It’s not just you—being a woman feels impossible right now. A year ago, trends like everything showers and
“high maintenance things I do to stay low maintenance”
had us all in an excited tizzy—and for a good reason. In a world that is so fast-paced and demanding, being encouraged to take a moment to indulge in self-care can feel like being permitted to take the break we’ve been aching for. But recently, this obsession with maintenance has piled up into a heaping mountain of self-care that feels impossible for the average person to climb. In reality, most of us don’t have the time, money, or energy to achieve the level of beauty maintenance that we’re currently being sold, no matter how much we may love our face tools or skincare routines.
There are real numbers behind the increased physical maintenance demands that the beauty industry has created in 2023. In April, it was reported that beauty is growing despite inflation. The marketing is targeting an increasingly younger audience, and according to a recent spending survey, teen spending on skincare climbed 19 percent this year. TikTok has undoubtedly played a role in this, as videos of influencers doing their makeup or skincare (even while talking about something entirely unrelated) have exploded on the app. 2023 was also the year of Botox, specifically preventative Botox, traptox or
“Barbie Botox,”
and masseter Botox.
“Maintaining”
your physical, mental, financial, and emotional health should come first. First, we might be shocked that there are people in this world who haven’t been convinced that shifting their appearance will bring them greater happiness; second, there’s not exactly anything that can be said to meaningfully disagree.
“It’s very easy, under conditions of artificial but continually escalating obligation, to find yourself organizing your life around practices you find ridiculous and possibly indefensible.”
Translation? Sometimes, you’re probably going to find yourself hooked on a beauty ritual that doesn’t make sense to or for you. In those moments, it’s essential to ask yourself whether we’re doing everything we can for our real maintenance routines: the ones that keep us sane, functional members of society. Things like physical movement, human connection, financial responsibility, and mental health have to come before the next beauty product or self-care trend.
Adjusting our consumption of beauty products to fit our current needs—financial, emotional, or otherwise—is something that gets increasingly difficult with the growth of the industry, which is all the more reason to continually check in with ourselves about what matters most to us in our routines. It’s not wrong to go through phases when you can’t
“maintain”
In 2020, during the global pandemic, most people dropped all self-care. In reality, we didn’t want to maintain our looks because our lives had been upended, and we were watching the world fall apart in real time. Our appearance felt unimportant because, quite frankly, it was. Dropping aspects of your maintenance routine in the face of global strife doesn’t make you a lazy mess. Instead, it is a crucial part of your humanity. Taking time and energy away from your maintenance routine might mean you’re able to dedicate more time and energy to causes you believe in or people you love when it’s most important. On top of that, it’s OK for what’s most important to you to change. Caring deeply about how your hair looks one day and not wanting to pick up your blow dryer the next (and vice versa) is not abnormal—again, it’s human. Some problems can be solved with new products and routines—but a lot can’t.
It would be naïve to say that the things we do to maintain our appearances don’t have a tangible impact on our real lives. Beauty routines are capable of boosting our self-confidence to get us striving for that promotion, jumping back into the dating pool, or socializing with people we find intimidating. That’s powerful, and it should not go unrecognized as a very real part of the female experience. At the same time, always trusting the next trending ritual or product to make our lives better can prevent us from enjoying where we are in the moment—and from realizing that there might be other ways to solve a problem. With each new addition to our beauty routines, we have to ask ourselves: What is the problem I’m trying to solve?
You’re allowed to love your maintenance routine and think critically about it at the same time. If you’re feeling excessive pressure to maintain your appearance, blowing up the comments of the influencer who’s taking an everything shower or getting traptox likely isn’t going to change that feeling. It’s also a chronic misplacement of the blame for the origins of that pressure (hint: it starts with a p) and the people who should be responsible for removing that pressure (hint: not women). There are far more effective ways to change your outlook on maintenance and optimization than getting angry with a woman whose job is to recommend a product for doing exactly that. And if you, still love your beauty products, this does not make you superficial, irresponsible, or vain. As women, it can be so easy to reduce ourselves to one thing—beauty-obsessed ordown-to-earth, financially responsible or indulging in getting our nails done—when, of course, we are many things all at once. This is why constantly evaluating the things that matter most to us, especially when it comes to maintenance routines, is so important.
When the pressure to maintain starts to feel insurmountable, returning to those core things you know make you feel great and ditching the rest is key. Think of your beauty routines like a capsule wardrobe: Invest more in the versatile parts of your routine that make you feel amazing, and only add on the trendier pieces when it makes sense for you.
“Personal style”
is something that many of us have worked to develop with fashion.
Adapted from: The Every Girl
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