Quick “Hollywood” Makeup Tips

Do you think Hollywood starlets wake up looking camera ready? Guess again...they roll out of bed the same way we all do. Take these makeup tips, put on your best face and become your own starlet

That Face!

Preparing your face with foundation is like preparing a canvas to what comes next. Match color and tone from face to neck so there is no mask look. Just blend, and blend, for no foundation lines.

Inside tip: use a lighter color foundation under the eyes.

Apply a light dusting of powder over foundation to set it and make the look last longer. I stress "light dusting," because as we get older, that beautiful powder catches in the creases and, if I dare say, wrinkles, making them appear more noticeable. However, not using powder over foundation will cause it to fade faster.

A little rose blush or light bronzer in the hollow of the cheek will warm you up without giving you the "she has a ton of makeup on" look.

Did you say you wanted a natural look? You can look natural and flawless at the same time. Natural doesn't always mean wearing no makeup. Stay with browns and creams which will add a little kick to your features without going overboard with color. If your are feeling a little bold, then by all means use a little more color; but can we stay away from that flamingo pink lipstick please...

For Smokey Eyes

Try this signature look. Lightest color on lid and under brow bone. Warmest shade rounding off crease. The darkest color, for however dramatic you want to look, place under lash line about half way in depending on eye shape and out to corner of eye. Blend upward towards crease and fade outwards towards outside corner of brow. The deepness will look like a sideways "V" on the outside corner of your eye.

Eye Liner & Mascara

I suggest black for everyone because I love the dramatic look it creates. However, older or lighter skin and hair-tone women should opt for a less sharp affect and go with a brown or a plum gray.

Liquid liner is the best at not smudging or bleeding. It is my product of choice but if you can’t master the liquid application, which creates a sharp line, don’t use it. There are great pencil liners that work just as well. Using a thin line of liner across the top of the lid will make lashes appear longer and lush at the root but, don’t forget to curl lashes. No woman deserves to be without a “come hither” look that comes from curled lashes.

Lips

One key to remember, the dryer the product, the longer it will last and the less it will bleed. Lipliner first, followed by lipstick which is a bit creamier.

Blend it almost to the end of the lipliner so that you don't have that outlined lip look which was never "in" to begin with. Finish with a touch of clear or shimmer gloss dabbed only on the center of the bottom lip for a fuller look. Don't rub, just blot your lips together slightly so as not to cause the gloss to spread too far towards the outside of the lips.

Now, if you practice... this should take you no more than 10 minutes and you will be paparazzi-ready where ever you go. You are ready for your closeup!

Pat Cruz is a retired pageant and wedding makeup artist. For 15 years she worked backstage at fashion shows and pageants with contestants into the hundreds at single events. Pat traveled throughout the US and received a national and international following. Her signature was to create amazing looks by bringing out the best features naturally and fast. Each starlets look lasted for the duration of the competition or wedding day.

How to Harness the Power of Momentum

‘It’s like the wind at my back, the sun in my face. It’s like running down a grass-covered hill.’ ~Leo Babauta

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Katie Tallo of Momentum Gathering.

It can carry you like a strong current carries a fallen leaf. It can ground you like an early morning walk through the woods. It can move you like wind moves a cloud across the summer sky. It can ignite your spirit and make you feel like you can do anything.

It is momentum – that invisible, universal force that can saturate your every choice, your every step, your every breath, your every moment of resolve with vibrant, joyful energy. Momentum can surge you forward and it can pull you under. It goes with your flow, follows your lead and enhances your trajectory.

It can be harnessed, gathered and used as an incredibly transformational tool.

How do I know this to be true? I’ve been actively gathering momentum for almost six years now, ever since I quit smoking. That one simple yet meaningful change shifted my direction just enough to spark momentum. I triggered it without even knowing it. All I knew at the time was that if I could quit smoking after twenty years of trying, I could do anything. That’s what momentum feels like. It seeps into your pores and tingles the back of your neck.

It feels like possibility.

That one success of quitting smoking led to another success … and then another. I took up running and yoga after years of sedentary living. I became a mindful eater and adopted a vegetarian diet after a lifetime as a meat-eater. I felt like I was waking up. I became aware for the first time in my life that I could make different choices from the ones I’d been taught – from the ones that had become habits. I let go long held beliefs, pounds and lethargy.

Momentum was helping to shape a new me, inside and out.

I found inner strength after years of feeling like someone who repeatedly started a new exercise regime or eating regime only to quit a few weeks in. I now knew I was capable of profound and lasting change.

I gave up the haze of red wine soaked evenings and instead wrote the first draft of a novel I’d been talking about for a decade. Momentum was gathering all around me. Even the word, momentum, kept popping up everywhere like red cars do after you buy a red car. I was seeing the word in books, hearing it in random conversations, feeling it as I ran and waking up with it on the tip of my tongue.

Six months ago, while reading one of my favourite blogs, Leo’s blog, this very blog, I linked to another called Write to Done which carried me to yet another called The A-List Blogging Club. That’s when I decided to write a blog about momentum as a means to express it, sustain it, understand it, embrace it, share it, inspire it in others and live it completely.

Momentum has propelled me and supported me.

It has been like a coach, mentor and teammate, and it has been my constant companion for the past six years of incredible life change and over the past six months of my new venture. It has ushered into my life the unexpected gifts of friendship, community, passion and life purpose. I have harnessed momentum and I never want to let it go.

How can you begin to gather momentum in your own life and make it work for you? How can you harness it’s power to create lasting and joyful life change? Simply let it.

Let momentum carry you

Dip into the warm waters of momentum by trying, experimenting, taking a first step, forgiving yourself for slip-ups and then trying again. Plunge into whatever you’ve been putting off for “some day” and make today the day you begin. Imagine how incredible it will feel to let the current of momentum carry you from this one success towards another. Each can be a wave you ride to the next.

Let momentum ground you

Feel the earth beneath your feet as you step in a direction that makes sense to you – just you. Ground yourself in the feeling that comes from reflecting upon what you believe in, doing what feels right to you and living by your own convictions, counsel and sense of right and wrong. Get solid about who you are and then feel the power and ease with which your choices come to you.

Let momentum move you

Take that first step in a direction of your own choosing, then with each bold statement, each strong stride, each clear-thinking choice let momentum joyously lift you higher and farther. Exceed your own expectations and strengthen your resolve to be who you were meant to be and nothing less. Don’t strive and stress – instead simplify and find success on your terms.

Let momentum ignite you

Once you feel it growing, let momentum fan the fire inside you – a fire that may have been burnt out or smoldering under the surface for a long time. Let yourself feel love and passion towards yourself, your life and everything you do then begin to recover, uncover or discover your true potential. If often leaps out of the flames.

Momentum thrives on you.

It is the water, the earth, the wind and the fire of your being. It embodies the elements of a life lived fully and on your own terms. It can fill your heart, sooth your soul, propel your body forward and, if you let it, momentum just might make you feel like you can do anything – and then likely, you can and will.

Katie Tallo seeks to inspire simple, joyful life change at Momentum Gathering. Her new book is The 7-Week Life Cleanse: A Simple Guide to Infusing Your Life With Momentum.

Romantic Attachment

Romantic Attachment
By: Dr. Jeanine Austin


Many years ago I remember sitting outside with my friend on Huntington Harbor and having a big cry. I had just broken-up with a boyfriend and I felt devastated. As Liz pushed my long hair from the tears it was stuck to on my face she said, “Jeanine, you are one romantic fool!” Suddenly, we started laughing! It was true; I was one big romantic fool!

Romance can be a big seduction in our culture, and I, like many others, have not been immune. Buddhist nun Pema Chodron has distilled the three poisons of our perceptions as: passion, aggression, and ignorance. For the purposes of this article, we will focus on the poison of passion.

I can “hear” many of my readers thinking, “What is so wrong with romantic passion? It is what makes the world go around.” In fact, that may have also been my perceptive error. What I have come to find is that love does make the world go around, divine, or healthy romantic love being very much a part of that equation. After all, love is the highest law. However, when we are derailed, attached, suffering, jealous, competitive, and insecure or some other untoward emotion as a result of our romantic passions, we may have to “shake free” and move toward true or divine love again.

Untoward romantic attachment (and we know it is untoward when it begins to limit our good) may lead us to either repress our feeling or act them out. For example, we may pretend we don’t really care that much or become angry at the “object” of our affection. Possibly, we act on our feelings with heavy expectation and lust.

Attachment to passion is some of what Christian thinking is talking about in relation to the concept of idolatry. The romance/person becomes our idol. Rather than really relating to the person, our desire becomes the most important thing in our life. We want that next fix. After awhile we might not even get high any longer or the good feelings become short lasting. We have become attached, addicted, and distorted in our thinking.


We often can’t enjoy what is here and now because we want to indulge our passions. Pema Chodron writes about the distracting quality of passion. In Start Where You Are she humorously writes, “And then there’s good old Mortimer, that person who is sitting next to you in the mediation hall, or perhaps someone who works in your office. Some people are lusting when they see Mortimer. He looks wonderful to them. A lot of their discursive thought is taken up with what they want to do with Mortimer.”

Most of us have been distracted by a Mortimer or two. To move towards realignment we may try and let our Mortimer free. We may start with the intention to release Mortimer from our expectations. Even a prayer such as, “Dear God, I am so attached to the idea of form that I want to share with Mortimer. Please release me from the shackles of my desires and let me love Mortimer independent of attachment and need.” Even just the intention to liberate yourself can make such a shift that you can begin to use your passions in a deliberate, positive, and healthy way.

The old adage about setting the butterfly free is a wonderful one. When we let our butterfly free, we also become free.

Rather than acting out or repressing our passions we may choose to go the gentle middle road with them. We can sit with them and just be with them. This can feel really uncomfortable, but also can give us insight and empowerment that we never get when we try to avoid the message of our passion.