It’s easy for me to get caught up focusing on techniques for fancy, full face makeup looks. I mean thats the most challenging and polished and fun, so it’s really tempting to talk about that all the time. But what about those days where you need to get out the door really quickly, you don’t care if you look fancy and you just want to look polished enough that people won’t ask if you have the flu?

Usually the go to move is to pop on some BB Cream, maybe fill in the brows a little bit and throw on some lip balm. That’s not a bad start at all but I find when I do that someone inevitably still asks me if I’m tired or if everything is ok…. and I’m like yup I’m good, this is just my face. I like to avoid that scenario and I’ve found that taking about sixty seconds to do a few small things to the eye area can really help you look more awake super quickly.

I figure most of you guys probably don’t dig when people ask that either. We know they mean well but nobody likes to be reminded that they look slightly more undead than usual, so here is what I do that takes practically no time at all and makes you look more awake.

1. CURL YOUR LASHES // You dont even have to take the time to apply mascara if you don’t want to. I purposely skipped mascara in the photo just to show the difference that curling them alone makes. It opens your eye shape up and makes it look more awake instantly. If you have naturally curled lashes you can skip this step, and then this will be a tutorial on how to look more awake in like 45 seconds instead of 60
2. BRIGHTEN YOUR WATERLINE // Simply use a skin tone or champagne colored eyeliner pencil in the waterline. Not only will that help cover any redness but it will actually add a reflective and brightening effect that makes the eyes look larger and more awake. Some people use white pencil for this but I think that looks a little too unnatural especially if you aren’t wearing much other makeup around it.
3. HIGHLIGHT YOUR INNER CORNER // Assuming we aren’t taking the time to apply and blend out under eye concealer the quickest way to brighten the inner corner of the eye is to add a dab of highlighter. You can use a highlighter that you would normally put on your cheekbones, or simply a bright shimmering shade of eyeshadow. It won’t cover up darkness in the area but it will bring light to the corner of the eye which inherantly makes you look more awake.

So with those three super quick techniques you can still get out of the house in no time, but look more awake so you don’t get the old “oh sweetie is everything ok?” from your well meaning but misguided coworkers. Who knows maybe they’re being passive aggressive but I like to pretend they mean well, either way 😉