The Dark Side of the Beauty Industry

How One Makeup Artist Transformed Her Beauty Career. The Result – Empowering Other Women.

Makeup artist and beauty blogger turned psychology student Kayla Matisi discusses just how rewarding it feels to empower women.

Combining her former profession in the beauty industry with her new endeavors in psychology gives her a unique perspective to help women grow, feel empowered, and be inspired.

Here is her guest post, and all she shares about discovering her path to helping others and learning about herself in the meantime.

Thanks, Kayla! Enjoy!

Hello readers of Utter Musings!

Let me introduce myself. My name is Kayla from MakeupYourMind.com.au and I am very excited to be writing to you all today!

Over the last three years, I have been on quite the journey towards living a truly remarkable and happy life!
Today I am here to inspire you to do the same with the ultimate motivational pep talk!

I have been working as a professional makeup artist for over six years. Do you know how many times I have heard women say, “Oh, I look so much better with makeup” or “Now I feel beautiful I’ve got makeup on” They would feel empowered only by wearing makeup.

I would spend hours with these amazing women. Listening to their stories, I honestly thought they were incredible. To hear that they didn’t feel as impressive as I thought they were broke my heart.

I think the reason why I related to these women so much is that I felt the same way about myself!

My confidence was non-existent. I would go looking for validation in all the wrong places. And for some reason, I was giving all this advice to make other women feel better. I never really thought that I could apply it to myself!

I felt like I had value and purpose because these women would keep coming back to me.
It felt like they needed me. My entire self-worth was dependent on these women. I needed them to tell me how nice I was or how talented I was.

Anyway, that brings me to the start of my journey of personal development when I hit rock bottom. MAC slowly became less popular with Sephora opening its stores left, right and center. Most people were purchasing online now, anyway. In turn, my shifts reduced because there were barely any customers coming in. And all of a sudden, I started to feel like I didn’t matter so much anymore.

The MAC store I worked in had become such a money-hungry and toxic environment that it forced me to leave, leaving me resentful towards the retail industry. Oh, and my boyfriend at the time had just broken up with me, too.

I was a mess.

How was I supposed to cope with all these feelings? I felt like I wasn’t worthy; I wasn’t good enough. I didn’t feel good within myself, so I distracted myself in the best way I knew how, with boys and parties.
I was completely numb and spent the next six months in a total daze. Riddled with anxiety and depression, one day, I couldn’t take it anymore.

That’s how I ended up in therapy.

After a few months of putting all the pieces of myself back together, I started making changes.

Outside of my regular sessions with my psychologist, I began researching. I started to learn about all the things my psychologist would speak of. I admired all his knowledge and wisdom he was passing onto me. It was fascinating, reading other blog posts from people who had been through things similar I had.

I realized I wasn’t as alone as I thought I was.

And that’s when it hit me! I wanted to be a beacon of hope for other women who were struggling just like I was. If I could pull myself back together, then anyone could!

I made a bold choice to go to university, this time to study psychology! It was scary, and I can’t even tell you how many times I wanted to quit. Eventually, I had so many mental breakdowns that I’m honestly surprised I made it past the first year. But I’m happy I did.

Looking back, I am grateful for all my experiences. Because they bought me to where I am now, truly happy in my life, and confident in who I am.

It led me to my blog!

The biggest thing for me was changing my mindset and learning to love myself. However, it wasn’t easy, and I still see my psychologist to this very day.
But with my story, I hope to inspire women to make those scary decisions. To go after what will make them happy. To help them see that they deserve to feel beautiful on the inside and out!

Makeup Your Mind combines my love of all things beauty, and it’s about empowerment for women.

No matter who you are. No matter what you’ve experienced. It’s about shifting your perspective and believing that you can do absolutely anything you set your mind to.

If you’re scared of failing, ask yourself what would happen if you did? Worst case scenario, you might have a little cry and be disappointed. But still, life would go on. So why wouldn’t you take the risk if that’s the worst that could happen!

I know that 2020 has been an absolute mess. It has been hard for a lot of you to look on the bright side of things. Our reality has changed so much that people who have perhaps not struggled with their mental health before are experiencing feelings they’ve never felt before!

We have to support each other.

So many people told me that going back to university was a bad idea. I wasn’t smart enough for it and that it would be too hard for me. There was a general belief that I wasn’t going to succeed.

People thought I was crazy having not studied anything academic before.

Despite them all, I stayed quiet and let my success be my noise.

A favorite Oscar Wilde quote of mine is, “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars,” and it’s true. We have all been through some hardships; we’ve all struggled. The most important thing is that even though sometimes you feel like you’re lying in the gutter. No matter how low, you can choose to look up at the stars!

At the end of the day, you are unique, your journey is unique. No one has your eyes, your smile, your kindness, or your soul. I think it’s about time that you start showing yourself off to the world! Don’t you?

All the love and support for your extraordinary lives!
It’s out there waiting for you!

Love Kayla.

About the Author

As a makeup artist turned psychology student Kayla aims to empower women to feel their own beauty on the inside and out. You can check out her very own blog here and follow her on social media here.

Please comment below about how you’re feeling and I hope that somewhere on my blog or on Kayla’s blog you find something uplifting and inspiring. Ultimately, you’re worth it!

Featured image by Annie Spratt via Unsplash