Miriam Quiambao: Graceful in every season

If any woman should know what grace under pressure should feel like, it would mean walking in four-inch heels and gliding, wearing a tall crown over the head and balancing it, wearing lipstick without smudging, putting mascara on coronation night and tearing, making mistakes and emerging, living in a broken, imperfect world and still loving.

Anyone would know that Miriam Quiambao is all that a beauty queen ought to be. Her beautiful tanned skin, long legs and pretty smile are always gracing every magazine and television screen, serving as a template for beauty, health and success. And what about strength? That, too, of course.

Miriam Quiambao made the decision early on to face her fears. "I used to be a loner; I used to be really shy. And then I decided not to be shy anymore." And then a beauty queen was born.

In essence a queen is someone who represents her people, who exudes fine living and grace and everything that a woman should be. And while the king is the strength and the power, the queen remains to be, for the most part, the heart. Miriam Quiambao, undoubtedly is a strong woman, with brains to match. She loves to read and incessantly tries to enrich her mind. She also is an advocate of nurturing her spirit. She feeds on books that nourish her soul. Miriam also loves to travel. Her many travels around the world have also given her a string of rich experiences. Despite being fully out there in the open, for the world to behold or just simply watch, Miriam also likes to spend quality time with important people in her life. She can indulge herself in braving the limelight but she still, also, on a good day, will enjoy indulging in a really good cup of coffee with a really important person.

These are the times that Miriam is truthfully finding who she really is. And after a season of putting herself out there to be loved by many, she is now learning to love the woman that she is inside. With her recent separation still fresh in the public’s view, Miriam simply takes it one day at a time. For her "life is just beginning." Her small steps start with trading her high heels for running shoes, going for a run around UP every morning (when she’s not flying in and out of town). She also takes care of herself, taking vitamins enjoying baths and trips to the spa and spending quiet time to meditate before the day begins.

Miriam says that a beautiful woman is someone who knows that she is complete. And that "Grace is a state of mind and heart," you can’t really try to be graceful, it flows from within. Of course Miriam had to go through extensive training during her beauty queen days. She did learn how to walk in the heels and wave with the crown and speak with the poise that all beauty queens seem to be naturally adept to. She worked hard and worked with excellence. Perhaps the fact that she is beautiful even when circumstances are stressful or busy or at times bleak, makes everyone enamored by her. When asked what was that one quality that defined her, she proudly said: "That I rise to the occasion." Miriam indeed, rises to every occasion, and does so with elegance and poise, carrying with her a head full of ideas, sound decisions and a will that is strong enough to carry her through life’s storms. It takes a lot of courage to go up against many beautiful women and represent your country, but for Miriam Quiambao, it was facing her own fears years ago as a young woman and now riding gracefully through a season of heartbreak and self-discovery that makes her a woman worthy of praise. Life has taken Miriam in and out of herself giving and winning back, traveling and searching, changing lives and perceptions both near and far. When she was asked to name her favorite place in the world, this former beauty queen, smiles, points to where her heart is and says: "right here — my home" and she smiled ever so radiantly.