Love Your Body

With summer just around the corner, store windows, magazines, and commercials keep reminding us that “bikini season” is upon us. Although there is undeniable pressure for women to look perfect year-round, summer can be especially hard on us and our body image. We find ourselves trying on bathing suits and leaving the dressing room discouraged, feeling the need to lose another 10 pounds or go on a new diet. From a young age, we’re taught by society to look for our flaws and imperfections instead of our natural beauty when we look in the mirror. We’re taught to critique and tear down our own self-esteem instead of build ourselves up. And nothing about that is beautiful.

When talking about positive body image, I usually always think of the iconic chick-flick Mean Girls and the scene where Regina, Gretchen, and Karen have to teach Cady how to find flaws in her appearance. “My pores are HUGE,” “I hate my calves,” and “I have man shoulders” are the negative comments the girls have to say about themselves, even though they are all obviously beautiful. Unfortunately, this scene is not as far removed from real life as it should be. Too often we’re taught to hate our bodies instead of love them, which ultimately results in seeing ourselves as “ugly.” The solution to overcoming this mindset is certainly not always easy, especially when we’ve grown up in a society that reinforces the practice. But just like you can learn to hate your body, you can always teach yourself how to love your body too. Here are 5 things I personally love doing to strengthen positive self-love in simple, every-day ways.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

1. Write yourself love notes

In my sophomore year of a college, a group of students decided to go all over campus and post notes that said things like “you are so beautiful” and “you look gorgeous today” on all the mirrors in our bathrooms. You wouldn’t think those notes would be so impactful, but it was amazing just how much I would find myself smiling after reading them. I stood a little taller, I beamed a little brighter, and I felt happier the rest of the day. I decided to try doing the same thing in my own bathroom at home, and I still always get a boost of self-confidence in the mornings when I see “you look gorgeous” hanging over my mirror. Try to write yourself loving, reaffirming notes to remind yourself just how beautiful you really are and hang them in a place where you can read them every day.

2. Don’t weigh yourself for a while

Although there are some medical situations where it’s necessary to keep daily track of your weight, there is really no general need for weighing ourselves every morning or evening. In high school, I began regularly working out for the first time with the intention of living a healthier lifestyle. In the first few months, I would weigh myself after every workout, slowly becoming discouraged and obsessed with keeping a certain number on the scale. Of course, I didn’t think about water retention, muscle weight, etc. and I felt like I wasn’t working hard enough, which couldn’t have been farther from the truth. I had become so fixated on scale numbers that I forgot the whole reason I had begun regularly exercising in the first place: to be healthy and beautiful, inside and out. I was actually making a lot of progress and living a much healthier lifestyle, and it showed through in my complexion, mood, and overall body image. But I wasn’t able to fully enjoy this new-found healthy, beautiful lifestyle when I was constantly criticizing myself for not weighing a certain amount. I had to discipline myself to get off the scale for a while, only checking it every so often. Since then, I have found it much easier to embrace my body and love it with all its unique features. When numbers on a scale are no longer competing for your attention, you can more easily direct your thoughts towards viewing yourself through loving and confident eyes.

3. Pamper yourself

While telling yourself you’re beautiful and important is definitely a must, showing yourself appreciation and love is also extremely important. Whenever you take the time to treat yourself to a pedicure, have an at-home spa day, soak in a bubble bath, or get a relaxing massage, you’re sending yourself the positive message that you’re worthy of feeling beautiful because you are beautiful. No matter how busy my semester gets, I always make sure to treat myself to a candlelit lavender bubble bath at LEAST once a month (I usually need it once a week!). By giving myself just an hour one weekend night to use luxurious products I love and have “me-time,” I really have learned how to value myself. Pampering yourself teaches you that you are beautiful and deserve to be treated like you are. So don’t hesitate to buy yourself that expensive mud mask next time you’re in Ulta or try out that new DIY bath bomb recipe you found on Pinterest. You’re beautiful, and you deserve it!

4. Surround yourself with positive people

I seriously cannot stress enough just how important positive, encouraging friends are. If you hang out with people like Regina George who constantly criticize either you or themselves, you will notice yourself starting to pick up that nasty little habit too. Just like the saying “you are what you eat,” you are who you hang out with. Start listening to how your friends talk about themselves, you, and other girls, and if you ever hear negative comments about appearances, hair, clothes, etc., gently discourage these sort of conversations. Instead, you and your girlfriends have to practice building each other up. Genuinely compliment one another and think of beauty as being more than skin deep. If you notice your friends continuing this behavior after you’ve made attempts to stop it, the healthiest thing for your own body image and self-love is to walk away from their toxic influence. Surround yourself with people that build you up and teach you to build them up in return.

Photo Credits: Caitlin Bailey

 

5. Tell yourself you’re beautiful

While writing yourself notes, pampering yourself, and surrounding yourself with positive friends helps grow a beautiful self-love over time, the number-one thing you can do for positive body image is to simply tell yourself you’re beautiful. When you try on a swimsuit and are tempted to feel self-conscious, say aloud, “I love everything about my body. I’m beautiful.” When you wake up with a hormonal breakout or dark circles under your eyes from pulling an all-nighter, look in your vanity mirror and say, “I love everything about my body. I’m beautiful.” And when an insecure girl at school comments something negative on your Instagram photo or a boy rejects you because you weren’t “pretty enough,” take a selfie and caption it: “I love everything about my body. I’m beautiful.”

5 Super Foods for Beauty (Inside and Out!)

As many college students are either just starting or finishing exams right now, dreams of summer are slowly starting to distract us from those algebra equations and history dates we need to cram into our memory last minute. And with thoughts of summer, we naturally begin daydreaming about beach trips, pool parties, and, of course, our favorite summer foods. From watermelon slices to fruity refreshers from Starbucks, summer is certainly a “sweet season” when it comes to dining.

Unfortunately, though, summer can also be a time for sunburns, split ends, and dry, flaking skin. Those Memorial Day boat rides and long swims in chlorine water can create beauty woes that don’t exactly make us feel like “beach babes.” However, the GOOD news is that a lot of our favorite summer foods actually double as beauty boosters (aka. super foods). I compiled a list of my favorite five “super foods” that make perfect summer snacks and perfect beauty boosters.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

1. Avocados

There are few foods I love more than avocados, especially in the middle of summer. According to the book I think we all know I’m just a BIT obsessed with—Eat Pretty by Jolene Hart—avocados are a wonderful source of healthy fats and vitamin E. In addition, they also contain antioxidants and niacin which all work together to reduce inflammation and redness, repair DNA, and detox your liver—ultimately resulting in clear, hydrated skin. Avocados are the perfect ingredient for all sorts of summer snacks, such as smoothies, salads, and sandwiches. You can use avocado as a spread for your toast, dip for your chips, or just eat it alone in big spoonfuls (something I really LOVE to do on a hot summer day!).

2. Berries

While all berries are amazing for you, my two favorites for beauty boosting are raspberries and strawberries. Raspberries are high in vitamin C, vitamin B, antioxidants (such as anthocyanin pigments and ellagic acid), fiber, and biotin. These elements make raspberries beauty super heroes because of their collagen-protecting, age-fighting, and skin and hair-beautifying powers. Strawberries, too, are amazing for preventing inflammation, free radicals, stress and age damage, and unbalanced blood sugar. They are rich in vitamin C, manganese, and anti-oxidants as well, and they’re usually fairly easy to find in summer. Both berries are extremely delicious in smoothies, salads, and desserts, and I especially love them on top of any breakfast food (waffles, cereal, yogurt—you name it!) Of course, these berries are perfectly fine on their own and make for very sweet, refreshing snacks throughout the summer.

3. Green tea

Although green tea isn’t exactly a food, it’s still an amazing beauty booster that is extremely refreshing during the hot summer months. That is, when it’s iced! Green tea is stuffed with catechins which combat free radicals, restore dying skin cells, prevent wrinkles, and even reverse sun damage. If applied topically as a toner or face mist, green tea can also help reduce redness and promote healing in skin damaged by UV exposure. Due to a personal struggle with anxiety disorder and panic attacks, I never drink caffeine and always make sure I buy decaffeinated green tea brands. However, the caffeine levels naturally occurring in green tea are not very high and would not be considered as very “beauty betraying.” If you can go decaf, though, do it! The beauty benefits of green tea will be more noticeable when they aren’t fighting against caffeine for control over your skin.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

4. Nuts

As a college student, these beauty boosters are perfect for me. Not only because I AM a little nuts as I try to juggle classes, work, and my social life, but also because they’re easily portable, yummy, and generally pretty filling snacks. Like avocados, they also are full of healthy fats which reduce inflammation and promote healthy skin and hair. Almonds are rich in vitamin E, cashews are a great source of copper, pistachios are high in vitamin B… The list goes on and on. All nuts are extremely good for your heart health as well, which is an added bonus to their beauty-boosting abilities. I like to eat nuts alone for an afternoon snack, usually, but they are perfect in summer salads, desserts, and dishes. I’ve also recently discovered that walnuts are perfect in pretty much any culinary dish.

5. Celery

Throughout other parts of the year, celery isn’t always a popular veggie. But as soon as summer comes around, we all become a little more open to celery, eating tons of it with ranch dip at our friends’ pool parties and 4^th of July get-togethers. Though it doesn’t have much in the way of flavor, celery is an extremely nutrient-rich food. Containing sodium, potassium, silicon, and coumarin (a phytochemical that helps lower blood pressure), celery is one of my favorite beauty boosters due to its ability to cool, detox, and hydrate the body. It also helps prevent inflammation and wrinkles and improves skin elasticity. Celery is a perfect summer snack by itself, but I really enjoy it dipped in peanut butter. You can also add it to salads, chicken salad mix, and other summer dishes too.

Flower Power: 3 Floral DIY Bath Products

Ah, spring. The birds are singing, the bees are buzzing, and flowers are blooming. For girls, spring is one of the most exciting and anticipated seasons due to all the bright colors, floral prints, and sundresses we finally get to wear. And with the onset of new blossoms (and, unfortunately, pollen), we generally find ourselves wanting to be a little more girly than usual. Spring brings the “princess side” out in all of us, and before long, we start looking for cute new nail polish shades and sweet-scented bath bombs.

But as you’ve already learned with makeup, bath products and girly cosmetics all have their fair share of harmful chemical ingredients too. Those seasonal spring bubble baths and shower gels from Bath and Body Works we start stockpiling at the beginning of March are actually very toxic, stuffed with harmful fragrances, parabens, and sulfates. Lotions, sugar scrubs, milk baths—all of these and more can be filled with as many “ugly” ingredients as your makeup. In fact, chemically-charged bath products can be even more harmful than makeup, due to their easy absorption through the skin. Think of how hot and steamy we generally like our baths to be. And what does steam do to pores? Opens them nice and wide to allow toxic ingredients directly into our body.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

So what’s a girl to do when she gets the urge for a spring spa day? Instead of worrying about reading ingredient lists and checking toxicity levels on the Environmental Working Group app, just make your own natural bath products! I have included instructions for creating three easy, simple, and effective floral spa products that I know you’ll love as much as I do. I was inspired by three of my favorite floral scents (rose, lavender, and jasmine), and, of course, by my continually-growing DIY Pinterest board full of multiple recipes and methods for making these products. I’ve sort of blended the things I’ve liked from different recipes into what works best for me, but feel free to change these up any way you see fit.

1. Jasmine Sugar Scrub

You’ll need: 8 tablespoons of granulated sugar, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, 1 teaspoon of flax seed oil, about 8-10 drops of jasmine essential oil, and 1 small mason jar or other small container.

Personally, I like to use organic ingredients when possible (organic sugar, organic olive oil, etc.), but non-organic ingredients work just as well too. As you can see from the simple ingredient list, there are absolutely no harmful chemicals or toxins, so having organic ingredients is just icing on the cake! To make this sugar scrub, add all these ingredients to your container (or a mixing bowl first, if you’d rather), and stir them together well, adding in the essential oil last. Try to ensure the sugar is evenly coated by oil, and then voila! You’re ready to use your new luxurious sugar scrub for the next few months.

2. Lavender Milk Bath

You’ll need: 1 ½ cup of powdered milk, ½ cup of cornstarch, about 20-30 drops of lavender essential oil, and a regular-sized mason jar (or other similar container)

Mix the powdered milk and cornstarch together in a large bowl until they are the same consistency and evenly mixed. Add in the essential oil, ensuring each drop lands in a different area in the cornstarch/powdered milk mixture. About halfway through drops, thoroughly mix again and repeat as before. Once the essential oil is evenly spread throughout the cornstarch/powdered milk mixture, transfer the mixture into your mason jar (or other container) and enjoy your relaxing milk bath!

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

3. Rose Petal Bath Salts

You’ll need: 1 ½ cups of unscented Epsom salts, ¾ cups of baking soda, 2-3 large petals from 1 rose (dried or fresh), about 15-20 drops of rose essential oil, 5 drops of red/pink food coloring (optional), and 1 regular-sized mason jar (or other similar container)

Mix the baking soda and Epsom salts together in a bowl, adding in the essential oil in different spots, just like with the lavender milk bath. Rose essential oil is fairly strong, so you don’t need to use a lot of drops to get a very pronounced scent. Next, add in the food coloring drops if you like. Red/pink coloring really helps give a “girly feel” to the bath salts, but this is entirely optional. Mix the food coloring until it evenly coats the mixture. Finally, take the rose petals and tear them off into small pieces, sprinkling them throughout the mixture. Stir once more to ensure the petals are evenly distributed throughout and then transfer your mixture to the mason jar (or other container). And there you have it! Now you can start your romantic floral bath soak while listening to “La Vie en Rose” (aka. my favorite spa day song).

Good Vibes: 3 “Hippie” Ways to Stay Beautiful Mentally

The end of April: for most people, it’s a beautiful time with birds singing, warming temperatures, and sunny days. But for college students, it’s several days of all-nighters, binge-eating, and mental breakdowns. The struggle IS indeed real when it comes to surviving the last few weeks of classes and finals, and from the breakouts, dark circles, and zombie eyes we see all over campus, we know the beauty struggle is real too. There’s no way we can expect to get a full 8 hours of sleep every night, eat clean foods, AND keep up with our healthy beauty regimens at the height of academic crunch time, so outward beauty is going to have to take a back seat for a few weeks. But inward beauty—especially the beauty of a healthy, happy mind—definitely has to become a priority.

Mental health is a huge component of being beautiful inside and out. How you take care of your mind affects how you take care of your body. If you allow stress and anxiety to negatively impact your thoughts, you will also inevitably allow negativity to affect how you feel about yourself. Those all-too-familiar doubts, fears of failure, and drops in self-confidence we experience at the end of each semester are all results of stress overpowering our minds. Only by learning to beautify our minds through healthy, ugly thought-banishing care can we really start to experience a self-love that radiates from the inside out.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

There are a few simple, practical ways you can nurture mental health on your own. Since Earth Day was yesterday and that “boho vibe” was all over social media, I was inspired to share three of my favorite holistic, “hippie” methods that work wonders for de-stressing and soothing your mind.

1. Meditation

No mental health care list would be complete without meditation. This is probably the #1 best thing you can do to beautify your mind. There are hundreds of techniques and methods for practicing meditation, and getting started can initially seem very overwhelming and almost mysterious. If you’re like me and most college students, you have no idea what a mantra or chakra is, and you really don’t have the time to research ancient breathing practices in the middle of studying for finals. Though some meditation rituals can be more complex, at its core the practice is actually fairly simple. The goal of meditation is to quiet the mind and force it to focus on only one thing for a set time period. This helps control the stress and raging anxious thoughts inside us. You can choose a word, a phrase like “ohm”, a mental picture, or anything else that you like for your mental object of focus. Set your alarm for 5-10 minutes, close your eyes, and gently force your mind to focus only on your object for the entire time allotment as you breathe deeply. And that’s it! You’ve just meditated. Keep this practice up once a day, and you’ll be amazed at how much more calm and efficient your mind is in high-stress situations

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

2. Essential oils

If you use Pinterest or know any suburban blogger mom, you are probably very familiar with the essential oil craze. Personally, I’m still a bit skeptical about all their supposed healing powers, but for sensory calming, they are pretty magical. The best way you can employ essential oils for mental health is to use them in a diffuser. An essential oil diffuser is usually fairly affordable, makes your room smell nice, AND helps relax you. Why wouldn’t you want to invest in a product like that? A few tried-and-true oils that help create those same “good vibrations” we feel walking into Earthbound Trading Company are: lavender, frankincense, Roman chamomile, ylang ylang, and peppermint oil. These oils are famous for their mental health properties and are extremely effective at combating stress, anxiety, and even depression. You can use these oils alone or buy scent blends that combine them with other soothing oils.

3. Teas

Sleep-deprived college students always turn to coffee for headache relief, pick-me-ups, and de-stressing. However, coffee is what the book Eat Pretty would call a “beauty betrayer.” Caffeine is not only bad for your outer beauty (talk about a complexion wrecker!), but it can disrupt mental health by creating caffeine crashes that lead to greater anxiety, stress, and headaches. Instead, a better beverage for mental health is herbal, non-caffeinated tea. Not a huge fan of black teas? Don’t worry, because these teas generally taste much sweeter, fruitier, and more floral than black teas. Just like with essential oils, there are dozens of tea flavors and combinations to choose from. However, my personal favorites include: chamomile, lavender, peppermint, and anything citrus (orange, lemon, etc.). You’ll notice that a lot of these tea flavors are the same as essential oils I just listed. These scents and flavors are doubly effective when diffused and steeped, and you’ll find that drinking lavender tea in a room that smells like lavender is probably one of the most relaxing feelings in the world.

My 5 Honest Beauty Favs

After learning the “ugly truth” about makeup in my last post, you may be thinking to yourself, “How in the world am I going to find non-toxic, chemically-clean cosmetics that are effective for me?” It seems almost impossible, I know. This is exactly where I found myself two years ago when I first started researching this stuff. I spent the entire summer of 2014 reading every ingredient on every cosmetic product I owned, researching replacement products online, and then going through the painful trial and error process of finding healthy products that actually worked. As much as we non-toxic cosmetic advocates hate to admit it, there are way too many natural and safe products out there that just miss the mark when it comes to performance. I’ve tried just about every organic shampoo on Whole Food’s beauty shelf, only to wake up with frizzy hair and split ends.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

Though I still use one or two products that are less than ideal, I’ve just about found a natural, effective alternative to every toxin-stuffed cosmetic I swore by before 2014. And when it comes to makeup, there’s a new natural beauty line that’s completely won me over: Honest Beauty. It was pretty obvious in my last post that I’m a huge supporter of Jessica Alba’s Honest Company, and this makeup line is her latest and greatest endeavor with the same “honest” commitment to safe ingredients that the Honest Company has. And, best of all, these cosmetics actually work.

I’m still in the process of trying all of the different skin care and makeup products Honest Beauty offers, but for now, I’m including my “5 favs” from my favorite beauty brand.

1. Everything Primer

Every girl knows, the first step to flawless makeup is a pore and line refining primer. The performance and ingredients of this product are extremely important, not only because they help hold your makeup in place throughout the day, but also because this is the cosmetic product that has the most direct contact with your skin. The ingredients in the Everything Primer are completely safe and are actually good for your skin as well. And, best of all, this product creates the perfect palette for your foundation. It’s non-greasy, pore-tightening, smoothing, and extremely effective—a forever fav.

2. Crème Blush

Until Honest Beauty introduced me to cream blush, I never really knew it existed. And when I tried to imagine blush in cream form, I could only think of really badly blended, stage makeup-esque results. I pushed all these doubts aside and still decided to give the Crème Blush a go, though, and I’ve been in love ever since. The creamy texture of the blush helps it blend more evenly and smoothly into my foundation, creating a much more natural, rosy look than powder blush ever could. And, because you can blend it in with your fingers, it’s the perfect cosmetic to stash away in your purse for touchups throughout the day.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

3. Concealer Duo

 

I’ll admit, before Honest Beauty came along, I was completely addicted to Tarte’s Amazonian Clay Concealer. Despite all the toxic ingredients, I just couldn’t bring myself to give it up because I couldn’t find an alternative that even came close to offering the same amount of full coverage and all-day performance Tarte did. That is, until the Concealer Duo. The creamy texture helps it easily blend for a flawless finish, and the consistency is heavy enough to conceal dark circles and red spots without being too heavy to be noticeable. And because it comes with two shades, you always get the perfect color for your lighter under-eye areas or your darker highlight areas. You can even mix them together to create a custom shade that perfectly suits your skin tone.

4. Brow Filler

The latest craze in beauty is perfect brows. We’ve all been envious of Lily Collins and Gigi Hadid for their gorgeous eyebrows, and no matter how many times we wax, tweeze, or thread, the results just never seem as symmetrical or perfect as we want them to be. That’s why brow fillers are so magical. Before switching to Honest Beauty’s Brow Filler, I just used a matte eye shadow shade that matched my brows. This worked fine, but Honest Beauty’s Brow Filler really showed me just how much magic I was missing out on by not having a professional brow-filling product. This Brow Filler is in a twistable pencil form, and the texture is semi-waxy, semi-velvety, and not at all like a liquid liner or marker. It glides on in a subtle way, but it can build if you need it to. This is perfect for clumsy people like me who can’t color in their eyebrows perfectly the first time (or the second or third time…). Apart from being easy to use, Honest Beauty’s Brow Filler stays in place ALL day, which is important if you don’t want half your eyebrow rubbing off before dinner.

5. Truly Lush Mascara + Primer

Though I completely love the four products mentioned above, THIS is the Honest Beauty product that’s completely changed my life. I will never, ever, ever be satisfied with another mascara after having tried this one. This two-in-one product includes an eyelash primer (who knew there was such a thing??) that you put on with a wand just like you would mascara, and then a gorgeous, clump-free, black mascara that makes you look like you’re wearing falsies after just one coat. The volume and length you get from both the primer and mascara are seriously amazing, and every time I use this product I feel like my eyes become ten times more glamorous. There’s a reason this product has been out of stock for the last few weeks—it’s truly (and honestly) lush!

The Ugly Truth about Makeup: 5 Harmful Ingredients Commonly Found in Cosmetics

There are few experiences as exciting or euphoric as walking into Sephora, buying a new shade of lipstick, and then trying it out with your favorite foundation and blush. A night on the town offers the perfect excuse for Kim Kardashian-esque contouring and Adele-inspired winged eyeliner, and all the best sleepovers include makeovers with bright, glittery eye shadows. It’s no secret that girls love makeup. But many of the cosmetics we love and use every day have a dark side as difficult to detect as the sun spots under our concealer.

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

It’s important to remember that our skin is not an impenetrable barrier against the outside world. Toxins on our hands, in the air, and in the cosmetics we apply all get absorbed to some degree through our pores, which means the ingredients that make up our makeup (see what I did there?) are worth paying attention to. I’ve researched the ugly ingredients in cosmetics for years, and along the way the most helpful, easy-to-use guide I’ve found on the subject is The Honest Life: Living Naturally and True to You by Jessica Alba. Seriously, this book will become your cosmetic ingredient Bible, and you’ll find yourself lugging it everywhere from Target to Ulta to compare its harmful ingredient list to those included in your favorite products. Though Jessica devotes five pages of the book to ingredient graphs with information to help navigate you through finding toxin-free cosmetics, I want to just highlight the top 5 most common (and most dangerous) ingredients to avoid when purchasing makeup.

1. Heavy metals, especially lead and mercury.

Why are they dangerous? Lead, which is a contaminant commonly found in lipstick, is a neurotoxin, meaning that it has been linked to neurological disorders such as autism. And mercury, which is commonly found in mascara and eye makeup, is also a neurotoxin that can cause serious allergic reactions and skin irritations.

2. TEA (triethanolamine) and DEA (diethanolamine).

Why are they dangerous? TEA and DEA, which are usually found in concealer, mascara, and tanning lotions, are proteins used as wetting agents or used in adjusting the pH balance of a cosmetic product. When they combine with certain types of preservatives, they can form nitrosamines, which have been shown to cause cancer.

3. Parabens.

Why are they dangerous? Parabens are preservatives commonly used in most water-based cosmetic products, like lotions and liquid foundations. Parabens have been found in breast tumors, linking them to cancer, and they are also toxic to our nervous, immune, and reproductive systems as well.

4. Petrochemicals, especially mineral oil, petroleum jelly, propylene glycol, and paraffin.

Why are they dangerous? Petrochemicals are common ingredients found in foundation, lipstick, mascara, and any colored cosmetic product, and aside from clogging pores, these harmful ingredients may be linked to cancer.

5. Fragrances.

Why are they dangerous? In the U.S., trademark laws allow cosmetic companies to withhold the ingredients in their fragrance blends, meaning that several harmful toxins like phthalates can end up in a fragrance without consumer knowledge. Aside from perfumes, hundreds of other cosmetics contain fragrance as well, and the phthalates alone have been linked to hormonal and reproductive system damage.

 

Photo Credits: Courtney Bailey

 

I know all of these long chemical names and ingredient lists can seem way too complicated and daunting to be practical for your makeup purchasing habits, but the next time you go to buy a cosmetic product, check out the ingredient list and see how many of those chemical names you recognize on the label. I guarantee you’ll be completely shocked, just like I was, when you see just how many common beauty brands contain these harmful ingredients. Discovering the ugly truth behind cosmetics is an essential first step in your journey towards healthy beauty.

Need a little help along the way? I recommend buying a copy of The Honest Life and downloading the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep app to see the toxicity ranking of the everyday products you have on your own vanity. How do your cosmetics compare?