Your Feb 3 newsletter on inner beauty has been on my mind a lot lately. In fact, I had considered writing to you about it recently. Imagine my delight when I saw you already had it covered.

I think inner beauty comes from only one source. Love. Everything in this world boils down to either love or fear. Love is to fear what light is to darkness. When a woman has love in her heart, she can light up a room and turn heads without trying. It doesn't matter what her physical attributes are, love is what makes her beautiful. Love is light and light attracts the eye.

And the reverse is also true. If a woman is fearful or self centered, she can have the most perfect figure on Earth but she won't look beautiful. Fear is darkness, the absence of love's light, and it shows.

That's why the first thing I notice about a woman is her smile. If she doesn't have an honest smile, what lies below it isn't worth a thing.

I have a good friend, a young lady who has that inner light of pure unconditional love. The most amazing thing is that she is completely unaware of how she lights up her surroundings. Most people struggle a lifetime to shed their fears and let their light come through. Yet she somehow manages to do it with no effort whatsoever.

My wife is the same way. I fall in love with her all over again every day because she just loves. She loves me, she loves life, she loves her community, she loves total strangers. Don't tell me that passion dwindles as a relationship progresses from year to year. My wife and I have been together 23 years and the spark of passion that began so long ago is now a raging fire! Over the years she has dropped her anxieties and now she lets her love radiate everywhere without a second thought. She'll be 51 years old next week and she can still turn the heads of much younger men. If it wasn't for the grey hairs you'd think she wasn't a day over 30.

Recently I saw a TV interview with the new President of Chile, Michelle Bachelet. She hadn't said two words before I saw that she had that spark of love in her. She just glowed! She spoke of love and forgiveness with the authority of someone who actually knew what she was talking about! It was tremendously refreshing to hear a national leader talk about love as the basis of public policy. In her youth she and her family had been victims of political torture. If anyone has reason to be bitter, it is she. But instead she is so full of love that just two words could convey it half way around the world. It was quite amazing. Curiously, she claims to be agnostic, yet she embodies the spirit of Christ more than all other world leaders combined.

Thanks for all you do for love and beauty.

James T