I know I’m not a beauty blogger (you can probably already tell by how little makeup I own) and my ‘fashion’ posts are just lame excuses for showing off what little fashionable clothes I own, but this blog post idea came to me a few months ago. I was talking with a friend who also attended St Andrews and we both realised that we came to the same conclusion back then. We both felt like wearing a lot of makeup daily made us feel less pretty, it made us like our natural self less, it made us want to hide more.
To start from the beginning, I started wearing highliner when I was a teenager and my beauty regiment has never really changed since. I’m very low maintenance, some eyeliner and some mascara so I don’t look like a corpse. Period.
When I moved to St Andrews it was like being shipped to a sea of tall and beautiful models: American, German, Scandinavian, British, etc. I didn’t feel ugly or anything, but I started feeling pressured to wear more makeup, to try and hide my imperfections, to always wear contacts and look put together.
Then one day, in the early hours of the morning as I walked home from yet another ball, I wiped my makeup off and I saw the massive difference it made, how pale and washed out I looked underneath it all… and I felt ugly.
It was like a slap in the face. ‘I’m not ugly, how dare you put yourself down and think that about your own face, Camila!’ And so, I decided I should stop trying so hard.
I mean I totally understand using makeup to enhance ourselves a bit, hide a few blemishes, etc. But the line became clear to me that day – that putting so much makeup on that, when I took it off, I didn’t like what I saw anymore, wasn’t what I wanted.
Obviously, I still use makeup. Actually I love makeup. I love trying on new eyeliners and new lipsticks, I love making my eyes pop, etc. But I’m also okay with not wearing makeup now. The less I wear it the more I’m okay with how I look naturally!
Do you also have a conflicted relationship with makeup?xx