According to sticky note brand, Post-it, you’re over 40 percent more likely to reach a goal if you simply write it down. If I had known this sooner, I have a feeling I’d be a lot richer and well-known, but I digress. If I had to guess, though, I’d be willing to bet singer and actress Hailee Steinfeld has made a habit of writing down her own goals. Aside from her music and acting accomplishments, Steinfeld’s also got her beauty routine on lock, but not without some help along the way. In fact, Hailee Steinfeld’s best beauty hack is one you’ve most likely tried yourself before.
I sat down with the “Starving” singer at a Post-it Brand event celebrating everyone’s favorite season — back to school — and the power of setting goals and making them “stick.” (Ha, see what they did there?) While I desperately wish I were going back to school instead of back to work for the rest of my life (hahaha HELP) one of the most memorable aspects of preparing for back to school, for me at least, was spending hours watching new beauty tutorials so I could make sure my ~lewk~ was straight fire when I walked through those doors.
Believe it or not, despite working with lots of makeup artists over the years, Steinfeld tells me one of the best beauty hacks she’s learned actually came from a YouTube tutorial. And come to think of it, I’ll pretty confidently assume that most beauty lovers have tried this tip at least once in their lives.
“This is actually kind of embarrassing,” she says. “This was learned on YouTube: using tape for eyeliner.”
In case you were confused, Steinfeld’s referring to using tape as a kind of straight edge to ensure your eyeliner wings are straight, fierce, and could cut someone if they got too close. (OK, maybe not that last part.)
Lest we forget, there is nothing embarrassing about using tape as an eyeliner guide. After all, haven’t we all tried the handy-dandy tape trick? Don’t we all want fierce AF wings? Let those of us with steady hands and always-perfect-on-the-first-try eyeliner wings be the first to cast a stone.
Still, though, even some of the best beauty hacks out there take a little practice to master. “I was doing it, and I taped my eye shut,” Steinfeld jokes, “and [I was like], ‘I don’t think I’m doing this right.’” Honestly? Relatable.
Even with a million beauty hacks under our belts, we all have to deal with our fair share of “sticky” situations (sorry, you guys, these are too easy) when going back to school. One of the biggest? Getting yourself to start waking up early again, with enough time to actually complete the beauty routine you’ve spent so long perfecting. I don’t know about you, but I typically have about negative five minutes to get out the door on a good day.
Steinfeld tells me she’s no stranger to rushing and needing a quick beauty routine to follow in the mornings as well. Luckily, her own five-minute routine is a lot easier than you think — meaning it’ll probably actually only take you five minutes.
“So you get up, you brush your teeth, you wash your face, put a little moisturizer on, [and] a little under-eye concealer never hurt nobody. Then, I’m out the door,” she says. “Honestly, this [routine] is kind of every day for me, too. I love my sleep.”
Even though getting back into a routine when you’re going back to school might be hard, Steinfeld reminisces that one of part of back to school season she loved was the possibility of a clean slate.
“Not only is it [going back to school] an opportunity to see your friends again and get back into the groove of things, it’s a fresh start,” she tells me. “It’s nice to have that. I guess, working now, you get a weekend, and Monday is your fresh start. But it’s nice to go away, have a summer, have a break, go places, do things you thought you’d never do, and then reel it all in and get back to focusing.”
Needless to say, back to school season is upon us right now, so Steinfeld and Post-it Brand have teamed up to encourage students everywhere (and hey, maybe this adult right here) to write down whatever they want to achieve. Whether you’re an aspiring engineer or an aspiring makeup artist with kick-ass eyeliner application skills (both of which are very admirable professions, thank you very much), writing down the steps you want to take to achieve that goal and posting it somewhere you’ll always see it is a small, but helpful step to get you there. The science behind this phenomenon boils down to the fact that you’re more likely to remember something when you write it down and are able to see it in front of you.
A new start means a new set of goals, and whether you’re going back to school or not, I think we can all benefit from new ways to help us achieve our goals. Catch me with 8,347,384,234 different kinds of Post-it notes with all the things I want to achieve this year (killer eyeliner wings included) posted up around my room.