This Week, According To Rani...
Originality: Is Anyone Truly Unique?
Growing up, I believed that being “one of a kind” or “unique” was a kind of status symbol - something to aspire to. With time, I’ve come to realise that no one is ever entirely original.
Think about a child learning from the world. They copy their parents’ gestures, the way they speak, the way they move. It’s how we learn, how we grow, how we begin to understand ourselves. Even in our attempts to stand apart, we are echoes of everyone who shaped us.
Every part of who we are carries traces of others. The way we laugh may have come from our mother, the way we say hello may have been picked up from a best friend. Our beliefs about the world, the way we handle challenges, the way we comfort others - these are all things we inherit from the people we have loved, admired, or simply spent time with. Some are still present in our lives, others have passed through, leaving fragments behind.
I am a mosaic, made up of all the pieces, from every person I have ever met or loved. My originality, such as it is, comes from these fragments, arranged in a way only I can be.
Maybe originality really is not being completely new, but being authentically yourself, shaped by everything and everyone that came before.
Have You Ever Wondered What Century Your Face Is From?
Have you ever wondered if your face belongs in this era, or wondered if it was from another decade entirely? Beauty trends change fast, but some people’s features seem to travel through time.
Take the cheeks, for example. Modern trends celebrate hollowed-out angles, while fuller cheeks are suddenly retro-cool. You will notice this a lot with actors, and how their cosmetic work or lack of will land them certain roles. For example: Amanda Seyfried skipped Botox for a year to play an 18th-century leader, and Holliday Grainger keeps landing period roles thanks to features that could be lifted straight from a Botticelli painting. Every decade has its aesthetic code, from 1920s cupid’s bow lips to the 2010s contour craze, and knowing it can feel like reading history through a screen.
Makeup artists and beauty historians can tell a lot about the “when” of a face. But maybe the real question isn’t which century your face belongs to. It’s: which era do you want to live in? A little retro, a little modern, maybe a little unpredictable? Timelessness might just be the best look of all.
