the best compliments you can give a woman

i think women spend too much of their lives being complimented on things that disappear.

beauty.
weight.
youth.
how agreeable they are.
how easy they are to be around.
how effortless they make everything look.

all lovely things.
all temporary things.

and maybe this is age, or motherhood, or illness, or survival talking.
but the older i get, the more i realize the best compliments have very little to do with appearance.

tell a woman she makes people feel safe.

tell her her children feel deeply loved.

tell her she walks into rooms and softens them instead of shrinking inside them.

tell her she survived things that could have made her cruel and somehow remained gentle anyway.

tell her she is emotionally honest.
that she is trusted.
that people exhale around her.
that she makes complicated things feel survivable.

tell her she is remembered well after she leaves.

that one especially.

because beauty can attract attention.
presence changes people.

i think the most beautiful women i have ever met are not necessarily the most physically perfect.

they are the women who make other people feel more human in their presence.

the women who notice.
the women who remember details.
the women who can hold grief without trying to rush it away.
the women who remain soft without becoming weak.
the women who know how to make a home out of themselves.

and yes, tell women they are beautiful.

god knows the world is hard enough already.

but also tell them:
you are brilliant.
you are safe to love.
you are emotionally generous.
you make life feel lighter.
you carry people carefully.
you are deeply alive.
you are more than what people first notice about you.

because i think many women secretly spend their entire lives wondering whether anyone sees beyond the surface they worked so hard to perfect.

and the most meaningful compliment in the world might simply be:

i see you clearly.
and i still think you are extraordinary.