I never leave the house without makeup!

That was my doctrine for a long time. Based on the experiences I had, for example, when I dropped my children at the kindergarten without wearing makeup or quickly bought some bread at the bakery before breakfast at half past six in the morning. “Are you not feeling well?” People often asked. Because I look the way I do without makeup: Eye shadows, pale lips, a pimple here or there.

For me, daily makeup became an irreplaceable part of my everyday costume, my mask.

Since I was about 18, my skin was a real problem. I had severe acne and was tremendously ashamed to be around people without makeup – I felt naked. Even with makeup, there was no chance. It was just too obvious. The scars are still visible today.

When the acne slowly got better, also thanks to my three pregnancies, which each time reshuffled the cards of my appearance - for better or for worse - I got dark spots on my face during a summer holiday. It looked like dirt and spread all over my face. It looked so ugly I wanted to die, that’s how ashamed I was of myself and in front of myself.

The skin is the mirror of the soul; they used to say.

There was so much going on what my soul already wanted to let me know by sending me desperate signals to make me look closer and maybe change something. But in those hectic times, I didn’t realise anything having three children, a house, etc. and a husband who was on the road up to 200 days a year for work.

During that time, I literally put on camouflage makeup. Gosh, what a struggle. A fight for my dignity. Yes, indeed. I felt undignified walking around blemished like that. Even when wearing makeup, my face looked all dark. Just thinking about it makes me feel queasy, and I have to take a deep breath. I was even afraid that my husband would leave me because of that...

Thank God, over the years the spots gradually faded and except for a few - humans really do get used to almost everything - my skin looks relatively normal today.

About five years ago, I had a fashion blog, and putting on makeup took on a whole new meaning. Now it was all about being as flawlessly made up as possible for a good photo. Although most of the time, you couldn’t see the effort. After all, I was taking full-body pictures of myself and not portraits. At that time, my daughter started doing makeup and was continually watching new tutorials and needed special beauty equipment. Of course, I have been infected by her, and I also started acquiring more makeup artistry skills and bought the hottest latest palettes.

Surprisingly my relationship with makeup changed during this time, I stopped trying to cover anything up and started emphasising what was beautiful on my face. This wonderful perspective was taught to me by my daughter, who could [and still can] look at herself in the mirror in that self-enamoured way only young teenage girls can, so lovely!

At some point, my daughter decided makeup to be no longer necessary – like young women are in their early years: They try things out, leave some things, change other things, then do it again, etc.

That’s when I did yoga more and more intensively and seriously and dived deeper and deeper into the yoga philosophy. Consciously or unconsciously, I distanced myself from my appearance, relaxed about my look and styling, put on makeup less often and if I did, then only lightly. I thought that now that I am a full-fledged yogini, I must not care so much about something like my appearance. Nativeness and standing by one’s flaws was the new motto. But to be honest, likewise, I started to avoid looking in the mirror because I didn’t particularly appreciate how I looked.

This had nothing whatsoever to do with self-love and authenticity.

Then 2020 - and half of my face was suddenly covered by a mouthguard. Coupled with a greasy forehead and dark circles under the eyes - what can I say. Nothing with being beautiful. Well, you could hardly recognise me anyway; just as you can scarcely recognise anyone wearing this mouthguard. So this mouthguard was just another kind of mask I could hide behind. Crazy!

The theme of 2020 for me was to find out who I genuinely am, in every sense of the word. I reprocessed my past, shed a lot of light on my conditioning, redefined what being a woman was - just for me, got clear about the meaning of sexuality, clarified my relationship to sex, in particular, faced many deep-seated fears and finally transformed them. Internally, I did a massive cleaning and a thorough de-cluttering.

One fine day I was sitting meditating, and the subject of “makeup” popped up in my mind. I checked inside and felt that against my own “convictions” I didn’t want to leave it behind. I wrote a long journal about it and concluded that I wanted to put makeup back on because I wanted to. I walked around without makeup long enough to see that I didn’t need it. But in the end, I have to admit that I like myself more with makeup. Is that a bad thing? Does that make me less authentic as a Yogi?

I say no. I am more authentic as being me. I allow myself this decorative act of self-love. I allow myself not to be blind or lie to myself but admit that wearing makeup is something that belongs to me, for whatever reason.

Today I don’t want or need to hide anything under my makeup, but it still gives me a specific inner strength that nothing else can give me. Even during the lockdown, I sit at home wearing carefully chosen and applied makeup that accentuates the colour of my eyes. I look in the mirror and love myself. And can say: Yes, that’s me.