Hi, I'm Liz aka itsliz89 and welcome to my little home on the internet. This is my personal website so I'll be blogging about what interests me which may include, makeup, vegetarian food, feminism, human rights, my dog, random blurbs, and who knows what else. I am a member on 
To mend my quarter life crisis
Jan
10
2009
One of my goals for the new semester is to work on my physical appearance. Out of all the goals a person can set for themselves, that probably sounds so shallow, but I’ve really let my care for my appearance go down the shitter.
I remember how shocked my father was last year when I got off the airplane wearing cow pajamas. It was actually my father that pushed me into Rock and Republic denim. When your own Asian father tells you you need to work on your appearance, you must really look like a hobo.
Because I have a makeup themed Youtube channel, close minded people will automatically assume that I’m the type of person who relies on makeup, spends hours to get ready everyday, don’t have the courage to step outside without painting my face. All that could not be further from the truth. If I’m lucky, I’ll wear makeup 2 days out of the week. Repeating, if I’m lucky… Most days, I’m bare faced. When you’ve only gotten 3 hours of sleep, the last thing you want to do is paint over your droopy face. If I’m not going to dress up my face then what’s the point of dressing up my body either, so I gravitate to the sweats, hoodies, and sneakers.
Over time, I think my confidence has died as well. When I was in high school, I NEVER wore neutral makeup. I was off in my own little world and didn’t care what people thought of me. Just recently, I was organizing my clothes and found some articles of clothing that I would never have the balls of wearing today. There are people who I went to high school with who can testify that I walked around wearing stripper-esque clothing and dark black full blown smokey eyes, oblivious that it’s not “acceptable”.
As I started growing up and being exposed to the “real world”, I had to learn how to apply “proper” makeup… neutral looks. As I was wearing the neutral looks more and more, I strayed away from the bright and bold, losing the confidence to rock them. The neutral looks and plain clothing became safe. It’s gotten so bad that I think I’ve been typcasted into only doing neutral looks on my Youtube channel. “I didn’t know you wore color”… That’s depressing.
The science and engineering field of study is still dominated by men, and I think it’s natural for a lot of females to not want to stick out more than they already do with lipsticks and heels. I’ve become used to wanting to blend in with the crowd. The sad reality of it is that a lot of people will assume that if spent some effort on your appearance, that you must be some bimbo. Unfortunately, as people grow older, it’s sort of inevitable to care about how others perceive you.
I went from dressing up everyday to barely at all. When I make the effort to dress up, I get, “Are you going somewhere special today?” when it used to be “So… you were too lazy today that you didn’t bother to dress up?”. It’s quiet embarrassing. It’s like I’ve already let myself go, at a really young age!
My econ teacher brought up an interesting subject. Shoe shine businesses aren’t all that common because people just aren’t dressing up anymore. Remember the days when men wore nice suits and women fancy dresses wherever they went? Society today tends to demonize vanity but there’s nothing wrong with dressing ourselves up and looking nice. It’s still expected that we groom ourselves and wear deodorant, but that’s not necessary for survival now is it?
I admire people who have the confidence to set themselves away from the crowd and not care about what people have to say. Like Dita Von Teese who looks perfect everywhere she goes. Or… xppinkxx! Her outfits are always so fierce and I envy her courage to pull them off so well. Bold lips, bold eyes, latex leggings, who the hell cares right?
… easier said than done. We will try…
8 Transmissions have been sent!
I love the way all of your blog entries are so deep! I was thinking the same thing about Ms. Pink she has that confidence to pull anything off.
Cant wait to see what it is you do to accomplish this goal.
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Well girl, I must say that I was reading it like I wrote it myself. I was dressing up with confidence, with brightness and courage. As I started getting into more adult life and world throwing just the “downs” on me I became rather safe with clothing, sometimes I miss old me…
It`s so damn hard to be ourselves if we know that world – like at work – expects something totaly different and we know they are going to dicsriminate us just for clothing. I do not know any serious company that allows their workers wear whatever they want in huge, corporate environemtn, etc…
I think you touched very impotant subject in here… ALl the best for you girl !!!
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aw girl! You are very beautiful! I understand that sometimes, there are days where we don’t feel like wearing make up, I too don’t wear make up everyday, only when I feel like it which is very rare. eyeliner and lip balm is good enough. I don’t also wear bold clothings. I can only wear shirt and jeans and if i’m lucky I’ll wear a dress with my heels. I also got tired of wearing diff colors of eyeshadows because I feel like too overdressed. I’m only 22, but I feel so old already as for my friends, they like dressing up and such. Good luck on your goals. I know you can totally reach everything you decide to do. You are stunning!
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Liz, I can definitely relate to you. I love reading your blog because you are so honest and upfront about who you are. Never one to fake anything.
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i was trying to figure out what i liked so much about you… now i know.. you had that “rebellious” streak in you like i did but then listened to people and my “rebellion” was muted by people’s opinion. i think when we’re young and grew up with a little freedom, we felt okay to express ourselves..then we meet the rest of the judging world and we start to crawl in a cave just to be accepted.. i do have some good news, as you get older.. much older like in your 30’s.. you won’t care as much and will go back to who you were/are and who you were meant to be.. you’re just at that stage of caring of what others think… i DO envy those that have NEVER cared at all.. what freedome those people must have.. i completely envy that feeling.. it will get better.. maybe you won’t take as long as me but you’ll eventually become the person you are inside dying to come out w/ courage and enthusiasm and feel great and TRULY FEEL inside that you could care less what they are thinking..
big hug..
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What a wonderful post. Thank you for sharing! :0)
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I'm so glad to see another fellow engineer also into makeup. Interestingly enough, I am in the EXACT same position as you. I'm a graduate student in Materials Science & Engineering and I am IN LOVE with makeup. I buy it all the time, but, like you, I will only wear it MAYBE twice a week. Other than that, I put on a t-shirt, some jeans, sneakers, pull my hair back and I'm off to class/lab. I'm really glad that I've found someone in a similar position too…it doesn't make me feel so alone and left out =]
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hi, i just stumbled onto your blog earlier by googling “nars fotd” lol. firstly, i have to say i love your makeup looks! then i saw the tab called “personal” and came across this post.
i completely know how you feel and i’ve been there too! (the funny thing is that i’m also from an engineering background!!) reading your post really resounded with me, about wearing more out there looks in high school, falling into a blah pit because no one else cares so you’ve stopped as well, people looking at you strangely if you ‘dress up’.
it’s hard to deviate from conservative when that’s the environment you’re in but you can still work it on the weekends or when you’re going out at night!
and once you start i hope you’ll gain more confidence to do so, because you rock some really cool looks on this site!
best of luck
x
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