Muslimah Going Makeupless

           

         Makeup is a multibillion dollar industry. The makeup industry thrives due to the delusions we’ve been fed as women. Society says we should look a certain way which creates acceptance. We have been made to believe that makeup is simply a part of being a woman. Makeup builds our confidence, so we deem it as something positive. Makeup helps us to feel more presentable to society. Makeup may be a creative outlet, but for most it’s a way to give us a false sense of beauty.  Unfortunately, all of this has begun to slowly make its way into the lifestyle of our Muslim woman. With the guidance of Allah subhana wa ta ala, I was able to recognize the danger this industry has on our ummah, our young impressionable Muslim sisters and myself.  I made the conscience decision to break away from the shackles of this industry. I came to realize that makeup is more than what you see, but affects our internal spirituality, our pockets and the society around us. Im praying that I am able to enlighten, or inspire more Muslim women to see beyond the perfection of deception.  Sometimes we forget that Allah subhana wa ta ala has liberated women through Islam already. Makeup is not liberation but a form of enslavement to society’s standards…enslavement to consumerism.

When I made the decision to stop wearing makeup publically I was still making videos for my YouTube channel ChelseyHijabLove. Only a couple years prior, I became a part of the makeup obsessed world of YouTube. My choices to go makeupless were religious, but also personal. I started my YouTube channel doing makeup tutorials, hijab tutorials and outfits of the day. As the months went on, a change in my imaan took place. My prayers became more consistent and my knowledge was increasing, as I was a convert and still learning my Islamic fundamentals. I began discussing Islamic topics on my channel and found myself deleting my old content. Unfortunately, I became discouraged at multiple occasions with my YouTube channel. I began thinking maybe my content wasn’t relatable. I thought, “Maybe I’m talking about religion too much.” It was extremely discouraging. I began to struggle with low imaan. The temptation to be more liked altered my better judgment. I found myself sucked into the popular world of being a “Makeup Guru”. With a trained education in Cosmetology, I figured I had the ability and skill to teach women. I kept telling myself that maybe it would lead them to watch my Islamic content. I started wearing more makeup on a daily basis, and began feeling less confident without it. I started spending an hour to do my makeup just to leave the house. I found myself taking more selfies being blinded to how “sensual” some of them looked. The worst of it all was Id justify my actions to myself and those who tried to advise me. As time went on my channel had become a place of emptiness for me. At one point I had been excited and proud to share my faith and now I’d sit and beautify myself to prove that I’m still a “normal woman”. My intelligence and spirit had been stripped away until I felt like a puppet. My first step was to stop doing makeup tutorials. Two years after that I found myself overwhelmed with all the makeup I had purchased during this time. I became regretful of all the money spent because of a YouTuber I saw using a certain product. I started to realize that I enjoyed taking my makeup off more than I liked putting it on. I was disappointed that I allowed myself to feel any less beautiful without makeup on. When we become so used to seeing the picture perfect us, we start to see flaws in ourselves that are projected by these makeup industries. Their reality is a delusion and we strive to be a part of it. I had enough. I wanted to feel beautiful again. Not the kind of beautiful that the magazines or social media show me, but truly beautiful, the way Allah subhana wa ta ala made me. So I stopped wearing makeup publically. Im not going to lie, it took me a few weeks to get used to it, but sure enough, I sit here today feeling more beautiful and confident in my natural self than ever before. I no longer see the dark circles under my eyes as a flaw but hard work. I’ve put my effort into my health, hydration and skincare to keep my skin clear and youthful without harmful chemicals. I finally feel freed from something I thought brought joy to my life.

Muslim women, in today’s society struggle so much with where they belong and where they want to fit in. On one hand we are proud to call ourselves Muslim, and may even abide by many Islamic practices or cultural elements of Islam, while at the same time we disobey Allah subhana wa ta ala because of our temptation for the beauty of this world and the acceptance of our society. We see other Muslim sisters whom we look up to, doing things that we then mirror without considering if its halal or haram. So we conform and begin to justify our un-Islamic acts with our intentions. We’ve given up the freedom Allah subhana wa ta ala has given us from the demand of societies standards. Allah says He has made us perfect, but society makes us feel otherwise. So we slab chemicals that may have killed animals during its testing phase, without considering Islam’s stance on animal cruelty.  We say makeup helps our confidence because of our bad skin or tiny eyelashes without accepting Allah has molded us. We wear bright red lipstick while acting ignorant to the attention it draws to an extremely desirable part of our awra. We say we beautify ourselves only for ourselves and not for the pleasure of men, but have no regards for the fact that Allah subhana wa ta ala has beautified the woman for the man. That Allah has made us one out of only a few things a man desires most in this life. Muslim women on social media have become tools for corporations to use. The industry isn’t trying to integrate us, their trying to make us conform. Even our Muslim sisters find it extreme to go “makeupless”. If we encourage our sisters to love themselves as Allah loves us we become judgmental or “extreme”. Everyday women are sexualized and made to feel as though their worth is somehow attached to their beauty, but Allah says that our worth is in our piety. So free yourselves. Go makeupless.