Selena Gomez isn’t afraid of keeping it real. In a world of Facetuned celebs and endless filters, her honesty breaks through the B.S. and reconfirms what it is we want from our “influencers”. We’re here for something glam, glitz and aspirational, but also, we deeply appreciate unfiltered, genuine relatability.
A lot of us got back in touch with our own skin over lockdown. Spots became a more familiar sight (ours and our co-workers over Zoom) and we became much more comfortable with real-life complexions. But, much of social media has stuck to its old ways, so it’s surprising – and refreshing – to see a celeb go truly barefaced. Zits and all.
In her latest Instagram post, Selena Gomez shared a picture of her hair left natural and curly and her skin totally uncovered to reveal a blemish beneath her nose. She simply captioned the picture, “Me.” And while it’s wild to consider this newsworthy, how often do we really see celebs embracing insecurities and sharing them with the world so openly?
Selena’s spoken before about her struggles with her skin. “I’ve for sure had acne and usually it’s kind of all in the T-zone,” she said on Vogue’s Beauty Secrets video series. “I try not to pick at anything. Sometimes that’s hard.” But she revealed her mind and mood play into how her complexion behaves. “I notice when I get stressed or something, I break our more.”
It’s not the first time Selena has pushed back on unrealistic beauty standards. Earlier this year she shared a video to her Instagram where she mused, “I’m a little bit big right now because I enjoyed myself during the holidays,” but she turned to her little sister laughing and added, “but we don’t care.” And she’s clapped back at appalling body shaming comments from internet trolls by continuing to post pictures of herself looking happy, healthy and 100% unbothered.
The singer has made it her mission to normalise looking, well, normal. She previously told GLAMOUR it was the whole reason why she started her own beauty brand, Rare. “Creating this brand was a way to have open conversations around beauty and mental health and [to] change the industry by breaking down unrealistic standards of beauty together.” Selena said. She acknowledged that she’s experienced pressure as a public figure. “It’s hard to feel comfortable when you feel like everyone is watching, judging, and commenting on the way you look,” she told us, admitting, “self-confidence is still something I work on daily.” But, she added, “when I stopped trying to conform to society’s unrealistic standards of beauty, my perspective entirely shifted.”
“It took me a long time to realise that I only wanted to be myself – that what made me unique was also what made me beautiful,” Selena told us, and honestly, we couldn’t have put it better.
For more from GLAMOUR’s Beauty Editor, Elle Turner, follow her on Instagram @elleturneruk