I’ve always prided myself on my personal sense of style and have always been the person that dresses up to make myself feel better. Everyone, however, makes mistakes when they’re younger when it comes to wardrobe, haircuts and other beauty choices. I have made plenty and hope to share what I’ve learned from some of my regrettable fashion decisions. In high school, for whatever reason, I thought it was cool to wear monochrome outfits. For classic colors like black, maybe even grey, this could be chic and edgy. Purple is not the color with which to do this look. I know from personal experience. Purple pants are sweet, but matched with a purple shirt, purple boots and a purple headband, it can be a bit overwhelming. I mean, it was perfect for school spirit day but I’m sad to say I brought the all-purple-everything look back out a few times before a close friend kindly told me I looked like Ronald McDonald’s friend Grimace. Also on the do-not-wear list: battery operated light-up Hello Kitty shirts and arm socks.
Another tip: Try not to cut your own bangs because a hip girl did it in a commercial and it looked empowering. Especially if you have unsteady hands and have been bad with scissors your whole life and had to ask your mother to cut things out for you until you were in college. Two big uneven snips and I gave myself blunt bangs that were supposed to be at least a little curved but instead had 1,000 pieces of short straight hair plastered to my forehead. I remember being upset that my American Girl doll had better bangs than me. On top of that, when I made this fringed mistake, my forehead acne got exponentially worse. So that was awesome.
Please, for the love of all bodily hair removal, do not try and clean up your eyebrow area with the same razor you use to shave your legs. This blunder I made in the past might also have to do with the fact that I have unsteady hands, but I still would advise you to go to a professional or at least use a special razor or maybe, I don’t know … tweezers? Desi women are known for our naturally impeccable eyebrow shape starting so close to the middle of a forehead that sometimes even a unibrow can form. But I have now forever ruined that contour by shaving off part of my left eyebrow in an attempt to clean stray hairs. There is nothing that can be done. Please try not to make this mistake twice in one year, especially using an electric razor the second time, because that hair really might never come back – not that I would know from personal experience or anything.
These are just a few of the many, many fashion and beauty mistakes I made during my blissfully ignorant high school career. At the end of the day, though, if you’re really feeling a change and just want to go for something new in the looks department, I’d say just do it. Even if you mess up or don’t get the result you wanted, remember that tomorrow is a new day and almost all the hair on your body can grow back.u