I Woke Up Like This

About

I woke up like this is a selfie trend in which the subject takes a selfie right after they wake up, catching them looking tired and unkempt. Eventually the trend was exaggerated and parodied, with people making themselves look incredibly messy before taking a photo and tagging it I woke up like this.

Origin

On December 13th, 2013, Beyonce's self titled album was released. The album includes the song "Flawless" which includes the lyrics:

"We flawless, ladies tell 'em
I woke up like this
I woke up like this"

On the same day, the Tumblr blog iwokeuplikethisflawless^[1] was created. The blog describes its purpose, saying:

"inspired by Beyoncé's song, "***Flawless," this selfie project will scratch away at beauty standards and expectations.
send in your own "i woke up like this" untouched morning selfies! no makeup, hair undone.
female and/or woman identified/ transwomen/ feminine-of-center gender non-conforming folks only, submit by clicking "i woke up like this, too!" below. "

The blog features user submissions of selfies taken just after the person has woken up.

Spread

On August 29th, 2014, Lena Dunham posted a picture clearly taken just after she woke up captioned:

"Is this what Beyonce was singing about?"

Several sites reported Dunham had taken a "I woke up like this selfie including The Huffington Post^[3] and E! Online.^[4]

On July 25th, New York Magazine^[5] published an article titled "Why Not Admit We Didn’t Wake Up Like This?" which discusses a desire to appear like you woke up looking more put together than you actually did. On October 2nd, 2014, Instagram user ijustwokeup^[6] finished her year long project^[7] to take a daily just woken up selfie.

Notable Examples

Related Memes

Wake-up Call

#WakeUpCall is a hashtag fundraiser campaign for UNICEF which began in October of 2014, in which the participant posts a selfie immediately upon waking and pledge to donate money to help the children displaced by the ongoing civil war in Syria, then challenge three others to do the same, similar to the nomination method used in the Ice Bucket Challenge for the ALS foundation.

Search Interest

External References