You’re Allowed to Want a More Beautiful Life
The first soft rays of sunlight appear on the horizon, and I pull back the curtain to let them spill into the room, breathing in that unmistakable freshness of morning on the Costa del Sol. Clouds drift across the sky in playful shapes and shifting colors, gathering around the rising sun like dancers circling a spotlight. Seagulls swoop and chatter overhead, their voices weaving into the rhythm of dawn, making it impossible not to pause and notice.
It was here in Marbella, during that very first week after relocating to Spain, that my husband and I found ourselves completely still, just watching the sunrise. Something so ordinary and yet so deeply beautiful. And in that simple moment, I felt a quiet reminder that a beautiful life isn’t defined by extravagance; it’s made of small moments that catch your breath and connect you back to yourself.
Sunrises are never the same, perhaps that’s what makes them magical and perhaps that is one of the simplest ways to make your life better every single day.
When I speak about wanting a more beautiful life, I know the word can be misunderstood.
I don’t mean shiny perfection, more money, yachts, designer logos, polished marble, or curated displays of luxury.
Beautiful, to me, means something more intimate, something that nourishes the mind and heart, that enriches the imagination, that reminds you what it feels like to be awake inside your own life.
And learning to notice it, to pause for it, is one of the most profound ways to improve your life without changing your circumstances.
In 2013, I flew to Cancun with one red suitcase, a story I’ve shared before in these articles “When happiness is packed in one red suitcase” and “How traveling solo with a one-way ticket changed my life?”
Seeing the Caribbean for the first time was like stepping into a postcard. The water was warm even in autumn, the sand bright white, the calmest turquoise waves lapping at the shore. I fell in love instantly.
But nine years later, something shifted quietly.
The coastline, which had once felt like paradise, became predictable. Sargassum seaweed washed up on the beaches, and instead of marveling at the color of the sea, I found myself noticing the smell. And although I enjoyed photographing the people there, creatively I felt boxed in, the light rarely changed, the scenery offered little contrast, and I found myself longing for shadows, textures, angles, anything different to turn that inner spark.
I wasn’t physically tired. I was creatively and emotionally tired, and craving a change.
That’s what can happen when we stay in one place too long without allowing ourselves to wander, to explore, to step into new landscapes and perspectives.
Sometimes, a beautiful life begins simply with a different life, a change that awakens the senses and helps you change your life from the inside out.
Beauty Isn’t Shallow. It’s Something We’re Wired For
Long before Instagram feeds and curated photo walls, beauty was woven into human existence. It lived in carved temples, in pottery, in music, in textiles, in the way people decorated their bodies and homes.
As an art student in Saint Petersburg, I visited the Hermitage Museum more times than I can count. Some visits thrilled me; others felt like just another assignment. But those countless hours taught me something deeper than art history, they shaped the way I saw. The proportions, the light, the lines, the textures; the quiet education of beauty seeped into my bones.
Wanting beauty is not frivolous it is instinctive, ancient and deeply human. And for many women, that desire to create, seek, and surround ourselves with beauty feels especially natural. Learning to honor it is a simple, elegant way to make your life better each day.
You’re Allowed to Have a Beautiful Life
Most of us know the inner protest well:
I don’t have time for this.
I have too many responsibilities.
It’s not practical, not necessary, not serious.
But someone else is allowed to want a promotion.
Someone else is allowed to dream of a family, a house, a luxury car.
So why shouldn’t you be allowed to want a life that feels inspiring, nourishing, textured, and alive?
Your dreams are valid, even if they don’t fit society’s usual categories. Longing for beauty, noticing it, and seeking it intentionally is how you improve your life, even in small, quiet ways.
How Spain Reawakens Your Eye for Beauty
Moving to Spain reminded me that beauty isn’t something to collect, it’s something to notice.
Here, beauty lives in the light bouncing off old stone walls, in tiled floors worn by centuries of footsteps, in a café terrace where time moves slower than the clock. It is in the food: olives, bread, anchovies, oranges and in the rituals of everyday living.
Through photography, especially macro photography, I learned a simple truth: you only notice beauty when you slow down enough to see it. First you pause. Then you look. And suddenly the ordinary becomes extraordinary. And that is one of the most immediate ways to change your life, to feel it fuller, richer, more awake (visit my online Macro Photos Gallery here).
Walking through Marbella’s narrow streets, breathing in the scent of citrus and sea salt, I realized that beauty has never left, I had simply stopped noticing it. Spain taught me what Cancun first revealed and then quietly took away: that beauty is everywhere, scattered across the world like clues, waiting for those who pay attention.
Wanting a beautiful life is not an escape from reality, it is a deeper participation in it, and that act itself begins to make your life better.
Beauty Lives in the Moment You’re In
So if you feel that pull, that gentle whisper that life could hold more color, more meaning, more small miracles — follow it.
Visit the museum you’ve passed a thousand times. Wake up for the sunrise. Sit at the café and watch people go by. Wander down a different street. Step into a story, even a small one.
A beautiful life doesn’t require permission, or perfect timing, or a bigger budget. It begins the moment you allow yourself to want it and the moment you choose, even in the tiniest way, to seek it. These small acts: noticing, exploring, pausing, are how you improve your life, one moment at a time.
Maybe it all starts with something as simple as sunlight slipping through a curtain in a country you weren’t born in, a reminder that you are allowed to desire a more beautiful life, that you can change your life, and that beauty, once invited, will always find a way to meet you halfway.
Longing for beauty doesn’t make you selfish. It makes you profoundly, unmistakably alive.
All images in this article were taken by Elena Sullivan, ArsVie Photo Studio and are protected by copyright. If you are interested in using any of the them, please contact me for permission. Thank you for understanding!
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