Losing My Working Mom Makeup Crutch, and Finding Something Better

Inside: One of my go-to hacks to handle my busy working mom schedule, and what I learned about confidence, self-induced expectations, and getting the job done when I didn’t have that crutch to lean on. Listen to the post here.

One of my working mom life hacks is keeping my makeup bag in the car.

I put on mascara and lipstick in the parking lot at work. Then maybe a swipe, or three, of under-eye concealer before walking into the office trying to convince everyone else that I went to bed on time or slept through the night.

Putting on makeup in a real mirror? Ain’t nobody got time for that.

My working mom schedule allows for about 3 minutes of getting myself presentable time, which is why I also own a car hairbrush and car deodorant.

Working Mom Hack: Don’t Clean

But yesterday I forgot my trusty face bag on the counter.

A fact I realized about 10 minutes into my 90-minute drive. As I ran through the events that I had lined up for the day, I realized there were meetings and a presentation and I was expected to look halfway human for both.

I was running too late to duck into a CVS. A quick look at my schedule for the day made me realize there was no time for a quick makeup run at lunch. And a futile dig under the car seat reminded me that we cleaned out the car yesterday, for the first time in many many moons.

See… this is why we don’t clean.

What Am I Hiding?

So I realized there was nothing I could do about this. I would be without my little bag of “look wide awake” for the day at work, and that just was what it was. This is my face. That will have to be fine.

And the more I settled into the day, the more I realized that YUP, this is my face. That’s more than fine actually.

Mascara might make me look more awake in a meeting, but my ideas will make me sound awake. Lipstick might give me a swipe of confidence heading into a presentation, but my words will make me sound confident. Under-eye concealer might hide the fact that I was up three times last night, but would it really?

And do I need to hide that?

Should I hide it?

3 Extra Minutes & A Confidence Boost

When you’re a working mom there are a certain set of expectations. Pressure, pushing down on you.

Balance work and family. Be there for all the things at all the times. Climb the ladder and make the beds. Make it look beautiful and effortless!

But some of that pressure, some of those expectations, are self-induced.

No one at the office yesterday cared that I wasn’t wearing makeup. If they did they didn’t tell me about it. Because that would have been super weird!

I got my work done, I did it well, and then I had less makeup to remove when I was putting the kids to bed last night. It was a boost of confidence coming to realize that I don’t need to put on a physical show to put on a mental show. One may impact the other, but they are separate.

Plus I saved myself some time in the morning and at night! As we’ve covered, any extra minutes found in a working mom schedule are a big win.

Ditching the Makeup?

So am I wearing makeup today?

Well…yes. I am.

Because I do like how a little mascara looks, and how a little lipstick feels. The makeup is for me, my little way of feeling pulled together on the surface when I’m paddling like crazy under the water.

But I’m also fine with this being my face. With or without the makeup. I’m fine with showing the world the paddling now and again, because it’s real life.

And as Shonda Rhimes so aptly puts it in The Year of Yes, not showing the real stuff of working mom life isn’t helpful to anyone!

So I’m proud of this face.

It’s the face of a working mom, managing her career, managing her family, and managing to laugh through it all. She’s figuring out how to handle this crazy schedule, learning new hacks, and staying true to herself. And she’s doing the best damn job she knows how to do.

That face, it’s looking pretty good. Yours is too.