Why I Don't Believe in Beauty Regrets, Mishaps, or Mistakes

For nearly a decade, I cut my own hair. With no disposable income, a knack for aesthetic spontaneity, and a belief that bangs would turn me into Zooey Deschanel (I was very wrong), I consistently took beauty matters into my own hands — fast and furiously. Bored, I cut my hair into a bob. Desperate for fresh starts, I dyed it brown, then black, then an uneven combination of the two. I covered my hair in hats, complemented it with dark eyeliner, and told myself that I was a dead ringer for any celebrity I was trying to model myself after. It wasn’t great, nothing was flattering, I'd never do any of it again. But beauty regrets — like most regrets — are a complete waste of time.

We learn from what we've tried and tested. Growing up, and growing into the people are now, we embrace the looks and trends that helped us become who we needed to be. We use makeup, haircuts, and hair dye to create and shape ourselves, and use those things to create the necessary battle armor to come up against new jobs, big life changes, or to make us feel more in control. The first time I cut my own hair back in college, I was desperate to be and to feel different: I was sad and lost and poured myself into the idea that if I could reshape the way I looked, the rest of my life would eventually follow. Then, I dyed it dark to cover up the person I once was. And I cut it again to shed the weight of bad decision-making. Years later, I bleached it to remind myself that I was capable of feeling light. If I softened my look, I thought, I could draw a line between who I used to be and who I'd become.

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Because that's the true purpose of new makeup and hair dye and haircuts, anyway. They exist to amplify the parts of ourselves we need to tap into to feel strong, transforming us into the characters we need to become to keep going. And regretting any of it is a waste of time. Even during years defined by too-thin eyebrows (been there), over-lined lips (sadly, same), or showcasing a stark contrast between our foundation shades and natural skin tones (absolutely), we still learned who we were and who we weren’t — and more importantly, that not every beauty trend needs to be for us.

Which is where our beauty signatures come from. We only adopt signature looks through time and practice — by trying on trends to see what feels right or whether you like yourself when you're wearing them. And since no one trend works for every person universally (a sad but true fact), that means there's no wrong or right approach to beauty at all. Meaning that even our biggest "mistakes" weren't actually mistakes. They were just things we did to become who we are now.

Of course, I’m not going to romanticize every trend I tried, nor am I going to resurrect the box-dyed black hair or face-smothering eyeliner because, years out, I don’t think they're "bad" anymore. But I am going to look back on them with less embarrassment and stop chalking them up to me being young, spontaneous, and even reckless as if I need to explain away my own choices.

Now, I’m going to file them alongside the other milestones of growing up — the behavior I've grown out of, the reactions I wouldn't have anymore, or even using self-destruction as a means of control. (See: Cutting my hair into a DIY bob in response to heartbreak.) Because we are the sum of our parts, and those are some of mine. Growing into who we are is messy, complicated, and far from glamorous, but that process is necessary or else we’d be stuck.

So I’m grateful for all the trends I tried that didn’t work. I may not be quick to toss them up for #TBT (no one needs to see my short-lived shag), but without them, I wouldn’t be the person I am now: a three-dimensional, grown-ass woman who knows she should avoid bangs, bronzer, and black hair dye at all costs.

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