Not the Pretty One

[Verse 1]

I learned it young, before I learned my worth
The way they’d look at me, then look at her
They’d say her name a little louder
Like I was standing next to something better

I didn’t need it spelled out loud
I knew where all the eyes would run
I learned real quick where I stood
Beside the pretty one


[Pre-Chorus]

It’s not one moment, it’s a thousand
Little cuts you don’t forget
You start measuring your worth
By the things they never said



[Chorus]

I was never the pretty one
Never the one they’d say out loud
I learned to smile through the quiet
Hold my ground inside the crowd

It hurt before I understood
I wasn’t what the mirror won
But I learned to stand in truth
I was more than not the pretty one


[Verse 2]

You grow a skin, you grow a way
To laugh it off and look okay
You learn to be the easy girl
So no one sees what you don’t say

You find your value somewhere else
In standing strong within yourself
In being chosen when it matters
Not just noticed for what flatters



[Pre-Chorus 2]

And yeah, some nights it still comes back
Those echoes I outgrew
But I don’t live inside the voice
That once defined my youth



[Chorus]

I was never the pretty one
Never the one they’d say out loud
I learned to smile through the quiet
Hold my ground inside the crowd

It hurt before I understood
I wasn’t what the mirror won
But I learned to stand in truth
I was more than not the pretty one

⸻

[Bridge]

They don’t tell you how a girl
Starts shrinking just to fit
Or how long it takes to unlearn
What the world was careless with

I found my name beyond their eyes
Found my strength in being seen
Not for how I looked to them
But who I learned to be


[Final Chorus]

I was never the pretty one
But I’m still standing, still enough
I’ve been loved for who I am
Not the shape or how I look

I don’t need to win that crown
I don’t need what they’d begun
I grew into something deeper
Than just being not the pretty one,
Yeah


[Outro]

I was just a girl who learned early
How the world keeps score
Now I’m a woman who knows
There’s so much more

Mid-tempo country pop, bright acoustic guitar, subtle drums, warm confident female vocal, hopeful not emotional