Shunning makeup can be a big “fuck you” to the patriarchy
And it is also a sign of wounding with the masculine.
I clung to makeup throughout my entire teenage life. I had horrible acne. I refused to let anyone see me without full foundation ever. I touched it up throughout the day, during soccer practices. I took makeup with me into the shower at college, at camps, so no one could see my bare skin.
Letting makeup go was one of the hugest internal shifts I have ever had to make in my life. Still, to this day.
Everything in the world told me I was ugly without it. I was afraid that no one would love me, no one would be nice to me, and I’d lose everybody in my life.
So when I dropped it – literally, woke up one day at 21 and was like “I am not doing this to myself anymore” – I swung the entire other direction.
Fuck men. Fuck magazines. Fuck women who tried to look pretty – they were just falling in line with what patriarchy taught them.
But there’s actually wounding in this too – it’s not the truth.
It’s still living in reaction to pain.
A lot of feminism is like this.
Some decide that men better like them in all forms – sweats and dirty clothes, smelly pits, unwashed hair – and so they stopping putting an ounce of effort into their appearance, ever.
Beware of the angry “I don’t HAVE to, so I won’t.”
I don’t often wear makeup. Ask Jordan how often I smell. He loves it. There is nothing wrong with these things.
But a shunning of makeup, of pretty clothes, of beautiful things is often just a shunning of that part of yourself.
It’s really no different than having an attachment to them.
A shunning of what is labeled by the world as “femininity” is a reaction to unprocessed harm done by a patriarchal culture.
True freedom is in getting beneath the pain so that you have full choice in your expression of yourself, no matter how the world assigns meaning to it, and no matter what that looks like for you.
If you liked this piece, you might also enjoy:
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– Saying “I don’t know” is a female response to a patriarchal culture
– 11 ways to increase your feminine energy