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Zadie Smith is an English novelist and essayist. She has recently become popular for a 15-minute mirror rule she holds her daughter to
Her daughter is seven years old by the way and it isn’t clear if it was a ”lessons my mama taught me” situation or an actual rebuke for time wasted

“I explained it to her in these terms: you are wasting time, your brother is not going to waste any time doing this. Everyday of his life he will put a shirt on, he’s out the door and he doesn’t give a shit if you waste an hour and a half doing your makeup”, she said at the Edinburgh international book festival.

“From what I can understand from this contouring business, that’s like an hour and a half, and that is too long.”

Probably not longer than the time it takes to beat a bride’s face in our part of the world or to beat the face of a celebrity who’s going on the red carpet or making a TV appearance.

In this age of fast-generating and easily-sharable perfectionism, it is not surprising that women are spending more and more energy and time trying to fit the beauty bill they are forcefully served everyday.

According to a 2016 survey, the average British woman spends 38 minutes putting on her face every day. Over the course of a week, that is just less than four and a half hours; in one year, that makes nearly 10 days (and nights).

The argument is that this time can be spent breaking glass ceilings and conquering matching milestones with the male folk, being equal.

Well, there are an array of things you can achieve in four and a half hours every day – read a 100-page book, reply emails, take a walk, connect with friends and family, engage new individuals in your network, create a business proposal, eat lunch or dinner and still have time left to do some catching up with work, and so on.

Even though these seem very mundane, a holistic view and taking stock does reveal that habits like these can and will improve the quality of life and productivity of an individual in the long run.

But here is what we do then. Just as we chide women for spending too much time making up and tell ourselves that we love women who wear their faces as is, we, our society, we are still the ones who collectively hold women to these standards of beauty that do not add up in the long run.

We want our women all natural but we ask that female colleague who isn’t wearing makeup if she’s ill when she shows up on Monday morning. We tell a subordinate to “look presentable” when she’s going to represent the firm at a meeting, we expect her to “dress up” for an outing or to “look nice” when meeting friends and family.

Yet we wonder about the lengths women go to to look good and fit the part.

And so when a teenager or young girl is in her formative years, due to the volatility of emotions, the subtle messages, the influence of social media, beauty becomes not what she looks like or likes to look like but what she is expected to look like, what she should look like to fit in and be accepted.

According to Mr. Reuben, where the problem lies isn’t necessarily in teaching young girls that time ‘wasted’ in front of a mirror can be spent breaking glass ceilings. Makeup mogul, Mary Kay Ash built an empire from makeup products after all.

The problem lies in where we fail to teach our young girls to find their perception of their own beauty from themselves because that is the only way not to waver in this time and age – deeper convictions, a deeply anchored sense of self, an unshakable audacity to live in that truth regardless.

These are what our young girls must learn.

And if by chance spending as much time in front of a mirror works towards achieving those goals, let her go for it. Tyra Banks is currently worth $90 million and has possibly spent at least 3 years collectively in front of a mirror while her modelling career was at its peak.

Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and the eyes are a window to the soul. Until our young girls get the soul of beauty right, the way beauty is viewed and appreciated will cntinue to be subject to the external.

Mr Reuben tackles gender stereotypes in his Madam Lagos Driver installment, watch video:




BEAUTY

Zadie Smith’s 15-minute mirror rule and the irony of beauty




Zadie Smith is an English novelist and essayist. She has recently become popular for a 15-minute mirror rule she holds her daughter to
Her daughter is seven years old by the way and it isn’t clear if it was a ”lessons my mama taught me” situation or an actual rebuke for time wasted

“I explained it to her in these terms: you are wasting time, your brother is not going to waste any time doing this. Everyday of his life he will put a shirt on, he’s out the door and he doesn’t give a shit if you waste an hour and a half doing your makeup”, she said at the Edinburgh international book festival.

“From what I can understand from this contouring business, that’s like an hour and a half, and that is too long.”

Probably not longer than the time it takes to beat a bride’s face in our part of the world or to beat the face of a celebrity who’s going on the red carpet or making a TV appearance.

In this age of fast-generating and easily-sharable perfectionism, it is not surprising that women are spending more and more energy and time trying to fit the beauty bill they are forcefully served everyday.

According to a 2016 survey, the average British woman spends 38 minutes putting on her face every day. Over the course of a week, that is just less than four and a half hours; in one year, that makes nearly 10 days (and nights).

The argument is that this time can be spent breaking glass ceilings and conquering matching milestones with the male folk, being equal.

Well, there are an array of things you can achieve in four and a half hours every day – read a 100-page book, reply emails, take a walk, connect with friends and family, engage new individuals in your network, create a business proposal, eat lunch or dinner and still have time left to do some catching up with work, and so on.

Even though these seem very mundane, a holistic view and taking stock does reveal that habits like these can and will improve the quality of life and productivity of an individual in the long run.

But here is what we do then. Just as we chide women for spending too much time making up and tell ourselves that we love women who wear their faces as is, we, our society, we are still the ones who collectively hold women to these standards of beauty that do not add up in the long run.

We want our women all natural but we ask that female colleague who isn’t wearing makeup if she’s ill when she shows up on Monday morning. We tell a subordinate to “look presentable” when she’s going to represent the firm at a meeting, we expect her to “dress up” for an outing or to “look nice” when meeting friends and family.

Yet we wonder about the lengths women go to to look good and fit the part.

And so when a teenager or young girl is in her formative years, due to the volatility of emotions, the subtle messages, the influence of social media, beauty becomes not what she looks like or likes to look like but what she is expected to look like, what she should look like to fit in and be accepted.

According to Mr. Reuben, where the problem lies isn’t necessarily in teaching young girls that time ‘wasted’ in front of a mirror can be spent breaking glass ceilings. Makeup mogul, Mary Kay Ash built an empire from makeup products after all.

The problem lies in where we fail to teach our young girls to find their perception of their own beauty from themselves because that is the only way not to waver in this time and age – deeper convictions, a deeply anchored sense of self, an unshakable audacity to live in that truth regardless.

These are what our young girls must learn.

And if by chance spending as much time in front of a mirror works towards achieving those goals, let her go for it. Tyra Banks is currently worth $90 million and has possibly spent at least 3 years collectively in front of a mirror while her modelling career was at its peak.

Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and the eyes are a window to the soul. Until our young girls get the soul of beauty right, the way beauty is viewed and appreciated will cntinue to be subject to the external.

Mr Reuben tackles gender stereotypes in his Madam Lagos Driver installment, watch video:




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