Beyond Face Value

You can never see yourself as the world does. No matter how many mirrors you look into, you won't see what everyone else does. Beyond Face Value is not just a lesson Raje had to learn, but it is an ethos she now lives her life by. Have you ever believed you were destined for a path that was totally different from where you started, or felt that life was directing you against the normal, the expected and the accepted, and that every challenge you faced was due to a higher power guiding you to a greater place?

Raje's story is both inspiring and devastating in equal measure. An outcast literally from birth, Raje has had to fight racism, prejudice and ignorance her entire life. Through a series of events that would have broken even the strongest man, Raje emerged as a butterfly does from a cocoon into a beautiful spirit, yet the cruelty of life has deprived her of the traditional facial value.

Her story to the global stage after word of her horrendous and painful botched silicone injections came to light in Florida. Quickly, the damage inflicted on her by Oneal Morris (a.k.a. "Duchess") had attracted the media, both nationally and internationally, within a matter of weeks. At the age of 44 she finally had a platform to speak out about injustice and cruelty. She appeared with CNN's Anderson Cooper and Dr. Phil, as well as on German, Japanese, Spanish, and British television. This attention and the positive reaction to her plight, gave her the extra strength to tell the whole story that led her to, essentially, a back alley for facial injections of "fix-a-flat."

Raje's story is about one transgendered woman's incredible journey to truly understanding beauty, but it has touched millions, not just through understanding the plight of a transgendered woman, but because everyone has experienced, at some point in their lives, the disapproval of their parents, bullying at the hands of ignorance, discrimination, and events that change lives for the good, even though the idea they could, or that a future is even possible, in incredulous.

Inner beauty is a lovely clich, but after a life of tragedy, through spiritual enlightenment and prayer, Raje has beaten the odds and reached a point in her life where she knows happiness and acceptance is truly Beyond Face Value.