Ninja Beauty Secrets — Part 9

Ninja Beauty Secrets, Part 9
“Questions & Answers”

This month we’re going to review some questions you sent me in reference to the past eight months of columns.

I’ve over-plucked my brows; now I can’t find a brow pencil that looks natural. What should I do?

Thin brows can certainly open up the eye area, but it’s not going to turn small or thin eyes into large and expressive ones. Don’t get carried away when tweezing your brows. If eyebrows are over-tweezed, you can look angry, evil, or alien-like. Even worse, you might end up looking like an angry, evil clown.

Look for a shade of brow pencil that’s slightly lighter than your natural brow color. Warmth from your skin and oils from your moisturizer can cause the pencil’s pigments to darken. Try the Aziza Brow Defining Pencil, L’Oreal Brow Elegance Enhancing Brow Liner, or the new refillable brow pencil made by Revlon.

If you still can’t find a good match, try a brow powder, such as Clinique Brow Shaper or Maybelline Ultra Brow Brush-on Color. You can vary the intensity more easily with powder. A fine dusting with a small square brush will fill in spaces and smooth light-colored brows. A heavier application will do the same for darker brows.

How can I achieve a highly feminine facial appearance?

The secret can be summed up in one word: tweezing. There is a baby skin smoothness you can achieve by tweezing your facial hair instead of shaving it. I recommend tweezing the mustache area if you can’t get laser hair removal or electrolysis. When you shave your mustache hair, no matter how closely you shave, you are still leaving a segment of each hair strand beneath the skin that results in a bulbous appearance, especially noticeable if you have a thick concentration of mustache hair. The area under the lower lip is especially sensitive and tweezing the beard area will be especially painful, so I leave it to you to decide whether or not you wish to do these areas. If you want a more permanent method of losing facial hair, you may wish to consider laser hair removal or electrolysis.

I’m trying to create a thin eyebrow look without shaving my eyebrows all the way. Is there some makeup that covers up eyebrow hair?

No, there’s not a specific type of makeup that can cover hair. What you will need to do is paste your eyebrows against your skin using a glue stick (you can buy these from an office supply store), let it dry, and then cover the area with makeup. The problem with this is you will still be able to see the hair if you look very closely. Tweezing is still the best way to get thin eyebrows.

I have small eyes and want a look that just makes them look big and beautiful. What should I do to get that look?

It all has to do with shading and contouring, so you will have to learn how to be a master of eye makeup. If you have small eyelids, characteristic of most Asians and some Irish people, you can create a false eyelid using eyeshadow. If you have eyes that are too narrow on your face, you will have to use eyeshadow to draw an onlooker’s attention away from that fact by emphasizing the outside areas of your eyes. It is very difficult to describe makeup techniques in words, so my best suggestion is to read my book, Secrets to an Awesome Makeover, to learn proper eye makeup techniques.

My natural lip line isn’t well-defined, so I’m not sure where to start with my lip liner. What do you suggest?

If you have thin or “broken” lips, you have to be especially careful with how you line them. The trick is to wear two shades of lip liner. First, line your lips with a nude shade that closely matches the natural color of your lips. Line beyond the edges of your lips with this shade. Use your best judgement with how far you will make the artificial lip line from the natural lip line. Next, line your lips just inside the first line with a bold color and make sure this line is perfect before filling in your lips with lipstick.

I want bigger lips. Can collagen injections give me this?

Collagen lip injections look so fake. Why would anyone want to look like they’ve been repeatedly hit in the mouth?

I’ve been trying to decide on whether or not I should get my teeth fixed. Should I?

Absolutely. A nice smile is one of the easiest ways of increasing your beauty by 100%. Oral surgery is the only form of “cosmetic surgery” I recommend so long as what you are doing has a functional aspect to it. Removing wisdom teeth because they are overcrowding your mouth makes sense. So does straightening out your teeth to prevent future root and gum problems. Removing molars other than wisdom teeth, like what Cher did, is probably not a very good idea.

Are those really your cheekbones in your pictures or did you get implants?

Yes, they are my own natural cheekbones. They’re plump enough to make Cher jealous. I got my cheeks from my mother. I have seen drag queens who have cheek implants and, at the risk of offending some of them, I will say that I have never seen a good up-close cheek implant job. Sure, the queens will look great in pictures, but when you are staring across the table at a person with these implants and the person turns to one side, you will immediately see what I mean. The cheeks just jut out like seashells stuck on the person’s face. I’m quite sure there are many reputable plastic surgeons who can do a proper cheek implant job, but I haven’t seen a good job yet.

What advice would you give a budding young crossdresser who would like to be the best that she can be?

Always stick to a plan. Have faith in your abilities. Learn how to apply makeup well and practice your skills several days a week. Only by getting enough practice with makeup application can you truly do a decent job with your own makeup and pass in public.

Also, make sure you learn how to color-coordinate clothing properly and learn how to find clothing that best suits your body shape. The only way you’re going to do this is by knowing your body and learning from your mistakes. If anyone talks about you behind your back, find out what they’re saying about you and fix those flaws.

Of course, if the only bad thing people can say about you is that you’re really a man in women’s clothing, you can’t help that. You are a man, a genetic male, in women’s clothing! That’s a fact. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. Freedom of expression makes the world a more fun place to live in.

Oh, yes, and don’t ever dress to look like a motherly or grandmotherly-type. Too many older crossdressers do this and it really makes them look ridiculous. Learn some fashion sense and style. This tip will take you far.

Some crossdressers get really down on themselves because they feel they can’t pass. What advice can you give them?

Like what I said previously, you have to stick to a plan. Improve yourself no matter what it takes. By that, I mean don’t do anything stupid you’ll regret later on in life. Only get boob implants or take hormones if you plan on being a woman the rest of your life. If you feel you have a confidence problem, seek professional help or confide in a good friend.

Crossdressing should never be used as a means to hide under-confidence. There are going to be times we will be read and other times we will pass. Even the best of us will be read no matter how great we look. Even I still get read by people, not by the average joe-shmoe, but by the person who knows what to look for. Usually, it’s a genetic woman who knows I look better than her and wants to pick me apart, so, to her, the fact that I’m a genetic male presenting myself as female is the one thing she can use against me.

I am six-foot-four and have a large frame. I have always been very curious about how women are truly treated by society. If I were to crossdress in public (currently I only do it at home) I would want a very genuine look. Is it possible to achieve this look?

To be quite honest, it will be very difficult to pass as a woman who is six-foot-four. I am not saying it is impossible because there are plenty of tall women in the world. It will just be a lot more difficult because being tall will attract a lot of attention so you will have to work much harder at passing than shorter folks.

Is it possible to achieve a genuine look at this height and build? Yes, but it will take a lot of planning. The big mistake many crossdressers who are tall and large make is either 1) throwing on a dress and hoping it will cover everything up or 2) just giving up on looking genuine. Do not ever give up on your goal of feminine perfection. Like almost anything in life, you have to work hard to achieve something. If at first you don’t succeed, try try again!

Are there many people who crossdress not because they want to be noticed, but because they don’t want to be noticed, that is, they want to pass and be treated like genetic women?

Absolutely! There are many crossdressers whose primary goal is to blend in with society. Not everyone wants to be a drag queen.

That’s a lot of questions! Next month, we’ll turn our attention to glamour makeup, some tricks that every makeup ninja should know. This new series of articles will focus on the various parts of the face like the first eight articles.

For more ninja beauty secrets, purchase Natural Makeup Techniques or Secrets to an Awesome Makeover from my website (will open in a new window).

Tags: makeup, use of makeup

Category: Transgender How To