Beauty Isn’t Surface Level—It Never Was
Much of the conversation around beauty and mental health tends to focus on harm. We hear about unrealistic standards, social media pressure, comparison, and the ways the industry can amplify insecurity. These critiques are important, and in many cases necessary. But they have also come to dominate the conversation to the point where another reality is often overlooked, what beauty actually does for people in their everyday lives.
Across my doctoral research, which includes interviews with private consumers and beauty influencers, a different narrative consistently emerges. When people describe their beauty routines, they are not primarily describing aspiration or pressure. Instead, they describe something far more ordinary, and far more meaningful.
They talk about feeling ready. They talk about feeling calm. They talk about feeling like themselves. One participant described her routine as “a big part of my morning, if I don’t do it, I don’t feel like I woke up.” Another explained, “it helps me reconnect with myself for the day, it grounds me before I start.” Others described it more directly: “it’s therapy for me,” “it’s my happy place,” or simply, “I feel ready to go outside.”
These are not statements about appearance. They are statements about experience. They point to something more embodied, where beauty is not just something seen, but something felt and lived through the body. What becomes clear is that beauty, in practice, is often less about how someone looks, and more about how they are able to move through the world.
Scientific research begins to support this perspective. A 2023 study published in the International Journal of Cosmetic Science found that facial skincare treatments produced significantly greater physiological relaxation and more positive emotional responses than rest alone, with participants experiencing deeper neurological and bodily states of calm. Complementing this, research on cosmetic use has consistently shown that the act of applying makeup is associated with improved mood, increased confidence, and enhanced self-perception, suggesting that beauty practices may extend beyond appearance and function as everyday forms of emotional support.
Dermatological research further reinforces this idea. The skin is not a passive surface but a complex sensory organ deeply connected to the nervous system. Through what is often described as the skin–brain axis, sensory experiences such as touch, temperature, and pressure interact with neurological and immune pathways that influence how we feel. From this perspective, skincare is not only something we apply, it is something we experience. And yet, this is rarely how beauty is discussed in media, social platforms, or everyday conversations.
In interviews, participants do not typically frame their routines as meaningful while they are happening. They describe them as normal, automatic, simply part of their day. It is only when something is disrupted, a skipped step, a rushed morning, a flare-up, that the experience shifts.
That is when they notice it. Participants consistently described this moment of disruption in similar ways. “If there’s a part of my routine that’s off, it stays in the back of my head all day.” Another noted, “if I don’t do it, I feel like something is missing.” Others were more direct: “I don’t feel like myself,” or “I just feel off.”
What this reveals is that the role of these routines is largely invisible while they are working. You don’t notice what they are doing for you, until they stop. Over time, repeated engagement with beauty practices appears to extend beyond the moment of use. What begins as something external, a product, a step, a routine, gradually becomes part of how someone maintains a sense of readiness, composure, or stability throughout the day. This process is subtle and cumulative, but its absence is immediately felt.
This perspective complicates the way we talk about beauty. Because if beauty is only framed as harmful, we miss the ways in which it can also function as support. And if we focus only on outcomes, clearer skin, better appearance, we overlook the processes through which people regulate themselves in everyday life.
Many participants described their routines as moments they look forward to. A few minutes in the morning. A moment at night. Something consistent in an otherwise unpredictable day. And sometimes, that is enough.
In a world that is often fast, demanding, and externally focused, these small, repeated practices can carry more weight than we tend to acknowledge.
Dania Khalife
