If you’re anything like me, you spent the last few years completely obsessed with the promise of self-care. We fell in love with the fabulousness of it all. The sleek, neutral-toned kitchens, the vibrant green juices, the journals filled with morning intentions, and the promise that we could somehow curate our way out of existential dread. It made us feel like peace of mind was just one perfect routine away. I am ashamed to admit how hard I fell for it. I was doing Olympic-le

I am saying fuck the performance, fuck the prescription, fuck the endless instructions on what femininity is supposed to look like and what we need to “tap into” more. Fuck the idea that becoming your highest self requires softening, silencing or cutting off the parts of you that don't fit someone else's definition of feminine.

Everyone wants to be seen as beautiful. We women, especially, spend endless hours preparing ourselves to become the image of beauty. We shave our legs, we obsess over the cleanliness of our nails, the sleekness of our hair, we practice smiles in the mirror, we paint and sculpt our faces to perfection, and we nitpick the clothes on our bodies until we exist as a faultless shape— a portrait of beauty. And when we go out, we walk like models on display. Yes, it’s art. But it’s

I found myself wondering the other day: why don't we have shows like Full House anymore? Those family-friendly sitcoms that had something, and someone, for everyone. From the youngest daughter with bows in her hair to the dad who prides himself on his golf swing. I think the real answer is that, thanks to streaming and the omnipresence of devices, most of us are consuming television alone now. And so we stopped needing things that appeal to everyone, because there is no "ever

For the longest time, a select few individuals and corporations have withheld the power to dictate culture. To better understand this, remember Meryl Streep's famous monologue in The Devil Wears Prada, when she lectures Anne Hathaway's character over her cerulean sweater 'it was selected for you by the people in this room'. This power dynamic is no longer accurate. These elites don't single-handedly make choices for the public anymore. Today, thanks to TikTok (and other platf

When female insecurity is profitable, the most radical thing a woman can do is stop treating her body like a problem to solve. At Cannes one year, Kristen Stewart said something I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. Since then, it has slowly engraved itself into my brain. She said: “Having a female body is an overtly political act if you can get out of bed in the morning and not hate yourself.” To a man’s ear, it may sound overly dramatic. To a woman, it feels almost ob

From sequels to vintage revivals, today’s culture thrives on replay. Film, fashion, and celebrity style lean less on invention than reinvention. It isn’t laziness or recycling; it’s nostalgia fueling the moment. Supermodels step out in archival Prada and Chanel, while Hollywood orders reboots and sequels at a dizzying pace. There’s comfort in knowing what’s coming, but if we keep returning to the past, do we risk settling into familiarity at the expense of originality? How do

I’m only friends with pretty people, and yes, prettiest is subjective. I say that knowing it’s a take I don’t fully believe, but I want to sit with it for a second because there’s something true buried underneath. I am disciplined myself. And when I fall, I fall hard, because discipline carries an anxiety most disciplined people aren’t even aware of. They just feel it. I remember stepping outside my own body and watching that old version of me wanting to be so rigid: rigid wi

I can’t stop watching Dance Moms. My senior year of college was the end of my three-year, on-and-off, absolutely horrible relationship. Every time he left me, and he left me a lot, I would put on Dance Moms, cry, and ask my mom if she’d hug me. This happened enough that Abby Lee Miller started to feel like a family member. It wasn’t even the breakups that got me. It was the thinking. He’d tell me he was “thinking.” Thinking about us. Thinking about life. Thinking about whethe

Dating wasn’t always so drawn out. With the rise of social media has come the notion that we have all the time in the world to decide, date around, and settle. The next day is never guaranteed, and although it's good to take your time getting to know someone, people might not be around forever. I think men especially fail to understand that their options might not always be there. When I lived in Paris, I was dating a guy who decided to stop seeing me in the Spring. After the

I left Turkey without much artistic experience, jumping into art school in a foreign country, knowing no one and speaking none of the language. Everything was uncertain. I always believed that if I followed my dreams, life would somehow meet me halfway. I knew, especially as a foreigner who hadn’t studied art before, that I’d struggle to fit into an artistic community. I found myself making work not for my own pleasure or curiosity anymore, but almost involuntarily, to be lik

To quote Samantha Jones, defender of messy women and hard truths: “Chill, babe. We’re all bad in someone’s story.” For nearly a year, I had an affair with a friend’s husband while living with my boyfriend of almost six years. Even now, writing that sentence makes my stomach turn. Not because it isn’t true, but because it is. I was in my thirties. I knew better. I was the kind of woman who would have destroyed a man for doing this to me. And yet, there I was, actively particip

Never date a lawyer, or maybe just don’t confuse political literacy and emotional integrity. After graduating with my undergraduate degree, I took a gap year. I spent it working a job so miserable that I quit on a random Friday after being accused of having an affair with a married coworker. It was the kind of accusation that made me wonder what kind of free time my coworkers believed me to have. Outside of work, I was trying to build a life that looked healthier than it felt

Imagine your closest friend telling you one day, "I think I'm finally ready to get married." Chances are, you wouldn't be surprised. After all, women's relationship with marriage has always been full of contradictions. They're asked about settling down before they've even figured out who they are, yet the moment they admit they want a serious relationship, they're suddenly accused of being too eager, too intense, or of putting pressure on men. It's one of those unwritten rule

Sex has always existed with two meanings. On one hand, it is an act of love shared between two people. On the other, it is a lustful sin, bitten by the tooth of taboo. Or so history would have it. As a friend and I laid our woes on the table one evening, both recounting worryingly similar experiences that had happened on different occasions, I began to realise something. Our understanding of what sex is has lost an important, intimate side in its slow shift towards becoming c