What You Wear Affects Your Mood
How You Dress Matters
“How you dress matters, what you wear affects your mood, how you feel about yourself and how others think about you.” Dawnn Karen
Putting an outfit together isn’t just about throwing a few clothes on and covering your body. How you look is saying something about who you are. Your appearance can affect how you feel about yourself and the perception of others too – and, surprise, surprise, you are totally in control of that.
Most of us learn to dress ourselves before we start school. But that doesn’t always mean we know how to put an outfit together that expresses our identity and is authentically aligned with your personal brand. The good news is that you can learn to hone the language of colour and clothes, so you are saying something about who you are before you even open your mouth.
Dressing With Intent, Not In Tents
Here’s my story about how I turned around my journey with colour and clothes…
I’d gained a lot of weight during my pregnancy with my son. I felt very conscious of my size, and I started to live in loose-fitting clothes. Lots of black. I hated my body and never felt nice, whatever I wore. I lived in hope that I would lose weight.
For seven years I kept pre-baby clothes in my wardrobe, the idea being they would inspire me to get my act together and lose weight. I yo-yo dieted and lost a significant amount of weight several times but even then, I never got back into those clothes. They languished in the wardrobe and seeing them was a daily reminder of how fat and frumpy I was feeling.
A turning point came in the summer of 2007 when I decided I’d had enough. I remember making the decision that I needed to accept that I was now firmly in the plus size category. I removed the too-small clothes from the wardrobe and made room for new clothes that I liked and that didn’t just hang shapelessly on me.
I decided I needed to change. I thought, ‘Sod it”’ and looked for more colourful things to wear in brighter, bolder patterns. I put my clothes on the diet instead of me and started to wear more fitted stuff, which accentuated my assets and actually made me look slimmer, instead of hiding in baggy clothes. I began to dress with intent rather than in tents.
Style Recipe, Personal Brand and Style
Here are a few snippets from clients who have benefited from figuring out their style recipes and how that has helped them move forward in terms of their personal style and brand.
Client A
"It's easy to think that clothes are simple and straightforward. Yet like most things in life dig a bit deeper and you start to uncover some really interesting stuff about yourself.
The short story is clothes were, for a long time, my only way of expressing how I felt inside - baggy and dark when I wanted to hide and full on in your face when I craved attention.
They were also my go to for emotional reassurance - buy clothes to make you feel better. I thought I had left that behind a long time ago. Turns out I hadn't.
Subconsciously I thought I could achieve an outcome staying in the shallows (seeing it as transactional). Luckily Lisa Newport spotted this early on.
So, a deeper more playful journey begins now... I'm really learning about clothes, style and colour and more importantly I'm having fun and learning about me, the choices I made along the way and how it’s now a journey towards being and showing the real me, inside and out."
Loss of Identity
Client B
“My life had changed; I got married, retired, moved away from my hometown, nursed, and lost my mum, and my daughters moved in with their partners….
I didn’t have a structure to my day for the first time as an adult. I lived in the middle of nowhere and only saw my husband and the dogs. I stopped wearing make up as it was a waste if nobody saw it. I started living in fleece joggers, tops and wellies. Hair scraped back as it is too windy to let it down. Most days I didn’t care and other days I appalled myself with my slipping standards.
At this stage I knew I needed the transformational services of Lisa. I’d seen the results she’d got with other women and decided it was time to ask for help. I was embarking on a new career path but didn’t know how to pitch myself. My experiences were unique and valuable, my cardigan and crocs weren’t going to sell my products.”
Looking the Part
Client C
“I got ready for my ‘big moment.’ My partner was working from home and in one of his usual ‘jesting moments’ said ‘Are you wearing that?’ Now I was wearing a pretty flowered skirt and lovely lace blouse. I know I look fab in this combo because I have been told on previous outings of the same outfit!!
BUT that little voice challenged me as to whether what I was wearing was ‘right’ for THIS moment. I decided to change. I changed into a dark grey skirt suit (not a boring corporate style I’ll just add) with a wide bright pink belt, blouse and high heels and I felt so much ‘the part’. I felt better and I felt more comfortable. I felt like I needed to feel for the ‘job’ ahead. Now I didn’t look corporate but I instantly felt totally ‘in control’ – not in a control freaky way but in a ‘I can totally rock this ‘ sort of way. I knew I would command the room but in my own feminine way because I looked the part, I felt the part and I totally showed up as me.”
Clothes Impact How You Feel About Yourself
All three of these stories show how clothes can impact your mood and how you feel about yourself. It can help to create your style recipe which helps with that next level of comfydence.
Comfydence is one of my made-up words – it’s a cross between comfortable and confident. It’s something to aspire to when you are putting an outfit together.
Your style recipe is about your essence; it’s very personal to you and encapsulates your identity, how you see yourself and how you want to be perceived. You then translate it into your personal appearance, and it gets tweaked depending on the flavour required for each day.
It’s just like cooking. You have your basic recipe; you know the ingredients needed and you can experiment with the finer details, adding spices and putting different twists on it depending on your mood. You’ll be able to put together a cohesive wardrobe that reflects your personality and lifestyle and can be dialled up and down to suit the occasion.
My own style recipe ‘ingredients’ are vibrant, fun, stylish, creative, and sassy.
I have a vision of what these words mean and that’s how I want to be perceived.
Vibrant = lively, colourful, energetic
Fun = light-hearted, I don’t take myself too seriously
Stylish = I walk the walk and talk the talk, I have my own look
Creative = I like to inspire others to break the mould
Sassy = confident, a bit bold, cheeky at times
For me, this recipe runs across everything in my brand; it’s not just about how I look. It’s about my graphics and posts on social media, it’s about the tone of voice of everything that I write and so on. This way people get a feel for me and know whether there’s a connection, whether they resonate with me, whether they think I’m a good fit for them, etc.
There are lots of other people doing the kind of stuff that I do, but nobody else will do it my way because they’re not me. It’s all about my vibe attracting my tribe. It’s the same for you. Your vibe will attract your tribe. If you would like some help with developing your vibe, including your style recipe and personal brand identity then the silver or gold level packages of the FAB Network membership might be just what you need. You can find out what’s included here.
Meanwhile have a think about the contents of your wardrobe, are you smashing it when it comes down to your vibe?
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