Makeup and teens have always been a topic of conversation in my life.

As a young girl growing up, I would see this false representation of women. Picking up a magazine and seeing a woman with makeup plastered all over her face was instantly what I wanted to become. I wanted to be that woman because she looked so beautiful. I began to sit down and watch shows like “America’s Next Top Model” with my mother, and I wished I could get my makeup done just like them.

As an impressionable girl, that is what I thought women should look like. That’s what guys liked, so I wanted to impress them. But as I grew up, I realized that it took too much work to be something I was not. I was not someone who wanted to give  others the wrong impression of myself. Now, I have a totally different perspective of life as a young woman. You either take the real me and enjoy the rare moments or you can just not approach me. Makeup and painting myself to be someone else I was not, was not what I wanted anymore and that came with confidence.

Not only do I have confidence, but celebrities do too. International model and creator of “America’s Next Top Model” Tyra Banks posted a morning selfie of herself stripped of what covered her in public: makeup.

At 41 years old, Banks is finally confident in showing us who she really is. And you know what? I am proud of her, and she is still beautiful.

Banks posted a picture on her Instagram feed and said, “I wanted to smooth out my dark circles so badly!!! But I was like, ‘Naw, Ty. Show ’em the REAL you.’  So … here I am. Raw. And there YOU are…looking at me, studying this picture. Maybe you’re thinking, ‘Whoa, she looks ROUGH.’  And if you are, great! You deserve to see the REAL me. The REALLY real me.”

I enjoy the real Tyra Banks, and although I was taken back by her natural face, I was in awe of her natural beauty and overall confidence to show us who she is. Now, it’s time for the other celebrities to show us who they really are.