Looking good is the best revenge

You don’t see it in the way Amor Powers holds her chin up and sneers at those who make the mistake of getting in her way. Neither do you see it in the way this arch villain of the small screen smirks at lesser mortals and declares herself the best, bar none.

But Eula Valdez, the person behind the strong-willed Ms. Powers, is as vulnerable as the heartache she recently experienced when she broke up with Ronnie Quizon, father of her eight-year-old son Miguel. It doesn’t show in her glowing skin (yes, flawless, with apologies to Rosanna Roces) and radiant smile.

But believe it or not – Eula Valdez is proudly, unabashedly 34 years old! What gives? Everything starts in the mind.

"I don’t cry over a problem. I do something about it," she declares. Not for her the energy-wasting stance of moping around because of a problem. After her breakup with Ronnie (they were together for more than nine years), Eula did not sleep or eat her problem away.

First, she explained to her son that it’s better for her to be friends with his dad than get into frequent fights with him.

"My priority is my son. If ever I get into a new relationship, I have to be assured first that the guy loves my son," Eula says.

After that heart-to-heart talk with her son, Eula attended to herself. "Either you choose to sulk forever, or be beautiful and improve yourself," she reasons out.

She upped and went to the gym, and threw herself to several rounds of her favorite sport, badminton. Who knows what she was thinking while swinging that racket for all she’s worth? Or hitting the shuttlecock with all the force she could muster?

She’s not breathing a word. All she says is, "If you allow problems to destroy you, they will. I’d rather move on. It’s a matter of loving yourself."

Result: She never for one minute looked like a lonely newly-separated woman, as her lesser sisters would have appeared.

"You cannot buy happiness. It’s a conscious effort to fight the negative and focus on the positive. It’s being at peace with yourself," Eula, also a Myra 300 E endorser, relates.

The inner peace gives her a radiance that’s different from just being beautiful. It gave her something more: character.

This, executives of Splash Extract Therapy were quick to notice. Thus, they signed her up as endorser early this year.

"She is the epitome of a beautiful woman, inside and out," a Splash Extract executive relates. "This strength of character only brings out the beauty in her."

Turns out the endorsement was just waiting to happen.

She has been using the product even before the Splash executives approached her.

"After a hard day’s work on the set, I remove makeup using Splash Extract Therapy," she reveals. "I use this to clean my face, twice a day. I always bring it with me in my bag."

Eula swears the daily regimen, coupled with lots of rest after work, has worked wonders.

"Before, a flattened pimple would leave ugly marks on my face. Now, these marks are gone," she explains.

For someone who makes a living out of staying beautiful, good skin is as precious as a flourishing career. She cannot afford to take chances.

"I don’t use soap on my face. It only dries my skin," Eula says.

For someone who started out as a sweet young thing who wore shoulder pads in those bagets movies with Raymond Lauchengco years back, Eula has come a long way.

"I won’t go back to those days anymore," she shakes her head.

Why should she? It will not only look out-of-place, it will also run counter to the strong woman roles she’s so identified with these days.

Aside from Amor Powers of Pangako Sa ’Yo fame, Eula is Mira, a single parent to a confused teenaged son in Darating ang Umaga. She was also the closet gay father Ricky Davao’s friend in Maalaala Mo Kaya, a role which catapulted her to leading TV star status in 1997 and changed the course of her career forever.

No one raised a howl when the Star Awards named Eula Best Actress for Television some years back.

Now, she plays another strong woman role in Star Cinema’s 10th anniversary offering, Marilou Diaz-Abaya’s Pagsasamang Kayganda… Noon at Ngayon.

This time, Eula is Sylvia, a mother who brought up her son Bobby (Marvin Agustin) in ways more liberal than most. It’s an unconventional character all over again, as Eula plays someone who accepts her husband’s preference for other men.

"Sylvia may look soft and fragile on the outside. But hers is a strength of spirit that makes her confront life and deal with her mistakes," Eula glows as she describes her character.

This inner strength is also seen in Sylvia’s close friends (played by Dina Bonnevie, Cherry Pie Picache and Jean Garcia, who became real-life buddies after the movie was shot). All of them, like the women who play their characters, emerged survivors, wounded, but never beaten.

Just like Eula and the rest of the strong woman roles she portrays. It’s art imitating life all over again.