s scarcity, precious.
Beauty contains surprise
If we go searching for beauty or attempt to manufacture it, we likely fail to find it. Beauty catches/arrives through unawareness; a perfect and unpredictable mix of internal circumstance and external stimulus. I’ve never experienced a moment of beauty that I tried to plan or that I expected to arrive.
Beauty provides a sense of connection
Within any moment I would describe as beautiful lies a message; that we are part of something bigger. That may be a belief in an intelligent or orchestrated plan, or simply the happenstance and chaos of the universe and nature. Beauty always reminds me that I am not alone, that others (both human and non-human) see and experience the world in strikingly similar ways given our diversity. We all experience grief, fear, loneliness, happiness; these base-level emotions that we associate with what it means to ‘be human’ but, in fact, extends to non-humans, too.
Beauty reduces ego
If all of the above is true, beauty is ultimately about the experience of being reminded that we are not in control. We are one piece in a bigger story, it pushes us, for just a moment, to step outside of ourselves and become aware of our connection with other humans and the planet – past, present and future.
Beauty is a reminder that we are but a speck of dust in the vast timeline of planet earth, each finding and making our own meaning in the world given the circumstances we were born into and the choices we make as a result of those circumstances. If that’s true, I’m not sure there’s anything more beautiful than that. What a privilege it is to experience any of it all.