When I was in high school, I had almost no skin problems. Sure, I would get the occasional pimple if I forgot to wash my face for a few nights, or if I was on my period. But I never had anything serious and I was able to stick to a very simple skin routine without much work to maintain my clear skin.
Enter my 20th birthday, about six months ago. For some reason, due to stress, hormones, or maybe karma, I started getting acne. Although it wasn’t as severe as what some people experience as teenagers, it was nothing that I’d ever dealt with before. I was breaking out consistently and it seemed like every morning I had a new blemish.
I did a ton of research to try and figure out what to do with my skin. I added in an arsenal of products to my formerly brief skin care routine, all aimed at getting rid of acne for good— but nothing worked. I started getting really desperate to fix my skin, but saw no success. I spent more money on new routines that the internet told me would work, but my skin stayed stubbornly unclear.
So, this week, I decided to try something more extreme— I was willing to do anything to get rid of my acne. I started using a friend’s acne facial cream, which was prescribed to him by a dermatologist. He warned me that it was a pretty strong formula, but I didn’t care. I just wanted my zits gone. Boy, was I wrong. The second night I used the cream, I had some kind of allergic reaction that left the skin around my eyes red, swollen, and very painful. Just putting water on my face burned so much it was almost unbearable.
The next morning, although my skin looked somewhat better, it was still extremely painful and to be honest, I looked a little like a heroin addict. All day, people asked me if I was sick or had been crying, and even though I hadn’t, I wanted to by the end of the day.
That night, as I looked at my puffy eyes and readied myself to gently wash my skin, I realized just how much time, money, and energy I was spending just to look pretty. I was willing to use something not prescribed to me just to get rid of acne that, to be honest, isn’t even that severe. I spent so much time worrying about my skin and trying to fix the problem— time I could have spent doing much more important and fulfilling things.
There are so, so many more important things than being pretty. And yet I, and most people I know, spend so much of our lives concerned with our appearance. It’s easy to do when the media and society tells us that our self-worth is based on the way we look. But this just isn’t true.
What if I had spent all that time worrying about my skin thinking instead about how I could treat others with more compassion? What if I had put that energy towards working on my writing, something I love doing more than anything? Or studying, reading, hanging out with friends, or doing something nice for myself? I think these things would have made me a far better person than clearing up my acne.
So for now, I’m going back to my simple face routine. Instead of spending an hour in front of the mirror, I’m going to try to read a book. It might not get rid of my zits, but in the end, who really cares, anyway?
