Why None of Us Will Ever Be #thatgirl

The hashtag #thatgirl has more than 2 billion (yes with a ‘b’) views on Tiktok. If you haven’t heard of her, you can read up here, but the tag is typically used with videos of women who are presenting carefully curated routines that supposedly level up your life. You know what I’m talking about - green smoothies, matching workout sets, journaling, all-neutral home décor. It’s a new variation on a wellness personality that has been haunting the internet for quite a few years now. The hashtag was at peak popularity in late summer 2021, but has made a little comeback this January amidst all the new year's resolutions. 

I’ve talked about ‘wellness’ trends in this forum before. Wellness today is a bastardization of the formerly noble concept of wellbeing. Brands now insert the term into every ad as a bid to sell you things purely because they are attached to the notion of health. Take Goop as an extreme example. #thatgirl is new packaging on the same wellness agenda and I’m sick of how little it has to do with our actual wellbeing.

First of all #thatgirl apparently cannot exist without a plethora of products. A Vitamix blender to make her smoothie bowls and juices. Matching leggings and sports bras for Pilates. Cute mugs and clear glass for iced coffee. Creamy notebooks for her morning manifestations.  Because #thatgirl is nothing if not aesthetic. Her chief characteristic is not that she is healthy nor productive, it’s that she looks impossibly good the entire time. Therefore, to be that girl is to consume. 

Consumption is not inherently bad. But no matter how many things you own, your life will never be aesthetic all the time. This trend consists of women posting videos that are never more than a minute long. What about the other 23 hrs and 59 minutes in a day? You think she never broke a yolk while plating her perfect avocado toast? You think she doesn’t have dog hair all over her leggings? That sunlight streams perfectly into her living room every morning? 

This trend promotes a ‘look’ that simply leaves no room for error, mess, or ugliness. Proponents of the trend say that there’s nothing wrong with wanting to romanticize your life or find beauty in the little moments and I would agree with that. That’s a positively lovely thing to do. But there’s a line between romanticizing moments that happen to be beautiful, and forcing them to happen as often as possible through the addition of products or activities that are merely to keep up appearances. 

My second biggest issue with this trend is the façade of self improvement that it hides behind. These routines are presented as a personification of ‘having your life together’. After all, who doesn’t want to be clean, pretty, and healthy, right? 

Except none of these habits are required to be those things. There are a million ways to be successful, happy, and healthy. Yet every #thatgirl video I can find has a white/gray made bed, some sort of smoothie or juice, fruit, a journal closeup, and a variety of workout shots. Although these habits can add value to your life - I myself have many of them - they do not necessarily constitute the entirety of wellbeing. 

True wellness looks different for everyone, it’s not based in consumerism, and it’s absolutely not perfect. Some people might do puzzles to keep their mind active rather than journal. They prefer dog walks to yoga. They live in a place that’s dark and cloudy most of the time. Their preferred breakfast is a scramble with meat and cheese rather than a green smoothie. They are most productive at night rather than in the morning. It’s frustrating how one type of wellness is constantly pushed by social media over and over and over again when there’s an infinite number of ways to find health and happiness in this world. Why does it all have to be white sheets, iced coffee, and beige all the time? And why should I have to buy so many things to make it happen?

Lastly, to those who are focused on wellness goals, the idea of perfection in these videos can be overwhelming. Maintaining consistency with a new routine is a key part of making it a habit but trying to workout, cook, clean, journal, meditate, etc. every single day is a lot. I consider myself pretty disciplined with a pretty extensive routine and even I only accomplish it about 70% of the time. Of that 70%, it probably runs smoothly and aesthetically only about 5% of the time. The rest is just… normal looking. I continue to do it because everything I include really does make me feel better no matter which products I use or when I do it in my day. Trying to do all of these habits, every day, all while looking incredible is a fantasy. Nobody’s life is like that. 

Maybe that’s my real problem with #thatgirl. That girl used to be a fashion or makeup influencer. She got to commodify things that had already been commodified. Maybe I resent the commodification of the most mundane activities. Maybe I resent the feeling she gives me that I, too, should look pretty while I eat breakfast or that I need that beautiful journal to be manifesting properly. I want all my little in-between moments to be my own - no standard set for them. I resent the creation of yet another unattainable image that makes even my smallest moments feel inferior.

As close as I’ve ever gotten to feeling like #thatgirl