Makeup.
Millions of people wear it for a variety of reasons. It is used in Broadway shows to transform ordinary people into mythical characters, worn by millions of women every day for school or work, and the list just goes on. At one point in my life, I wore makeup very regularly. I would get up early every day in high school to make sure I had time to put on a full face of makeup. I wore it all, the foundation, concealer, powder, blush, mascara, brow products, contour, highlight, I wore it all pretty much every day.
By the time I was a senior in high school, I started to wear less of it. I would skip applying certain things or just not wear any at all. Then by the time I started college, my whole "makeup routine" and outlook on makeup changed.
It's a lot of work.
This might be self explanatory but wearing a full face of makeup every single day just got to be too much. I would get up at 6 in the morning to make sure I had time for all of my makeup. That just sounds ridiculous to me now. If I do wear makeup I have a go-to short routine that isn't too much of a hassle but for the full face glam look, that takes so much extra time. I probably sound somewhat lazy but if I had to choose between sleeping more or putting on a full face of makeup, I'm sleeping and I'm not sorry about it. To make my mother and grandmother feel a little better (they wear makeup regularly) I do still make the time for the full face of all things makeup when I'm doing something special, but that is becoming a rare occasion.
Wearing less helps my skin.
Makeup can cause acne. By constantly clogging your pores with foundation and concealer it can cause breakouts or make your already-existing acne worse. Once I stopped wearing that much makeup my acne improved. I really buckled down on my skin care and was careful of what I put on my face and I have seen results. To be fair, I still get breakouts like any other teenage girl but I really think by limiting the amount of makeup I put on my face I have seen improvements.
I was too busy in college.
When I started attending college, putting on makeup was the absolute last thing on my mind. I had to learn to get ready in a shorter amount of time and spending 15-20 minutes doing my makeup was one of the first things to be cut out. To me, it wasn't really a big deal. Many of my friends didn't wear makeup or not a lot of it so I never felt like I was doing something wrong. Honestly, even if my college friends did wear a lot of makeup I probably still wouldn't have worn it because I was too busy focusing on school.
I want to embrace natural beauty.
As I have gotten older, I have really tried to embrace being myself and looking natural. I didn't want to transform my face into someone that was unrecognizable anymore, I wanted to work with what I already have. Like I mentioned earlier, I now have a much more simple and shorter makeup routine. I am still experimenting with it but my goal is to wear as little as possible but still feel my very best. I have found that if you invest in a good skin care regimen and really focus on clearing your skin or fixing imperfections, you won't feel like you need a lot of makeup to look good. This is what I have been trying to do. Working on my skin and learning what helps it look the best so I can feel confident with barely or no makeup on.
I don't need it to feel good about myself anymore.
This is probably the biggest reason I wear less makeup now. This reason goes along with the previous one, but in high school I used to think I needed to wear makeup to feel good. If for whatever I ran out of time to put some on, my whole day felt off and I felt very uncomfortable. It was like I had to wear a full face of makeup to feel complete and confident in myself. Looking back I understand why I felt that way, but I am so glad I broke that cycle. Feeling confident in how you naturally look is so important. I really can't stress it enough. In order for a person to feel confident in themselves embracing how you look is a big factor.
Makeup can do wonders and sometimes it's fun to wear and try new looks. However, it is important to remember that at the end of the day, all of it has to come off and you're left with your natural, bare face. Feeling confident with makeup on is one thing, but how you feel when you take it off is what really matters.
