Lina Pilgrim

If you are very concerned and care a lot about your looks... does that mean that you do not care about other people, and what's underneath? That is how I feel like people think of those who are very occupied with how they look. I do not think of myself as superficial as I can show my face with no make up, upload ugly photos of myself, value who I am more than what I am, and also fall in love with personalities and voices far deeper than only looks. But I am still very occupied with superficial things. I sometimes feel like it is art though... colours and shadows and lines and highlighting. Eyes and lips and skin and hair and dresses and hourglass-silhouettes. It's painting the face, grooming of the hair, design of the clothes and the anatomy of the body. Everything comes from a dream, and I want to be reminded of that dream when I look into the mirror. 

I've changed my haircolour a lot but I didn't feel like it was me staring back at me in the mirror. So I am growing out my natural, and even if it isn't as colourful or other people are far more fond of the red hair, it still feels like Me and that matters more. But I wouldn't say that if my boyfriend liked anything else more than my natural... I can so tell when he is lying, but I know that he thinks I am beautiful in every colour I've had. That feels nice, because I can tell that he isn't lying when he says that.

It's weird though... how keeping my appearance like my dream, and my dream is my fantasy which I write and paint. It is like everything I think and do is connected to my fantasyworld. It's weird... or maybe not so in reality. Some sociologists are saying that we in the western world are living in an escapistic society. We are buying things, changing our appearance, our homes, ourselves, chasing our conception of what we want to be, although it is all a dream. We never actually succeed and stop, feeling satisfied as we've become perfect. What we want to be... idealistic. But that conception is always changing, the conception of perfection. If you follow the ideals of society or a certain style or just continue to grow and change your mind of who you want to be, you can never accomplish it and be finished.

So what and from whom are my ideals coming from? My conception of the dreamworld and fitting in the fantasy. To actually look like I've been born out of the dream. But at the same time... I am just me, and when I think like that, I just stop for some time and rest while being just me.

But still... I never want to be taken for a superficial person. There are a lot of deeper issues and struggles in life which is just too heavy to think about all the time. Sometimes I get so overwhelmed I just want to focus on something more easy-going. When I am too tired for making art, I usually turn to dreaming about clothes and make-up. As long as I don't buy anything, and understand that I can only do it for a break and not an avoidance... it is a good and uplifting thing. It is the superficial substitute of my dream.

I am going to eat my oatmeal and go to bed with music in my ears now.

Hell Yeah!