Written By: Bakare Zainab

Feature Image Credit: El PAIS English

There is a certain kind of room you see on the internet now. It has white walls, a mirror that leans against the wall (never hung), a shelf full of books that have not been opened, and a candle lit on a Pinterest-style desk in broad daylight for “ambience.”

There is a throw blanket that somehow looks perfect and messy at the same time. And of course, a cup of iced soda or some iced whip coffee placed on its Pinterest inspired saucer.

You don’t even need to see the username. You have come across this exact video or a slightly different version at least five times this week — different person, same vibe.

Welcome to the age of aesthetics. Where everyone’s life, or at least, the part of it we are allowed to see, is starting to look the same.

Copying Aesthetics, Losing Self

Let us be honest, we all love a good aesthetic. The clean, minimalist lifestyle which was once an act of rebellion has somehow, along the way, got swallowed up by the algorithm. Now, what started as soft living has become a digital personality type. A lifestyle genre. A visual template we all unconsciously subscribe to.

It is no longer just “I like my space to feel calm.” It is “I need my life to look social media worthy”. And in that shift, we have quietly traded individuality for alignment.

Photo Credit: Elevator Inc

If It is Not Aesthetic, Is It Still Valid?

There is an unspoken rule now: if your breakfast is not on a ceramic plate, don't post it. If your skincare isn’t arranged like a mini boutique, keep it to yourself. If your apartment has coloured curtains or your walls are not white or that old Nigerian rug with elephants on it, just delete the footage.

The aesthetic standard is clear — clean, neutral, and preferably white or beige. Beige couch, white walls, aesthetic life. Add some fake climbing leaves and LED lights, boom! you are in the cult.

But what happens when your real life doesn’t look like that? What happens when your apartment came fully furnished with brown curtains, beige tiles, and orange walls you didn’t choose? What happens when you don’t have money for “clean girl” candles or matching glassware? What happens when you’re just living, not performing?

The internet has slowly trained us to believe that if something can’t be turned into content, it is not valuable. If it doesn’t photograph well, it is not beautiful. And if your lifestyle doesn’t fit the template, maybe your life is a little messy and just there.

Photo Credit: Pinterest

The Empty Sides of Pretty Lives

Sometimes its safe to wonder: who are we without our “perfect” corners?

Can you be at peace if no one sees your serenity? Can you feel beautiful when your space isn’t minimal? Can your life be soft even if it is loud, colorful, chaotic, or imperfect?

The scariest part is, we are not just rearranging our rooms, we are rearranging ourselves.

We are shaving off the edges of our personalities to match a cleaner version of who we think we should be. We are deleting parts of our real, dynamic lives to fit an aesthetic that doesn’t have room for individual expression.

Your childhood teddy bear doesn’t match your Instagram palette? Into storage. Your yellow bedsheets? Into the storage. But what is left when everything real is gone?

Staging Life For the Internet

Let’s not pretend this is just about home decor. This is about life, about identity, about how the internet has made us all editors of our own realities.

We stage our spaces, arrange our skincare, rehearse the vulnerability meant for social media only. We light candles before filming, put on cozy music in the background, and zoom in on clean counters and self-help books. And deep down, we hope someone somewhere will say, “Wow, she’s got it all together.” But we don’t.

Behind that caption about rest is a breakdown we didn’t film. Behind that aesthetic is a person still figuring things out. And that’s okay.

But it doesn’t sell, and that is fine. It doesn’t go viral, and that is okay. It doesn’t “fit the feed,” as it should be. Because a person’s originality should stand out and not squeeze a space in a crowd of replicas.

Soft Life, But Make It Honest

Soft life was never supposed to be a branding exercise. It was supposed to be ease, peace, emotional safety, community and knowing joy beyond just what is camera-ready.

But the internet doesn’t know how to let things breathe. Now, you need a robe, a clean desk, an aesthetic set of cups, and curated content to prove you are living softly. Otherwise, you're just another tired girl with a noisy life.

But the truth is real soft life can be noisy. Real peace can be messy. Real self-care can look like sleeping in and not filming it. Real joy might just be fried yam and pepper sauce, eaten in bed, while watching old episodes of Jenifa’s Diary.

The Colour Blindness Trap

Why does peace have to be colourless? It is wild how we’ve come to associate order and luxury with blandness. Colour is now seen as chaos and culture is too loud.

We now have people in Lagos, Accra, Nairobi, and Cape Town trying to recreate an aesthetic that does not suit or even key into their culture, the booming colours culture.

We have adopted aesthetics that don’t even reflect our environment and we have started to feel like anything that isn’t clean and colourless is shameful.

But your purple curtains don’t make you less valuable. Your red bucket doesn’t cancel your peace. And your kitchen with mismatched plates? Still soft, still yours.

Live Real, Not Just Aesthetics

The solution isn’t to shame aesthetics. The solution is to unchain ourselves from performance. To remember that it is okay to like clean spaces and still be “messy”. It is okay to post curated content and still be real. It is okay to want a Pinterest-style room and still keep your loud Ankara covers.

Because ultimately, what we are all craving isn’t perfection. It is permission. Permission to live honestly and be seen fully.

So please, show the chaos. Post the rice that scattered on the floor. Show your balcony with wet clothes and wire hangers. Let us see your human. Let us see you.

Your life doesn’t have to look like a mood board to be beautiful.

Written By: Bakare Zainab