Keilidh Cashell: We have to welcome the messing-up but in this world, it’s very hard to do

Keilidh Cashell: 'I’d rather regret something I did do than regret something I didn’t do. You’re never going to get that chance again.' Picture: Con O'Donoghue Photography

I grew up in the back arse of Monaghan; the tiniest little town, there wasn’t much going on. I was the biggest tomboy ever growing up. Makeup was probably the last thing anyone I thought I would end up doing.

My earliest memory is moving house. I originally lived in Clane in Kildare. I remember sitting in the back of the car with my toy piano and my feet not even reaching the floor.

I think everyone is born to be the person they are. We change, as people, all the time. That’s what makes life fun or exciting — constantly evolving and changing. What’s for you won’t pass you. As long as you put in the work, you’ll get to where you want to be.

The greatest challenge I faced was probably the pandemic. It definitely gave me a totally different perspective on life. We actually launched Kash Beauty during the pandemic so people think we’re a little bit crazy. It just proves what I always say about makeup; it’s for yourself. People don’t wear it to impress boys — they wear it to look good for themselves. It didn’t matter if we weren’t leaving the house; that’s the power of makeup.

My brand Kash Beauty is my proudest achievement. For a makeup artist, their dream is always to have their own brand. And the fact that I have done this so early on in my career, it’s obviously down to the people who supported me and gave me the confidence to know that I can do this.

My greatest quality is that I’m very open-minded. I feel like there’s nothing anyone could say to me that I would instantly be like, “no”. I always embrace people and want to learn about different people’s backgrounds and whatnot.

My boyfriend Darren is the person I turn to most. God love him; he hears it all — whether it’s big or small dilemmas. I’ve been with him for 12 years now — since I was 14, which is insane.

My life lesson is just to be truly yourself. Obviously, society tells you you should be this or that, but I think the greatest gift is to be able to live life as your real self. It doesn’t matter what anyone else says if you’re living authentically, that’s where you’re going to be your happiest.

I wouldn’t even think twice about not wearing makeup on social media. I’ll come on camera looking like God knows what — I don’t care. I’ll have the biggest hun bun on my head. This is my reality 90% of the time. I’m just getting glammed to post online or if I’m going somewhere — in reality, I look like a potato.

Just going for it and not caring what anybody else thinks — that’s the greatest advice I’ve ever been given. I remember when I first started having an interest in makeup, and people were like, “Oh, how is that going to be a career?”

Humans are weird, because anything to do with numbers we associate our self-worth with. Our weight, social media… you don’t get enough likes, you don’t get enough followers. You have to disassociate yourself from that. The internet is so volatile, things change all the time. And if you’re going to attach your self-worth to that, of course how you feel about yourself is going to be volatile.

Sometimes things take off. Sometimes they don’t. You have to try new things or just keep going and persevere.

I hope that I give people confidence to, like, be themselves and encourage them to be creative. I like having a positive impact on other people’s lives. I could sit in my room and paint my face all day, but hearing someone say, “That trick really helped me” — that’s the biggest thing for me.

When I first started, I thought I was class. I thought I was absolutely unreal. Oh dear. But that’s the whole point — you’re always going to look back and cringe but instead of seeing it as a negative thing — look at how much you’ve grown.

You learn from everything. There might be things that you mess up but you learn from that and you become a better person. This is probably very cliche, but if you don’t mess up then you can’t learn.

We have to welcome the messing-up, but in this world, it’s very hard to do. People mess up once and that’s it. You’re kind of done. People don’t have compassion for people anymore. They forget that we’re human. Twitter is a place for unwanted opinions, so I’m not going to be there.

I’m not going to sit here and say that I’m the biggest spokesperson [for sustainability], but I’m definitely trying to be more conscious. I always find it interesting when people are like, “Oh, me doing this one little thing is not going to make a difference.” It is. If all of us decided to do one little thing, it would make a huge difference. That’s such a powerful thing. We’re all in it together.

Look back 100 years ago when women weren’t allowed to do anything. Now, we’re ruling the bloody thing. You have to invite change, you can’t push it out. You can’t force people — you just kind of have to nearly make them think it’s their idea.

What scares me most in life are regrets. I’d rather regret something I did do than regret something I didn’t do. You’re never going to get that chance again. Whereas if I did it and I mess it up well, at least I know I did it. I don’t want to be left thinking “what if”.

Setting up the brand was a very big, bold move. I put everything into it. You don’t know how it’s gonna pan out. I think anyone who has a business will agree with that. So far, it’s paying off.

Even if I took a different fork in the road, I feel like I’d still end up here. I’d definitely do something artistic anyways, I actually wanted to be a tattoo artist before.

• Keilidh Cashell is popular on Tiktok for her makeup content. She is both the face and brains behind the popular makeup brand Kash Beauty. Keilidh constantly sets trends with her unique makeup challenges and recreations on TikTok, where she has over 2.7m followers.