See Beautiful Girl of the Month: Camryn Berry

Camryn Berry is beautiful. She writes it. She paints it. She celebrates it. She creates it. And at 14-years-old, she lives it in a way that reflects a lifetime of growing beautiful. Ask those around her and they'll tell you that she's always been this way: An inspiring individual who sees and seeks beautiful in everything. Wise beyond her years, Camryn sets out each day with the intention of seeing beautiful, both in herself and the world. At the age of 14 she paints, she writes, she builds, she plays and she leaves others empowered to be more like her. We are incredibly honored to celebrate Camryn Berry - and we are certain she'll leave you seeing and seeking more beautiful! Thank you, Camryn.

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See Beautiful Girl of the Month: CAMRYN BERRY

Camryn Berry. Shared with permission.

Written by Camryn Berry

Every morning I follow a certain routine, an infinite amount of actions that have taken place over an infinite amount of days. My alarm clock blares. I press “snooze” well over half a dozen times. Finally, thereʼs the dragging myself out of bed. Brush my teeth groggily and jump in the shower (if Iʼm really late I can do these at the same time).

However, itʼs not until Iʼm picking out my outfit, when I look up at the wispy lettering of the wall decal above my closet that my day really begins. “Be your own kind of beautiful,” it says.

Image shared with permission by Camryn Berry.

I have a rare disease called Fibrous Dysplasia. This disease has caused a large solid tumor to grow in my left cheek. It is the size of a baseball. Growing up, it did result in a certain level of bullying. A friend once told me about how a girl on his bus was making fun of me behind my back and how he had defended me. I can still remember him telling me about how the girl had called me “ugly.” I called my mom crying when I got home. Though it was a hard thing to deal with and even harder to get over, I began to realize that society is nurtured from a very young age to believe that beautiful is defined by looks; that you have to be a Barbie in order to deserve the label of beautiful. It took a while to accept that I could never be a perfect doll of a girl. But I soon realized that this didnʼt mean I couldnʼt be beautiful. Think of soldiers in battle, sacrificing their lives for our country. Is that not beautiful? Think of a girl being teased behind her back for her disease, but a friend putting his reputation on the line to come to her rescue.

Can you tell me that that isnʼt beautiful?

Image shared with permission from Camryn Berry.

To me, beauty is something that canʼt be defined. And with unclearness as to beautyʼs denotation, it can be found almost anywhere. A side effect of my tumor is that it affects the area surrounding it. For example, it has greatly decreased the eyesight in my left eye. In all truth, I can hardly see at all. However, I don't mind. The reason being, there is so little creativity, it seems. Everyone desires the same outlook on life: through 20/20 vision. Yet there is something so beautiful about the way things are hazy and blurry and how colors disappear and morph into each other. It's like having a different lens on your Canon. It opens a whole new world of opportunity. Why would I want to give that up all to see the world like everybody else sees it?

Portrait by Camryn Berry.

The same goes for beauty. Why would you want to be the way everyone desires looking, a perfect Barbie doll, when you could “be your own kind of beautiful?”

Camryn Berry...and her beautiful paintings.