Beauty trends are NON-stop these days, and unless we want to be puppeteered for the rest of our lives by social media and the media at large, we need to make sure we have a solid internal relationship with ourselves. We need to question our beliefs about who we are, what we “should” look like, and most of all, stop taking all of it so damn seriously. This is an important one!
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Beauty trends are NON-stop these days, and unless we want to be puppeteered for the rest of our lives by social media and the media at large, we need to make sure we have a solid internal relationship with ourselves. We need to question our beliefs about who we are, what we “should” look like, and most of all, stop taking all of it so damn seriously. This is an important one!
I cover:
Feedback? Questions? Comments? Head on over to Instagram and let me know in my DMs!
FREE TRAINING
COURSES
Follow me on Tiktok: @jessiemgolden
Subscribe to my Youtube channel
[00:00:00] Welcome to the Jesse Golden podcast. We are talking about all things, beauty today and standards. The title being stopped, taking yourself so damn seriously with beauty. And I understand that there are a lot of nuances here. And the first thing that people typically want to say is easy for XYZ to say. Or must be nice XYZ, right?
Based on different attributes that we assigned to somebody else and say it's easier for them. And of course, society. Judges women. Even young girls based on beauty in no way, shape or form. Am I denying that? However, we also need to come to the place of accepting that and deciding if we are going to be puppeteered for the rest of our lives, when it comes to how we view ourselves.
So yes, the way life works is we all. Have different ends of the spectrum when it comes to a variety of attributes and traits, that's just the way life works. [00:01:00] And I like to think that it evens out in many different ways when it comes to some people are brilliant. They are born with a really high IQ. They are just naturally much smarter. Other people are born with great skin genetics.
Other people are born with. Naturally having apps, we all have our things, right. That we come into the world with. So I would invite you to just keep an open mind throughout this conversation and understand that I am fully aware that we all have different genetic backgrounds, that we all have different histories, et cetera.
But this work is really important. And I cover this a lot when it comes to body image. Instead of food, freedom, evolution. And with beauty trends and aging becoming such a prevalent thing, I think it's an, it's an important topic to discuss. You can apply a lot of what we're talking about here to body image.
If that's something you struggled with in particular. So. First thing's first beauty trends and standards will always be changing. They just, well, that's the way it's always been [00:02:00] likely the way it always will be. And it's up to us to decide that we are going to detach from these trends and decide what we want for ourselves.
There's nothing wrong with wanting to look a certain way at all. We are social creatures. And we do things all the time for the way that we look. And it's really tempting to start to talk shit about other women doing things that are different from what you might be doing or different from what you might be able to afford. But when it comes down to it, I don't know, one woman in my life who's completely opted out of beauty standards or wanting to pay attention to their appearance in some way. Styling their hair, coloring their hair, getting their nails done, getting facials. Focusing on the way that they dress, whatever it is, there is some focus on their appearance, which is fine. We need to make that normal.
I hate the word normalized, but. I'm going to say let's make it normal. Secondly, millennial women and previous generation grew up with that. Waiflike really thin body type and disordered eating was [00:03:00] everywhere. And I know gen Z and younger women deal with different body pressures when it comes to you have to. I be curvy and all the right places that kind of thin fit thick physique. Kardashians asks style body that a lot of women. Are trying to attain.
And when you're a young girl, you think you haven't even gone through puberty. Of course you don't have hips, but I am almost five 11. Woman with a very small bone structure and there's no way I'm ever going to look like a Kardashian. It's just absurd. So imagine that with young girls, they have their own different type of pressure.
But I think because there's so much conversation around having a healthy relationship with food now, And that was not ever discussed growing up as a millennial woman for myself.
The obsession with women's looks hasn't changed. It's just morphed, right? So big ass, small waist lean, but not too lean. You can't age in Hollywood.
Everyone looks like they're just frozen in time. [00:04:00] Just with the top look. Big lips, small nose, big eyebrows, right? It's like everyone knows what the conventional beauty standard is. These days. And that will change. So with women getting a bunch of plastic surgery to match these trends, it's going to be really interesting if in 10 years, What is ideal is completely different, how that will be managed.
So we'll see. And all of these are completely fine. You could check every single one of these boxes and be like, yep. I want every single one of those. If they're genuinely in alignment with our own preferences. And then if anything here is we won't ever really know because we're all influenced right. But you can see with fashion trends. You can see the trend and say, uh, yeah, I don't actually like that. I don't want to wear wide leg jeans.
I don't want to wear a crop tops. I've never been a crop top gal. That's not my thing. Love wide leg jeans. Right now it's like those mesh ballet flats are kind of, and there's some interesting trends that go around a fashion and we can [00:05:00] pretty clearly say, Hmm, no, not for me. Same thing when it comes to body trends and beauty trends. Tune inward for the answers as to what you want to be doing rather than saying, oh, I just need to follow what everybody else is doing.
And the key, in my opinion, To being able to navigate all of this with some semblance of stability within yourself is having a sense of humor about it all. And this is what I share with my SLA clients. When it comes to fat loss is start the process with a sense of detachment. Emotional detachment of this is not do or die. And I understand there. I mean, that's a whole different conversation with health ramifications of weight, et cetera.
But. For a lot of women, they're doing it for vanity purposes. And even if it is with health, doing it in a way that is, I'm doing this to take care of myself. And it's not, the world is not going to end. Yes. Is my health important? Absolutely, but I [00:06:00] don't have to approach it with a sense of I'm being chased by a tiger and I'm about to die, certainly when it comes to beauty trends.
Right. So I went down a bit of a rabbit hole there for a second when it comes to health and. Body composition. But when we just, if we just focus on beauty trends here for a second, We can absolutely have a sense of humor about it all. None of us listening to this podcast. Is Beyonce. And even she will get old at some point and die. No one will remember us in a hundred years.
That's just the way it is. So when we get so obsessive, we focused on the way that we look on our beauty and stopping time and making sure that we are. Perfect. And everyone feels like just maintaining their health quote unquote and the way they look as a full-time job. We need to get a grip a little bit, right?
We don't have millions of eyes. We're not Taylor swift staring at us. I can absolutely understand the pressure when it comes to somebody like that. And it sounds like even she's worked through that, Taylor swift, if you're interested in that she has a documentary where she [00:07:00] talks about her past issues with dieting and relationship with food, et cetera. But. Youth will eventually fade no matter what we do about it, unless we are planning to nip and talk our entire body so that we don't have wrinkles anywhere, you might have a top face, but the rest of your body is going to be saggy and wrinkly.
Right. And who knows what the technology what's going to happen. But sometimes I wonder if this obsession with staying young is just a fear of our own mortality. But I think more so for women, and this is not to shame any of us because I certainly still have to do all this work on myself. I have to catch myself. Is, we are taught that our sense of connection and safety in the tribe and community is dependent on the way that we look and now even more so, because. I was talking to my friend yesterday.
Who's in her mid forties. And. We were talking about aging and she was saying, you know, it's weird being in your mid forties and you realize that you're never going to [00:08:00] look as hot as you once did. And of course there's nuance there. Right. And there's a lot of subjectivity, but. Society idolizes youth. With women. And that is something that we have to reconcile because we see so often we don't, or rather we don't see what women look like as they age. It's just like non-existent in social media, in popular media. Essentially the messaging is you get to be in your forties and then poof, everything disappears. Like women just don't exist after that age.
Hello. We need more examples of women. Aging show me women. And they're 50, 60 seventies. I want to see this. And of course we had, you know, Betty White and. I think in Hollywood, women are trying to show that more. I think Cameron Diaz she's like, no, I just am not fighting my aging or drew Barrymore and, um, Paulina. I'm going a bunch of her last name. Or something like that.
She's a former [00:09:00] supermodel or current supermodel. I think she's stunning, but she's chosen to opt out of Botox and plastic surgery and things like that. So there are women, but you don't see it. You have to really seek it out. And I think that can do a number on our brains because we think, oh shit. In order to stay connected.
And this is a subconscious conversation we're not aware of in order to stay connected to the tribe. To be safe to belong. I have to maintain. This image of being frozen in time in my twenties and thirties. And it's impossible for all of us. And I mentioned this just a second ago, but I can't help, but wonder if our obsession with youth is really a cover for fear of death and our own mortality. Or we just want to pretend like this song dance goes on forever and it keeps us trapped and really superficial conversations rather than thinking about. You know, the depth of what it is to be human and to be alive in this whole journey of life.
And. I love speaking to women who are older. I love [00:10:00] speaking to my grandmothers. Both of them are alive. They're in their nineties. They have such wisdom to share and they have such perspective and there's so much value and their lived experience. And we, we block that out and I think it's because we have to then face the fact that that will be us one day. This whole charade will be over at some point.
So I think subconsciously there is that fear of death and our own mortality, because we just don't want to talk about death in our culture. And that it is coming for us in Western cultures. And also just the, and I have so much compassion for all of us in this way, this subconscious fear that I'm going to be rejected. Unless I stay looking like all these images I'm inundated with on a non-stop basis, which is. You know, we see Gigi Hadid. Hailey Bieber. Um, Kendall Jenner all these young women and they are probably going to look like that forever. At least their face as well. To for as much as they can control it. Right.
So [00:11:00] I have a lot of compassion and so we have to do the work because society is not going to do it for us. They're not going to offer us this stuff up on a silver platter. I think women are being more vocal about wanting to see women age, but. We are going to have to form our own opinions and work on our sense of self-worth and self-esteem. Outside of what society is going to do for us.
I will never rely on them to give me self-esteem. Them, whoever they are. So we can also take things too seriously in either direction. We can virtue signal about how pure we are, kind of that pick me girl mentality, where we talk shit about other women getting work done. Like, oh my gosh, I never wear makeup.
I've never done anything to this. XYZ. I would never get Botox. Oh, my gosh, I can't believe you get that. It's like, okay, I get it. You have never done anything. You're just naturally stunning and you don't have any interest in the way that you look. That is wonderful. If that is true. And also if someone is so confident [00:12:00] in that, In that way of being in that perspective, then they certainly, aren't going to feel the need to put other women down who do things differently, like who gives a shit, another woman is going to do it.
And I've talked about this on a different episode. That I fell into the trap of. Subtly judging other women for getting work done because I was like, fuck. I'm going to have to keep up with all this without even questioning it. It was just the subliminal feeling of pressure of, okay, they're doing all this stuff and I'm going to have to do all this stuff in order to keep up with it.
And that is my shit. To work on and I've done work on that and it doesn't bother me anymore, but it certainly used to where it was like, no, I am a grown woman. I can decide what I want and I can own it. And if other women want to do it and I decide that I want to do it. It's because B because I want to not because I'm trying to. Stay up. Up to date with them and compete with them.
That's a little girl mentality and that's where I was. So if you're in that place, know that I've been there as well, but that's taking [00:13:00] things too seriously as well because it's too much of a focus on our appearance. And our beauty, our bodies. What have you? If you want to never have any focus on your body and your beauty. I love that for you. We also, I respect your decision and then we can respect other women's decisions to be in the complete opposite end of the spectrum. Which is putting our bodies through endless trauma and stress to achieve a look with no finish line. Right.
We've seen all these plastic surgery shows where women just, it's never enough. You nip and tuck one thing, and then you have to nip and tuck another thing. And it's. I think we've, it's interesting to see how we all have different things that we find important. So, We will, women will put their bodies. Through intense trauma when it comes to these. Big plastic surgeries.
I mean, that's no joke on your body. But then we'll be afraid of some Stevia or aspartame and a diet soda. It's like, whoa, I think we need to take a step [00:14:00] back and really assess. What we actually care about here. Right. So there's a fine line for both ends of the spectrum in the end. Coming back to a place of self respect, self care. And getting aligned with your own preferences and say, what do I like, what do I want for myself?
And neither end of the spectrum are really beneficial to us and they both keep the focus of our identity. This is the key thing, our identity on our beauty and the way that we look. I realized when I was going through my food and body stuff in my twenties. That. I was never going to get out of it. If my identity was based on the way that I look primarily. And I had to really let that sink in and say, this is a sinking ship, essentially, because this will never be consistent.
My body will always be changing. I wasn't thinking about aging at all at that point, but in terms of my body, And it just felt kind of icky when I really sat and thought about it. I'm really, I'm going to have this whole beautiful life [00:15:00] experience. And my primary identity is going to be focused on the way that I look I'm going to be on my death bed and say, well, you know, I was hot in my twenties and thirties and forties. Cool.
No one gives a fuck. That is such a. A waste of this beautiful experience that we have here. And that's up to us. It's really my relationship with me. Your relationship with you is all that matters in that way. Is your identity within your self now? How not? How other people identify you? So just somebody to consider.
So instead. My suggestion at my invitation is to focus on your character. Sit and consider what are the values that you hold dear and that you admire? What do you want to be known for when it comes to you with you at the end of your life? And you're sitting here thinking who was I while I was here on earth. Do you want to be the woman who was so attached to her Lux and couldn't let them go. Or would you rather be the woman who [00:16:00] contributed to the greater good and to others in life? That you were a woman who is kind, who is honest, who is generous, really sit and think about the values you want to embody in your character, because these are things that will actually keep you safe.
Constantly trying to keep up with this moving goalpost. Of beauty and trends will not keep you safe. Despite what your primal subconscious brain is telling you, but will actually keep you safe, is focusing on solidifying a sense of self that is rooted in something that no one can take from you. And that will not change with the times. You have control over it. You have control over your character and the values that you choose to embody and act on. That is what will bring you that sense of peace and that sense of confidence that so many women are striving for with external appearance. Focus on being an alignment within yourself. Knowing that you can look in the mirror and say, I am who I said I am.
When it comes to my values, my actions aligned with what I actually believe is important. [00:17:00]
The same time being kind and gentle. With yourself, you need to have so much compassion with ourselves with all these conversations because we're scrutinized left and right. And if anything, I said in this conversation thus far about being more of that virtue signaling, which I. Completely admit that I had some elements of at some point in time of judging women who got work done or. If you're a woman who's really struggling with letting so much focus, go on her appearance, then that's completely fine.
Be kind of gentle with yourself. It's normal for us to experiencing, to experience this. Consider focusing on your heart and your health versus just looks what feels true to you in your heart, your true sense of self. When you tune in to what matters to you, is it experiencing life, spending time with loved ones?
What really matters to you? And your health. Right because there will always be some overlap there. If you move too far on one end of the [00:18:00] spectrum, like I said, these big surgeries, there's health risks for that. So take that into consideration. What is actually good for you?
I would also encourage you to focus on living your life now, instead of always preparing to live it. Once my skin looks like this, or once I get this nipped and tucked, then I will live my life, then I will feel okay. And I understand this is where that conversation I mentioned at the beginning of we all are starting at different places. Some people have had skin issues their entire life.
And that's something that I haven't had. I've struggled with my weight. For a decade of my life. And that was something in my relationship with food that some women just never struggled with. And that's okay because we're all different and we all have different things that we are face in this life, but one thing. That is important is showing up now. Live your life now. I really had to focus on that when I was releasing my focus on my body is I cannot continue to [00:19:00] say I will wear the shorts, go on the vacation, be dating, doing the things. Once I look like this. It doesn't work that way.
You have to start living now, and this will reiterate and show your brain. That I'm not in a place of shame. Because we hide when we're in a place of shame, right. And the only way to overcome that is to bring it to light. So show up and you can do this in the smallest of ways. If you're insecure about. The way that your body looks or. Insecure about your skin or aging.
It's just show it. And I have opportunities to do this all the time, given my job. Is just showing the things that other people would deem as unsavory. Like my neck is aging faster than my face, and I've just showed you guys that. When it comes to my skin, I don't, if I have a breakout and pimples, I don't cover it up or not show up on camera.
I'm. It's just, yeah. I've splotchy skin right now. And that's the way it is. And w. Avoiding the use of all these filters and all these [00:20:00] things. I do that for myself, because I don't want to look in the mirror and say, oh, I need to hide my face for myself because I don't like the way that I look it's about my relationship with myself.
Same thing with makeup. I'll have friends say, oh, you're so minimalist with your makeup and you look great. And I said, I always respond. It's because you don't see me with a full face of makeup. You would think that that looks better because my skin would look more even. Things will look better. If I had a completely even skin tone, but I don't want to show that image to myself and. It clearly works on other people too, because they just don't have that juxtaposition to compare it to that difference of me having completely even skin tone to me, just having my regular skin tone without foundation foundation. Which has a lot of redness and unevenness, and that's just the way that I'm going to continue to show up. Because I don't want to set the standard for myself and my own brain. That I have to look completely curated. [00:21:00]
Showing up, which brings me to showing up fully in every iteration of you with, or without makeup with over that work done to ensure that you're not furthering this shame. So reinforces what I just said, getting to know yourself outside of your external shell. The take the focus off your appearance. It's like such a boring conversation at this point, right? Where you sit down with a group of women and all everyone wants to talk about is sick. What work are you doing?
What things have been done? Dah, dah, dah. Let's talk about more interesting shit. What do you enjoy? What did you love as a kid? Put the focus back on your experience of the world. Versus you being an object that everyone's just looking at. That's very much that princess mentality. Versus queen, or should I talk about in food, freedom evolution, where.
We have to grow to that at some point. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be 60 years old sitting here just obsessing over my wrinkles. That's not the type of, of woman that I want to be. And I would encourage [00:22:00] you if you feel like, well, that is who I want to be. Just make sure again, I won't judge you, but make sure those are your values.
Not societies.
And this is a question I've been pondering and it's. I don't have an answer, but I would, I think it's a helpful question just to really help. Assess. And it's a thought experiment to see what your true values really are and what are. Values as a society and these little subcultures on social media are as well.
So I can't help but wonder. If everyone would be as obsessed with clean eating, healthy eating. If it didn't also help us lose weight and be leaner. So if let's just say in some world eating healthy, and this does happen for women where they're too thin, too lean, they start eating a normal amount of food or a healthy amount of food and they gain weight. And I love to see that for me when I gained 30 pounds. It was healthier for me to not go into a calorie deficit, [00:23:00] given the state of my nervous system at that point in time. And so I chose my health over the way that I looked.
For a year and a half, I sat at that higher weight, 30 pounds heavier. Intentionally not budging. Because my health was more important to me than the way that I looked. And so if you're sitting here, the reason I asked this question is because. Perhaps we can have less judgment towards other people. If they're choosing not to live a purely clean lifestyle. If the thought experiment was well, what if that made you gain weight? What of eating purely clean meant that you didn't lose weight.
It didn't help you lose weight. The very least you maintained it, but maybe it even made you gain weight. Then would people, would women in particular be so focused on it? My strong hunch is no. Because we see that with beauty trends and procedures. Women are willing to go under traumatic. Surgeries procedures to look a certain way. It's a far cry from some quote-unquote chemicals in your food. [00:24:00] Right. So it's just something to interesting to think about and say, okay, but what are my actual values?
And if other people around me are choosing not to eat super clean or healthy, or be really focused on all this wellness stuff. Maybe it's because they just don't give a shit as much about the way that they look and I've associated clean living. With looking a certain way more than actual health. If I'm honest with myself, And I've been pondering this.
I'd love to hear your guys' thoughts on this. If that is something that rings true for you, or if you're like, you know, even if it meant that like my skin would look less great or that. But my health markers would improve or that I would gain weight, but my health markers would improve if I ate this way, if you would show yourself more leniency and be like, actually, yeah, it's not like the health focus that I care about so much.
It's about looking a certain way that I care about more. So. Let me know your thoughts and what your answers are. We'd love to talk about this with you guys over on Instagram, in my DMS. So feel free to pop on over there. And I know this [00:25:00] is a very.
It's a nuanced conversation requires a lot of context, but I think it's important to keep in top of mind. As things are only going to get more intense procedures are only going to become more and more prevalent. And beauty trends are probably only going to become more and more wild. Because we have, the Kardashians is leading the way, you know what I'm saying?
So it's more important than ever for us to have our own internal sense of self, our check in with ourselves to see what we really want for ourselves, what we value, what we enjoy and absolutely keeping our focus, our identities on what really matters in life. Having fun with the aesthetics. I love to look a certain way to don't get me wrong, but. Taking ourselves too seriously with all this shit will set us up for disaster. I will see you guys in the next episode