As many of you are aware I’m a happily married woman and have been for some time now. I consider myself incredibly lucky to share my life with a man who is so considerate of my female ways. He has accustomed to my pre night out break downs and occasional fat days. He knows that despite my constant moaning about piling on a few ponds I will continue to eat every Custard Cream in sight nether the less, and that’s fine. Self-confidence plays a huge role in all of our everyday lives, I don’t exclude males from that sentiment either. But how do we make ourselves feel confident, and do we do it solely for ourselves or with another in mind?
Fitting in Fashion
I’m constantly engaging on conversations online regarding fashion and beauty as like many woman, it’s my absolute favourite pastime. Fashion can play a complicated role in the lives of many. Its fills and fuels our media, it acts as the perfect Saturday pass time and can turn a down day completely on its head, yes a nice skit has the power to do such a thing. Recently my husband questioned why I never wore a selection of my wardrobe, “Nat this dress is lovely, why do you never wear this one?” the question really stuck with me and he’s right, I have sooo many clothes but sometimes get into a habit of wearing the same select few. I think us woman have a comfort zone and once we are well and truly within the rhythm of that zone, it’s hard to break away.
After giving more thought to his query, it started to question whether this ‘comfort zone’ we create ourselves is because we are in fact dressing with somebody else in mind, and this if this is the case how does that affect our relationship with ourselves. We dress for work and have to contemplate whether a blouse is too low cut or not low cut enough? Will it gain unwanted attention and therefore make you feel subconscious for the rest of the day. The same applies for first dates, both situations relate closely to having clothing dilemmas. I was however, shocked to hear from a close friend the pressure she feels to not look a state on the morning school run. Apparently wet hair tied up in a bun and jogging bottoms is no longer a reliable go to outfit. Now mums are dressing the impress other mums, unknowingly putting unnecessary pressure on each other.
Putting Him on the Spot
So after a lot of pondering and self-reflection, I went back to my beloved husband and asked him what his favourite outfit of mine was. His face, as I’m sure many of you ladies can imagine, was slightly taken aback. I could see the cogs working overtime as he desperately tried to remember something I had worn one time that he absolutely loved. True to form, he came up trumps with his response of “I went crazy that time you wore that Gatsby dress for Sarah’s 1920’s party, that dress made me feel young and crazy in love again.”. My first reaction was something along the lines of ‘are you sure that’s not just because your favourite film happens to be The Great Gatsby’, but eventually took the compliment as it was originally intended. What did I learn? If I’m honest, although his words made me feel smitten, I too remember feeling incredible in that dress, from the moment I bought it to putting it on and dancing the night away, my confidence was through the roof. So as much as the sparkle caught my fellas eye, as he too has confirmed, in actual fact it the way I held myself in that outfit made all the difference.
To test myself and ensure that I break my usual pattern, I am challenging myself to not instantly grab my usual comfort clothes and instead try something new or even better something I bought last year and have not yet warn for whatever reason. I am constantly acquiring new items of clothing and for some reason or another disregarding them as quickly as I purchased, more often than not because I fear it may be too much or too little for somebody else. The tight restrictions of dress codes are slowly being broken, for this to ever truly be the case we must embrace and find confidence in what we wear for ourselves, nobody else.
