I spent a significant portion of my adolescence shying away from the things I deemed too “girly.” Ten-year-old Eva took herself exceedingly seriously and decided one day that dance class and glitter were simply far too embarrassing to be associated with.

I’ve always struggled with being girly. Separate from femininity, being a “girly-girl” is something I both adore and shy away from. I love that all of my best friends are women. I love my ever-growing dress collection and braiding my hair and singing along to Taylor Swift in the shower, but they’ve always held an uncomfortable place in my heart. I’ve had a chip on my shoulder since I was a child about being taken seriously, and it’s not entirely unsubstantiated. I sat silently through remarks from adults that “she’s smart, but she’s a cheerleader,” and experienced the unique phenomenon of dying my hair blonde and suddenly not being called on to answer questions in class.

Though small, experiences like those had tangible consequences for how I presented myself. I still wear a blazer and ponytail for class only to breathe a sigh of relief when I come home to my sorority house where I know I’ll be taken seriously in my pink tennis skirt.

Watching “Barbie” over the summer was like seeing a parody of my own experiences in IMAX, and like most girls, I was thoroughly obsessed. Like Barbie, I’ve become bolder in my girlishness because of the mental hurdles I fought through in the past, and it’s made me far more fearless today. I started listening to the soundtrack on repeat last July, and the lyrics — which often refer to the listener as “Barbie” — brought me back to my musical roots: bubblegum pop.

Bubblegum pop is a heavily commercialized genre marketed to tween and teen girls with songs that tend to be exceedingly upbeat with simple, clear lyrics. I’m unsure exactly when I was introduced to it, but my clearest memory is by far the summer of 2011, when One Direction hit the Top 40 with “What Makes You Beautiful.” I was nine. I was in love.

One Direction was, to me and many other girls my age, pivotal in our social development. The group rose to fame just as we were entering middle school, a time when you discard the cocoon of childhood and begin the terrifying and fruitless search for the person you’re going to grow up to be. Sure, the songs were fun and the boys were cute, but being their fan offered a safe, trial-size identity when we had nothing else to go on.

The lyrics are cookie cutter: “You’ve got that [elusive, undefined, fill in the blank to match yourself] one thing,” is the perfect example. Listeners become the subjects of the songs, the recipients of the singers’ unbridled affection. Bubblegum pop doesn’t ask anything of its listeners; it’s not philosophical or counter-culture. Instead of demanding something from listeners, it believes in them.

The genre presents a fairytale reality, where every girl is smart and powerful, every boy is kind to them and friends face their problems together. Simplistic? Maybe. Naive? Absolutely. But when you’re 12 years old, it’s an irreplaceable refuge from the feeling that your kindergarten best friend is talking behind your back and boys have started snickering at you in the hallway. Bubblegum pop is, in a word, safe.

I’m proud to say that, despite my periodic stifling of my girlishness, I never really left my bubblegum pop days. As has been expressed again and again in both pop culture and the pages of “Jam Journal,” music is a uniquely private experience that allows listeners to be exactly who they are, separate from the expectations and judgments of others — and for me, that means the girliest songs of all time.

My music taste has grown exponentially since 2011, but listening to One Direction, Hannah Montana, early Taylor Swift and the Jonas Brothers gives me the same feeling as sleeping in my own bed for the first time after a semester abroad. They’ve made their way back into my playlist rotation thanks to “Barbie,” and I walk to class every day to lyrics that sound like they were written in glitter-pink gel pen. My high school self would be horrified to know I was openly admitting to this now, but you know what? It makes me happy. And it’s really freaking fun.

So if you see me walking into the law school or the newsroom dressed in my usual black and white with my hair in a bun, just know, I’m probably blasting One Direction. And if you’re in need of a reprieve from the stress of midterms and the existential pressure of internship applications, let me recommend that maybe — just maybe — you should turn on some sugary-sweet 2010s hits.

“Jam Journal” is a rotating column featuring a new Daily Trojan editor in each installment commenting on the music most important to them. “Jam Journal” runs every other Thursday. Eva Hartman is the news assignments editor at the Daily Trojan.