I was recently introduced to this incredible story about Marilyn Monroe. Cliff’s Notes: she was doing an interview while walking around NYC unbeknownst to passersby. She remarks to the journalist, “Do you want to see her?” She takes off her coat, fluffs her hair, changes her posture and folks around start to take notice not only is this somebody, this was THE Marilyn Monroe.

And it started with her perspective shift.

The hard thing I have with my job is making very certain that my clients know makeup won’t change their lives. It can change their perspectives, and it can change others’ perspectives of them. But that’s it. There’s no magic lipstick or eye cream. You’re not going to get what you want from a particular shade of blush.

It’s so easy to talk about perspective shifts, goal-setting, manifesting, positive vibes…but it’s really hard to grasp when things aren’t great. And then you start to spiral.

I’ve learned you have to treat your brain like a muscle. Even in the good times, you have to work to find the good. That’s why they call it practicing gratitude - you have to do it over and over again. So here are two ques that help my practice:

1. This is happening FOR me, not TO me

2. I GET to do this, I don’t HAVE to do it

It’s All For You

The first works in anything from unexpected traffic jams to you dog almost dying in surgery. I don’t know why things happen the way they do. And, frankly, I’m not someone who thinks everything happens for a reason. But I do believe that if we live through something, we have something to learn from it that will help us later on.

So when I have to go through something, I imagine the best case scenario is coming but I need to pass this test to move on to the next level of my life. Maybe it’s patience, maybe it’s trust, or maybe it’s to rest. I just know that if I’m still alive, I have a purpose, and everything I experience is happening to help me fulfill that purpose.

We Get To

We take so much for granted. In middle school, I was fortunate enough to go on missions trips, volunteering with different organizations to make real change. One time, I went to Mexico to build a house for a family of four. You know those wooden palettes you see at Costco or the supermarket that big displays rest on? They had stacked those up and covered them with cardboard. That was their house.

So we dug up the ground and mixed concrete by hand and poured a foundation and built them a house with real walls and a roof. I felt awful because we couldn’t give them plumbing and electricity, but they were still so grateful and happy. Then, when we arrived back home, the first time I went through automatic doors I started to cry. Because I get to live somewhere where we don’t have to open our own doors while there are others not so far away who don’t even have a door.

It’s one of those things where you don’t know what you have until it’s gone, but my hope is we don’t have to lose things before we begin to deeply appreciate them.

After 17 years of ballet I needed hip reconstruction. Today I didn’t want to work out, but I was able to remember what it was like when I couldn’t move my body, so I worked out. Knowing we get to do things, even the hard things, can create a deep well of motivation.

Become Her

The thing that’s so striking to me about the Marilyn Monroe story isn’t that she felt like she had to be two different people, or that people took notice of the difference. It’s that nothing changed outwardly. In the teen dramas the girl loses the glasses and gets a makeover before her identity shifts. But when Marilyn became “her,” literally nothing about her looks changed.

I’m here for you. I’m so happy to help if you want to learn how to do a smokey eye or wear-to-work makeup look. But I just really, really want you to know that it won’t change you. To become her, you have to do that all yourself.

Appreciate you, mean it. -JY