I have a photograph from my early twenties that I love and kind of hate at the same time. I am at some event — doesn't matter which one — and I am wearing the most aggressively smokey eye you have ever seen in your life. Deep black, heavy blending, a little shimmer on the inner corner because it was THAT era and we were all doing it. My skin underneath is… fine. You can't really tell because there is a full beat of bronzer that would make today's "clean girl makeup" and "your skin but better" run away crying. But twenty-two living in California looked great on everyone.
What I did not know then — and what took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out — is that the skin under all that shimmer and gold was completely on its own. I was not giving it a single thing except removal, and even the removal was questionable. A makeup wipe and a drugstore foaming cleanser that in retrospect must have been stripping my barrier twice a day. I was young, skin dumb, and I had no idea that it needed to be supported or nourished or maintained. I thought you either had good skin or you didn't, the end.
The smokey eye era and what I was ignoring underneath it
The whole first half of my twenties was makeup-first. Skincare was whatever came in a gift set or what the person at the Sephora counter handed me while I was technically there to buy mascara. A moisturizer in winter if my face felt tight, or if the Santa Ana winds were blowing. Nothing otherwise.
I was living in a city, working a typical 9-5, sleeping badly, eating whatever was in front of me, going out at night a little too much and my skin was skin — it had its ups and downs in a time where star pimple patches were nowhere in sight to save you.
I was not thinking about my skin as something that needed care, I really only thought of it when a breakout hit, panic hit, and the best beauty tip we had at the time was "don't pick at it!". At that age we aren't focused on skin health unless it's dire but looking back in a "things I'd tell my younger self" kind of way, I'd 100% say "Girl DO NOT go to bed until you wash off your makeup!"… plus a slew of other things. lol
The product that changed the framework
So here's where the switch happened and the first product that made me understand what skincare was actually supposed to feel like was the Eminence Strawberry Rhubarb Dermafoliant. It was a year later and I'm now 23, just moved up the coast to Los Angeles, and I got a big girl facial at a spa who exclusively used Eminence.
I bought all her product recs because my skin felt like God herself came down from the heavens and purified my face with angel dust. The glow, undeniable. The softness, ethereal magic.
It was the first time I understood that skincare wasn't about covering things and my face needed to fucking breathe. So I'll forever wear the badge that I was no-makeup makeup baddie before it was cool and from there on out (to this day) the most you'll get out of me is mascara, red lip, and a barely there, peachy golden glow on the lids.
The Ordinary years
My early thirties were The Ordinary years, and I'm genuinely grateful for them. I found them at a point in my life when I was trying to understand what was actually in products and why, and they made that easier because they told you. The names were the formulas. Niacinamide 10% + Zinc. Hyaluronic Acid 2% + B5. For someone who had been buying products based on beautiful packaging and vague "radiance" promises, this was a revelation — not to mention it was the cheapest Hyaluronic Acid on the market and all the girls bought it in bulk because it was that light on the wallet.
I learned to read an ingredient list during this period. I learned the difference between a humectant and an occlusive. I learned, the hard way, why applying hyaluronic acid to dry skin in a dry apartment in January was making my face feel worse by mid-afternoon — it was pulling moisture up from below and letting it evaporate. The Ordinary didn't make me an expert, but it made me a more informed consumer, and that turns out to be most of the work.
This was also the period when I started stripping the routine back, for reasons I wrote about in more detail in my earlier post. More information didn't mean more products. It mostly meant understanding which two or three products were actually doing something and quietly letting the rest go.
When The Golden Secrets entered the picture
The Golden Secrets was a friend referral but I was sold once I saw the goddess that is Jesse Golden — the founder — and thought, she is visibly glowing and I would like to know why. I ordered the Youth Beauty Face Oil and within a week I knew it was staying. This was not a dramatic before-and-after product. It didn't fix something I'd been losing sleep over. What it did was make my skin feel genuinely, deeply nourished in a way I hadn't experienced before — the kind of nourished where your skin just stops needing to tell you anything. Ayurvedic-rooted, 24k gold, rosehip, sea buckthorn, turmeric, plant stem cells. Think Dirty Verified. I use it morning and night and I will use it until they stop making it, and then I will chain myself naked to a tree in protest until Jesse decides to put it back on our shelves… (a girl's gotta think ahead with products this good.)
What I'm using now
The current routine is the simplest it has ever been. The Dermafoliant, two or three times a week. The Youth Beauty Face Oil, morning and night. And the OSEA Ocean Cleanser, which I discovered 3 years ago and the body washes, cleansers, and moisturizers line my shower and bathroom cabinets.
I had not fully understood what a good cleanser could do until I switched to OSEA. Sulfate-free, seaweed-based, low pH. The thing that made the biggest difference was simply that my face felt comfortable immediately after rinsing — not dry, but actually in her naturally thriving era.
I also added the OSEA Hyaluronic Sea Serum into the routine. Three molecular weights of hyaluronic acid layered with their seaweed complex. I apply it on damp skin after cleansing and seal it with the oil. That is the entire thing. My skin approaching forty is calmer, more even, and less reactive than it was at thirty-two when I had cabinets full of product that most sat in for years before being discarded. It's much easier having "empties" when your go-to products stay minimal. That said… I know in my personal notes here I'm going to sound repetitive, but that's what skincare should be: simplified into the things you absolutely love, not a guessing game of what to use next. I'm also aware that I've been blessed with amazing skin, but the amazing skin only really started happening when I exhaled all the bullshit products.
The one I haven't bought yet (but I'm about three seconds from ordering)
I keep ending up on the Shani Darden Retinol Reform page. I open it. I read the ingredient list. I look at the scores in our database — which are high enough that I cannot in good conscience find a reason not to buy it. I close the tab. I open it again a week later. I think as an ode to myself, and knowing that skin changes as we gain wisdom year after year, I might bless myself with trying new things just for the fun of it. But then I hear my great-granddad in the ether saying "if it ain't broke don't fix it!"… So what do you think? Should I branch out? Send me some of your favorite products and maybe I'll give em a whirl!
The rational answer is yes. The hesitation is that my skin is happy and I'm nervous about the six-week adjustment period, but I think we all know how this is going to end.
So. Watch this space.
