How Do You Feel?

Posted in: Blog, Style Corner by Ms. Ayo Fashola on July 25, 2011 2:03 pm

It’s Monday and I’m back on the Northeast after an exciting week visiting my family and working with my clients in Dallas. It was such a joy and pleasure to spend time with and work with my clients after my 7 month hiatus and world adventure.

During our shopping sessions, i became aware of how often I asked my clients “how do you feel?” each time she would try on an item. It’s important to become aware of how you feel when you try on clothes. The ideal is to feel really good. When you feel really good in a piece, it’s because the item feels congruent with how you feel on the inside. The quality of the fabric is ideal, the style reflects your point of view, and the item is a perfect fit or has the potential to be so after minor alterations and hemming. Feeling good and blissful in the skin we are in is our birthright, yet the issue is we are so far removed or disconnected from what feels good to us. We become so used to feeling bad or uncomfortable that it begins to feel “normal” to us. We should never settle for less than what feels good and right to us.

The focus when working with my clients is normally on creating confidence with clothing. This in no way trivalizes lack of confidence or low self-esteem, but recognizing the incredible power your external appearance has on your confidence. Looking at confidence from a styling point of view, we are all aware of how certain clothes make us feel less confident, while others seem to empower us. When you wear your “confident clothes” you feel that you can meet anyone  and you can take on challenges throughout the day with much better ease.

Your clothes can speak volumes about who you are, what you think of yourself, and–whether you agree with it or not–how others may treat you. Our physical appearance has a massive influence on our mental state and vice versa. Therefore, a great first step i is to find clothes that increase your confidence and empower you, clothes that help a you feel good about who you are.

What are “Feel Good Factor” Clothes?

• When you try them on you don’t want to take them off!
• When you try them on, you walk out the fitting room with your head held high, your shoulders held back, and you have an involuntary grin on your face!
• You wear when you need that extra boost of confidence for whatever reason
• You wish you could wear every day!
• You think are just really you! They express your personality and they just feel right!
• When you wear them you wish you’d bump into an old friend that you haven’t seen in a long time!
• Are comfortable, not too tight, not too hot or too cold, and feel good next to our skin!
• You know instinctively that they are appropriate for your age and the occasion, you feel wonderful!

Clothes that help us feel Confident are:

• Clothes that are appropriate
• Clothes and underwear that flatter and fit
• Clothes that are clean and well pressed
• Clothes that are not itchy or irritating
• Clothes that are “wow” colors
• Polished and heeled shoes
• Quality fabrics that don’t cling, pucker or pull.

Clothes that Deplete Confidence

• Are those that are inappropriate for the occasion
• Show every lump, bump and underwear line!
• Are creased or even stained, or that have a missing button, loose threads or hems, faded, ladders or bobbles!
• Are made of itchy fabrics
• Make us appear a pound heavier that we are!
• Are obviously cheap and tacky, i.e. plastic belts and accessories
• Are over the top fashion items that could cause self-consciousness
• Clothes that are frumpy or way out of date

I say if your clothes don’t make you feel like a goddess, diva, star, simply amazing or fill in the blank,  get rid of it. Its better to have a few clothes you feel amazing in, than to have a lot of clothes you feel so so about. How we dress needs to be taken a little more seriously–especially at the shopping and wardrobe de-bugging stages. We should never buy or keep any clothes that do not have a feel-good factor--its as simple as that! This has to include our underwear, our nightwear, leisure wear even our gardening wear!

Share your world and show your style and choose clothes that only make you FEEL GOOD!

How do you feel about this information? Do you have items in your closet that make you feel amazing each and every time you wear it? What pieces are those? What can you do to increase the amount of time or how often you feel good when you get dressed? 

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