If you know me, you will know that I love to put makeup on my eyebrows. Growing up, I never really thought about eyebrows - at all. I have always had blonde, almost invisible, eyebrows. Honestly, I have never been self-conscious about the way my eyebrows looked. I would overpluck and underpluck for years. Here is what my eyebrows currently look like without any form of makeup on.

I was totally used to my eyebrows being unnoticeable on my face, but I was not used to the wave of eyebrow fashion. Sometime in my high school journey, eyebrows were all "the rage" and drawing your eyebrows in became more and more popular. So, I joined the trend and bought an eyebrow pencil in the shade "auburn," which is the color of my hair.

The struggle is real when matching eyebrow pencil colors to hair color. As you can see, my eyebrows are very, very blonde and my hair is brown/reddish. When the auburn pencil came out like a red crayon, I felt defeated. I tried blonde after that and then tried to mix both blonde and auburn before trying a brunette pencil. Here is what my brows look like after I have filled them in:

You can see an obvious difference between the two photos. (Keep in mind that I do have a lot more makeup on than an eyebrow pencil.) These differences became a lot more noticeable once I finally did my eyebrows. I know it sounds silly, but I made my identity around my eyebrows. I was focusing my beauty on whether or not you could see my eyebrows.

I don't blame society for the eyebrow trend, but I blame myself. Yes, society has pressured women into thinking that a strong eyebrow is a statement of power or self-confidence, but the way I want to present myself is up to me. If I want to rock my blonde eyebrows for a day, that shouldn't break down my confidence.

When a guy passed by me and I was wearing no makeup, I would cringe. In my head, I just knew that they were thinking about my eyebrows right away. Honestly, they may have, but that is their opinion. I refused to leave the house, even to go to the store five minutes away, without putting on a face full of makeup with eyebrows. You have to believe that the right guy and right friends will accept me without makeup.

Women get so caught up in what society wants them to look like and they are so quick to point fingers at the first person that claimed the latest trend. What we don't realize is that you are allowing low, shallow standard define your sense of beauty. God didn't specify that bold brows and heavy eyeliner could make you more beautiful. Ladies, stop pointing fingers at the people who tried to make shallow trends and start showing those trends a beautiful, natural woman.