When I was 16 or 17 and I was really beginning to think about my career long-term, I knew that I wanted to make a difference in music, and I was still figuring out how to do that. I knew I loved writing songs, and I knew I wanted to be an advocate and make the world a better place, and one of the ways I discovered to do that that was really authentic to me was being vulnerable and open — which means not only being vulnerable and open about mental health, but also vulnerable and open about my real face and my real body and my real skin. So I committed to that being part of the Rosie brand in 2018 or so.
I've never wavered in my decision to not wear makeup, but I've wavered in my confidence. There were days when it was way harder than I thought it'd be, and to this day — I've been doing it for four or five years — it wavers all the time. It's not my belief in what I'm doing that wavers, it's just my belief in myself and my own confidence, because there are days I wake up and I'm like, you gotta go do a shoot now.
And I can't hide my mental health or the bags under my eyes. So I waver all the time in my confidence, but not my mission. As someone who got on social media when I was 13 — the day I got on, it just kind of ruined my self-confidence and my relationship to my body and my relationship to my face and my overall self-love and self-worth.
As a 13-year-old, I didn't know what was going on, but by 17 or 18 I could kind of conceptualize why. And I realized it was beca.
