little white truths

Back in the day I really hated getting ready - I mean, really hated it.

Most of all I couldn't stand putting makeup on but felt I had to for work, so I would apply my few products either on the tram or at the traffic lights on the way to the office, thinking that at least I wasn't wasting time on my face because it was 'dead' time anyway and I might as well fill it with something.

On weekends I wouldn't start getting dressed until the last possible moment, and my makeup was applied and hair straightened while I sipped at a glass of wine and played loud music to make the whole process less painless. It was all about removing myself from what I was doing and taking my mind somewhere else.

My routine was in essence a 'slap it on and hope for the best' affair, and I had no idea about how to use my products and get the best from them. I was one of those people who put concealer on before my foundation and then wondered why it was getting rubbed off as I applied my base over the top.

If I could avoid putting makeup on at all, I would. I felt it was a waste of time, of money, and the few products I owned were either given to me by Santa or friends, or I'd picked them up on impulse when I was in Myer or Priceline buying something else.

I had a crusty makeup bag with products that looked older than I was. When I travelled, I didn't take makeup with me because it was a waste of precious backpack space and really, who could be bothered?

This applied to skincare as well: I had cleanser, moisturiser and sunscreen. Sometimes I used them; sometimes I forgot. The end.

Then something happened. And indeed, it happened overnight.

One Christmas I suddenly realised that I'd been missing out on something big, something fun, something creative. I'm a writer by trade and not a visual artist, but it suddenly struck me that for years I'd been missing an opportunity to dabble in a form of visual art that could also make me feel and look my best. And there was also the products themselves: the look, the feel, the smell of them. Why had I never noticed the sensory aspect of cosmetics before?

I started ordering products online, enjoying the search for things that might suit me. When my packages arrived, I spent the following weeks having insane amounts of fun as I learned how to apply them.

The rest, as they say, is history - and not a day goes by now when I don't play with a bunch of fun stuff and enjoy putting it on my face.

My skincare ritual has been elevated to something almost holy. Each morning and evening contains a little chunk of time when I dedicate myself to feeding my skin and fully engaging with the process.

I had wondered whether cosmetics would be a fleeting craze for me, and whether soon enough I'd grow tired of them and transfer my obsession to something else. But come this Christmas, four years will have passed since I first started ordering those products and I see no sign of my interest fading away.

So what is it about cosmetics that has me firmly hooked? I asked myself this not long ago and came up with an answer. It was an answer that I didn't struggle to find.

Makeup and skincare have become a form of meditation for me. I do practise mindfulness and I think it's now almost second nature for me to engage with what I'm doing more often and more strongly than I once did.

I have a nine-month-old baby and when you have a child, your life as it was suddenly shrinks in a big way. It grows too of course, but I'm talking about the time you once had to do things for yourself. Once the dog is walked, the chores done and your child looked after, there's only a handful of moments you have to sneak in little things for yourself. Beauty has filled those moments ever since my daughter was born.

Part of the reason for this is of course the old baby brain, so writing and reading aren't things I'm doing as much because I don't have the head for it. I'm not going to cafés or out for lunch because we don't have the money and it's such an operation to just leave the house, and it's hard to get stuck into creative projects because I so rarely have a block of time in which to do them.

But beauty can be broken down and slotted into the spaces. It might take half a day sometimes for me to put on a whole face of makeup, but it always gets done. A wash of eyeshadow between feeds, mascara and liner while I'm watching my daughter in her playpen, lipstick when I've taken her and the dog to the park and have a moment of quiet.

And I'm engaged with every step of the process. Every item of skincare is smelled, touched and applied with a sense of peace. Nothing is thrown on as I'm rushing to do something else: every liquid and cream is used like it's something precious that shouldn't fall into the waste of a busy day.

I focus on every stroke of the brush when I'm applying my powders, watching the colours build and blend into patches of light and dark, and if I can't focus on what I'm doing because my daughter has started grizzling, then I put everything down and return to it later when I have the space.

Because makeup isn't something to slap on at a red light. Skincare isn't something that only happens because everyone else is doing it, so I probably should too. Not for me, not anymore.

It's something creative that I can do to keep a part of myself alive in these early years of motherhood, when I can't write as I once did because there just isn't time - and even if there was, I don't have the head for it through my sleep-deprived, baby brain.

Makeup isn't vanity. It isn't indulgent and it isn't a waste of time. It's meditation and it is art. Most of all it's like cooking - taking individual components and blending them together to form a cohesive whole - and I do love to cook.

But perhaps what I love most about makeup, is that you wash it off at the end of the day. Because art isn't about the result, it's about the process - the process of creating something that's no more permanent than we are.

And the best things in life never last. That's what makes them so beautiful and so sweet.