My Influencer Identity Crisis

Beauty, burnout, and job title I hate most.

It always happens the same way: someone asks what I do. I say I work in beauty, I create content, I work with brands… and then comes the question.

“Oh, so you’re an influencer?”

Cue my full-body recoil.

I’ve been doing this for well over a decade, and I still cringe at that word.

So why do I find it so embarrassing? Let’s start from the beginning.

I was a part of the last generation to grow up without social media (thank effing GOD) – so I lived a much more analog, quiet, au naturale existence than the generations that followed. Nowadays we see young kids feeling incredibly comfortable in front of the camera, filming themselves without any discomfort, and never thinking twice about what anyone thinks of it.

I, on the other hand, grew up playing outside – not online. Hell, I even got through college without any social media aside from Facebook, which absolutely feels like something that warrants bragging rights. (I truly can’t imagine a college experience where every moment is documented in real time. Give me the next-day Facebook album round-ups forever over IG Stories or god forbid, Snapchat?! Shudder.)

It’s also worth noting that I spent most of my youth living a fairly shy and reserved existence. Despite being a Leo, I was not the most confident. I had an unfairly long awkward stage – unruly curls, glasses, braces – you get the idea. Even if social media had been a thing back then, I can all but guarantee you I wouldn’t have been running to plaster my face to a public platform and open myself up to scrutiny.

Thank goodness for the glow up.

I went to school for journalism, with the dream of becoming a beauty editor at a magazine someday (thanks a lot, every rom com of the late 90s/early 00’s!) Graduating college at the exact moment the print industry was starting its decline did not make that easy, but I saw an opportunity to translate everything I wanted to do in print format into this new digital space.

I began blogging (a term which somehow also feels outdated now), long-form articles sharing product reviews and photo tutorials. That slowly spilled over into the world of Instagram, a platform which rapidly progressed from heavily filtered photos of your dinner plate into polished glamour shots, video content, and real-time unfiltered documentation via Stories.

And you know what happened from there – all of a sudden it felt like a huge chunk of our existence was online. It’s how we share, shop, communicate, brag, connect, and yes – influence. But that part felt a little new and weird – while I had embraced the power of the Internet to share/connect/create, there was this new ‘business’ side of it that felt awkward to me.

It wasn’t just about sharing “for fun” anymore; it became about performing relatability. Selling aspiration.

I felt like a sell-out, acquiescing to what Meta/FB wanted out of its users vs. showing up authentically (a criminally overused word in this context). The vibe went from “this is my favorite nude lipstick, I love it so much and I think you will too!” to “You need to buy this nude lipstick right now before it sells out!”. Also, make sure you’re still being relatable and authentic; don’t try to sound salesy. Also make sure you’re uploading every day (because of ~the algorithm~). You snooze, you lose. Skipped a week of posting? Cool, everyone forgot about you.

But at the same time, I’m business savvy. I saw an opportunity to monetize on my passion. And isn’t that the advice we’re always given: “do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life!”

Except, it is work. It’s hard work. It’s concepting, emailing, prepping, filming, editing, writing, optimizing, monetizing. It’s investing in equipment – cameras, lighting, software, outfits, props. And it never made me enough money to do exclusively – so I was doing all of this while also working full time.

I was constantly walking a tightrope of feeling stupid for putting so much effort into something that barely made me any money, while burning out from trying to juggle it with a full-time job, and questioning non-stop whether any of it was worth it. The time commitment, the pressure to keep up, and the regret I knew I’d feel if I gave up – I grappled with all of it daily.

Influencing means becoming hyper-aware of what you look like and becoming intimately familiar with every blemish, wrinkle, and sun spot on your face. Early into my content creation journey, I developed a brutal case of hormonal, cystic acne that was nearly impossible to kick until I finally started medication years later. It took a huge toll on my mental health and was a gut-punch to my confidence. Sharing that journey ultimately fostered real trust and loyalty with my audience – but it took a lot to get there.

But ultimately, my biggest fear around influencing was based around how I was being perceived by others. The nature of beauty influencing is extremely vain at its core. My social feed is full of hundreds of photos of my own face. I felt like every time I uploaded, there was this invisible shouting voice behind each post: “LIKE ME! VALIDATE ME! ACCEPT ME!” – which just felt so… sad? Lame? Desperate? All of the above.

I intentionally wrote the above paragraph in past tense because thankfully, over the years, I’ve learned to reframe what I do in a much more positive light. I know that deep down, this whole journey started because I had a love and a passion for beauty – and that remains true, over a decade later. I didn’t do this to be popular, admired, or honestly, even to make money. Monetizing off of my passion did end up being a bonus of all of this, but it wasn’t why I started – because it wasn’t even possible when I started.

Influencing, despite the cringe factor, was something I ultimately refused to stop doing because I saw the possibility in it. It has put opportunities in front of me that I never thought possible, and put me in rooms where I used to only peer in from the window outside.

When I received an email from MAKE UP FOR EVER asking me to be a part of a new product launch campaign, I made three of my friends look at it to verify it wasn’t a scam. Then I posted to my story “I just received the most exciting email of my career.” That email led to a video shoot, a role in a paid ad campaign, and an ongoing relationship with one of my all-time favorite brands – a brand I was obsessed with long before any of this was even on the table.

And that’s just one example.

These days, I have what’s basically a beauty closet at home, thanks to the steady stream of PR packages that show up on my stoop from brands who’ve seen my content and want me to test, demo, and share their products. This work has given me a 360-degree view of the industry – not just as a creator, but from the brand and agency side, too (remember those full-time jobs I referenced before?)

It’s made me a sharper marketer, a better strategist, and someone who’s earned a seat at the table.

And maybe that’s the part I’m still making peace with: that even if I cringe at the label of “influencer,” this work has built something real.

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