Finding Your Own Beauty

This article is adapted from my post for Her Campus at Chapel Hill. Click here to check it out!

My beauty journey has been a long and, dare I say, occasionally unfortunate one. From high school pictures featuring way too much blue eyeshadow to college photos where I apparently hadn’t discovered the concept of enough coverage, I’ve spent years trying to find the right balance. And honestly? I’m still figuring it out.

A few years ago, I felt like I needed to put on a full face of makeup every time I left the house. Grocery store run? Full glam. Quick trip down the street? Better make sure everything is blended.

Looking back, I have to ask myself: What exactly was I getting ready for on a two-block walk to the grocery store?

Don’t get me wrong. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with loving makeup, experimenting with different looks, or going all out when you’re in the mood to feel extra glamorous. But at some point, I realized that I wasn’t always wearing makeup because I wanted to. Sometimes, I was wearing it because I felt like I was supposed to.

And that was something I wanted to change.

Learning to Feel Comfortable in My Own Skin

After a little soul-searching and a conversation with my mom, I decided to challenge myself to gradually wear less makeup.

I didn’t go from a full face to bare-faced overnight. Instead, I took it one step at a time.

I’d start with my usual routine and slowly leave things out. First, maybe a little less blush. Then no eyeshadow. Eventually, I started skipping the eyeliner, mascara, foundation, and concealer, too.

One product at a time, I loosened my gorilla grip on my makeup bag until I was comfortable leaving the house with little more than tinted lip balm and a quick brush through my brows.

And you know what surprised me most?

How quickly something that initially felt uncomfortable started to feel completely normal.

After a few days, I began to realize that I didn’t need to spend so much time getting ready just to run a simple errand. I could leave the house without carefully applying layer after layer of makeup and still feel good about myself.

More importantly, I started questioning why I’d felt like I needed all those layers in the first place.

When Makeup Becomes an Expectation

I think it’s easy to underestimate how much our surroundings influence the way we see ourselves.

We’re constantly exposed to polished photos, carefully curated beauty routines, flawless-looking skin, and makeup tutorials that make a ten-step routine look like the bare minimum.

Even when we know that social media doesn’t show the whole picture, it’s difficult not to absorb some of those expectations; at least, that was my experience.

I realized that I wasn’t always putting on makeup because it made me happy. Sometimes, I was doing it because I thought it was what other people expected of me—or because I felt like I needed to look a certain way to feel presentable, and I didn’t want to keep operating that way. I wanted to feel just as comfortable going out with a bare face as I did when I’d spent time getting ready.

That didn’t mean suddenly disliking makeup or deciding I would never wear a full face again. It simply meant giving myself permission to choose.

Making Glam Makeup Feel Special Again

These days, I save my full-glam looks for the occasions when I genuinely want to dress up and have fun with my makeup.

Sometimes that’s for a night out. Sometimes it’s because I’m in the mood to experiment with a new look. And sometimes, I just feel like putting on a little extra mascara and lipstick because why not?

The difference is that makeup has become something I choose to do rather than something I feel I have to do, and that shift has made the experience so much more enjoyable.

Instead of feeling like I need makeup to leave the house, I get to appreciate it as a form of self-expression. I can have fun with it, play around with different products, and enjoy getting ready without feeling like my bare face isn’t enough.

Because it is.

Finding Your Own Beauty

Here’s what I want you to take away from my experience: there is no single right way to wear makeup.

If you love a full-glam beat every day, go for it. If your routine consists of moisturizer and tinted lip balm, that’s great, too. And if you’re somewhere in between, welcome to the club.

The goal isn’t to wear less makeup just for the sake of wearing less makeup. It’s to figure out what makes you feel comfortable and confident, without feeling pressured to meet someone else’s expectations.

If you’re trying to find that happy medium, give yourself room to experiment. Try skipping a product you usually reach for automatically. Take a few days to get comfortable with a simpler routine. Pay attention to how you feel, and remember that you can always change your mind.

You don’t have to give up the things you love about makeup to feel beautiful without it and you certainly don’t have to earn the right to feel confident by looking a certain way.

At the end of the day, makeup should be something that adds to your experience of yourself—not something that determines how you feel about yourself.

Whether you’re bare-faced, full-faced, or somewhere in between, I hope you find the freedom to feel beautiful on your own terms.

How have you found your beauty?