A selfie. An Instagram filter. Makeup. Things we see in our daily lives, but how do those things influence how we see ourselves?

The selfie has evolved throughout the past ten or so years. It has gone from something that nobody really took seriously to a complete art form. Ten years ago nobody really cared what angle someone took their selfie at or what filter they used, but now basically your entire ego is based on how many likes a selfie gets on Instagram. It has become our culture, filled with Facetune and VSCO filters. There are even certain poses that oftentimes girls use on Instagram, and you are automatically judged if you don't pose a certain way.

Like it's a crime if you don't want to look like every other girl out there on the internet. Instagram is no longer a place where you can post whatever you want, and we have been conditioned to look like one another and to pose the same and to use the same filter. Because of what? To create fake lives in order to get likes and stay relevant? In order to contribute to some kind of aesthetic? Basically, the answer to all of these is yes. Social media has told us that in order to be liked by other people, we have to be aesthetically pleasing and portray a certain lifestyle that almost nobody has in their real life. If you really think about it, it's a pretty unhealthy mentality to be having. At least with America beauty standards, it has become an obsession to be "curvy" or "slim thick", like the Kardashians. However, in reality, not a lot of people are born with this body type. And the representation of woman in ads like Victoria's Secret doesn't help either.

In addition to the perspective of ideal body type, makeup has control over what we think is real and not real. While I know that many people use makeup as a creative outlet, which I think is amazing, I do believe that it contributes immensely to the beauty standards of society. While I enjoy wearing makeup and testing out different products (I'll admit to watching beauty gurus on YouTube), I'm not the person to wear makeup every day. Honestly, I'm just lazy and prefer to sleep in. But, anyhow, wearing makeup has become a standard now. Some people look at these beauty gurus and think that they wear a full face of makeup all the time, which is by far not true. If that is what you're into, then great, I'm not disrespecting that. But, it becomes an issue when people are using makeup and tuning their pictures to hide their insecurities about themselves. It's one thing to wear makeup because you feel better and it boosts your confidence, but to wear it all the time to hide who you are is something that damages a person's mental health and image of themselves and the world around them. And when people are telling you that you look pretty only when you have makeup on, it is kind of demeaning to the soul and makes you wonder if people will like you at all in your real flesh and body without the help of foundation or eyeliner.

While us as a society think we are getting better at including people of all shapes and sizes, I believe that the same unrealistic beauty standards are still out there. Technology has given us a way to represent how we look and live to the world as to how we want other people to see it. We thrive off of validation through conforming. And often we do this unintentionally since its so interwoven in our culture. We don't see anything wrong with it, or if we do, we keep posting pictures and continue to skew and basically "photoshop" ourselves and our lives in order to fit into this idea of a "perfect" self and because, simply, it's human nature. I believe that our beauty and aesthetic culture on the internet and social media has taught us that the authenticity of life has to be painted over with fine detail and attention to every single flaw until we don't know what is real anymore.

Yet it is necessary to realize in the world we live in today thatlife is worth so much more when it is lived with real and raw beauty instead of with masks of a person that is unknown to us.

Below is an ode I wrote to makeup. This is just one general interpretation of the absurd societal beauty standards that exist today out of many others. By no means am I saying any one person is better if they choose to wear makeup or not. We all feel different things. Makeup is a creative outlet for both girls and boys, and if people feel like expressing themselves through it, then the more power to you. I'm just saying that if maybe we put down the contour and Photoshop, we might be able to see the more important things in life that don't include always having to be "camera ready". I simply want to make it known that we as human beings are beautiful without all the accessories. We should gain validation from within ourselves and not other people. And we should learn that it's okay to live our lives how we want to, without feeling a need to bend the truth in order to be loved.

Here you lay on my face, melting into my skin becoming something I am really not.

They say you make me pretty, but is that true?

I constantly am surrounded by beauty, unnatural beauty that is made to be natural.

I hear ads chanting “easy, breezy, beautiful Covergirl”, but do I really want to be this Covergirl?

No I don't!

Is this Covergirl even a reachable thing?

Perhaps it's never reachable because people will always admire to be something they will never be.

This eye shadow, does it really accentuate my eyes or does it just make me a shadow of my own self hiding from self pity and shame?

Does this mascara really elongate my lashes or does it really just elongate my need to please everybody else?

Does this eyeliner really shape my eyes or does it just shape me to be something I am really not?

And for the foundation, the base of all "beauty", does it really mask all the flaws on my face?

No, it doesn't!

What it truly does is hide myself from my true identity.

We live in a society that doesn't think twice when they see a girl with makeup on because it's considered a "natural" thing to do.

Well, it's not natural...

I am enclosed in a circle that punishes people for not being flawless.

Well perhaps I am flawless but in a different way.

I woke up like this, in the raw, naturally beautiful,

okay enough with myself to break away from continuing to mask my own self with the stroke of a brush or a smear of a certain blush.

When I take you off, all that is left is a few black and blue smudges on this towel.

These black and blue smudges are like my battle wounds, bruises long forgotten.

And when I take you off, I am missing something that has been a part of me, but a false part at that, for so long.

And with great pleasure, I throw you and all my black and blue scars into the garbage because you don't deserve to control me like you did.

Here you continue not to lay on my face,

but I am better without you.