Any of you who follow my Instagram or Facebook account, will recall that a year and a half ago I created a “30 Day Wardrobe Challenge” wherein I showcased 30 days of fabulous fresh fashion looks, straight out of my closet onto the virtual runway of your news feed. With that 30 day challenge (herein referred to as 30DWC), I put into place a few ground “rules” for myself: 1) I am not allowed to purchase anything new – everything has to come from existing pieces in my closet; 2) I am not allowed to duplicate any item throughout the 30 days (that includes shoes!); 3) I write a short essay about each piece and why I’ve put them together this way; 4) Have fun.
To date I’ve completed the 30DWC three times, which is surprising even to me. It started as a fun experiment because I was low on funds and couldn’t afford to go shopping so I decided to “shop” my closet. I had, after all, purchased each piece mindfully (I told myself) and as such knew that I loved everything in my closet. Also, I reminded myself that I’m a fashion designer and should be able to find new and fun ways to wear my clothing rather than the mundane routine I had fallen into with wearing my outfits essentially the same way time after time.
It gave me a chance to reinvigorate my clothes and my fashion sense, to find new appreciation for the “textilian” symbol of abundance hanging in my closet (yes, I made up that word!) There they were – silently draped upon slip-proof felt hangers – just waiting for me to notice them, caress them between my fingers feeling the softness/texture/density of the fabric, take them down and give them a good, much needed wearing. Many long-forgotten items that I was convinced had to be lurking in my closet! Little hidden gems that would feel like genius to pair with skinny jeans and a moto jacket. I would be the hero of my wardrobe and rescue these designer pieces and place them in the light where they belonged.
Except I don’t actually own any designer pieces. But the moments leading up to the actual excavation of my closet felt like I was about to discover ancient buried treasures. King Tut's tomb held no comparison to what I believed I would discover hidden within the dark recesses of my closet. This misguided hope that I would discover SOMETHING new was enough to motivate me to get started. I began the process of dragging out every article of clothing I had collected thru the years and started the task of putting outfits together. Simple, right? Yet, I would find that in actuation it was significantly more daunting than I had initially imagined, especially when I got down to the last few outfits and had to admit that some pieces just didn’t work together. Thus began the process to deconstruct previously paired outfits to find the final best “new and fresh” configurations. And by the way, there were no "forgotten" designer pieces waiting to be discovered. Just my ordinary, mostly bargain priced items.
This is where it the real challenge began. I knew there were tried and true outfits that I had worn together for years. Combinations that felt sinful to separate from each other. We are creatures of habit in life and in our costuming and I’ll admit that I struggled with breaking my own wardrobe mold at times.
Another challenge I noticed is that since we ARE creatures of habit, we also tend to gravitate towards the same few articles of clothing time after time. I’ve heard it said that we wear 10% of our clothing 90% of the time. This idea intrigued me, especially as I pondered the sheer amount of abundance we enjoy as Westerners. Am I actually so ungrateful towards my material wealth that I am ignoring 90% of what is in my soon-to-collapse-from-the-sheer-weight-of clothing closet shelves? (Yes, this actually happened, and my husband was home alone to deal with the wreckage of my collapsed closet. He went to The Home Depot and repaired the shelves before I arrived back home from work. Now that’s love!)
Determined to “Marie Kondo-it” - and this was before I knew about Marie Kondo - I examined each piece intentionally and asked the questions: Does this bring me joy? Is this the person I wanted to project to the world? Does this represent the person I aspire to be? Does it fit my life now? I decided that thru this process I would let go of pieces that didn’t represent who I am now or who I wanted to be. It was ok to let go.
Letting go of clothing is often a difficult thing for people to do. I find that some people believe they are making a deep and dark admission about themselves by getting rid of clothing that is no longer serving them. Perhaps, they reason, they are giving up on their goals and aspirations of traveling abroad to the Italian alps to ski the Matterhorn. Or they are giving up on the goal of having a body that could actually ski the Matterhorn. And let’s face it, we all have an ideal image in our mind from that one time in our life when we were finally at our goal weight and inevitably went on a shopping spree to outfit that new rockin' bod'. And now we have the ghosts of that former body hanging in our closet to mock us every time we gaze upon that Anthropologie silk kimono wrap top that made us feel like a rock star but now only wraps halfway around our body. Did it actually tie?
I get it. Giving away our clothing can seem like an admission that we will never again reach some random “ideal” weight. It can feel like we are actually giving up on ourselves which obviously means we’ve given up on life. Get me the Haagen Daaz coffee ice cream and a large spoon stat!
But folks, this just isn’t true! Although it may be factual that we are no longer at the same weight as we were years ago, there is absolutely zero proof that we have given up on ourselves! We’re still here, striving and thriving, accomplishing goals, building relationships and careers, raising children and giving so much love and attention to our friends and family that too often we put our own needs last.
What I’ve come to realize on my journey is that no matter what weight I am right now, what matters is that I dress this body with unconditional love and in a way that both flatters my figure and represents who I am right now. This is the only body I have and the only one I get. As far as I know, science hasn’t developed gorgeous human robotic surrogates that we can drive around while we sit at home stuffing our faces with Doritos. And being this imperfect flawed human being with all of its dreams and longings is a beautiful thing and something to be honored – in or out of clothing.
As I embarked on the first 30DWT, I was fortunate, in a way, that years ago I began removing anything from my closet that wasn’t my current size. I decided to love myself enough to end the self- imposed torture of reminding myself of how I had “failed” at my weight loss goals. I knew that anything currently hanging in my closet was going to fit me. I recommend that everyone edit their closet at least twice a year to pull out things that either don’t fit or that should obviously be thrown out (i.e anything ripped or stained and cannot be cleaned or repaired).
Although it took effort (and a few hours) to put together 30 outfits, it was honestly a lot of fun to see how my clothes could be transformed by, say, pairing a tee-shirt with wide-legged dress trousers and a jeans jacket. Or by pairing a dressy silk blouse with jeans and sandals. It was rewarding to feel excited about wearing pieces that I had owned for upwards of 10 or more years in a new way. That I hadn’t supplied the ever-growing landfills with more waste nor had I contributed to a consumerist attitude of a throw-away society was a source of pride for me. I had taken care of and shown appreciation for the clothes I owned.
There were other benefits that I discovered along the way as well:
1) I found new gratitude in my clothes as a symbol of abundance in my life. I mean, I have MORE than 30 pairs of shoes thus no shoe was worn twice in the month. Are you kidding me?
2) Getting ready for work in the morning became a breeze. I wasted no time looking for “something” to wear. All my outfits were organized in a row and all I had to do was pick the next one in line.
3) At the end of the 30 days I was able to part with additional items from my closet that needed to leave. In editing my wardrobe, I became like a surgeon with a razor sharp scalpel cutting away any excess items that needed to go.
I found that there were certain pieces I was planning to wear during the 30 days which just weren’t working for me and I knew it was time to release them. I donated items to Goodwill and gave them my blessing to bring someone else joy and thanked them for showing me more clearly who I am now.
Good tip: Anything or anyone that we release from our lives, thank them for the gifts they brought into your life by showing you who you are, where you need to grow and who you want to be.
Although there were many other life lessons learned during the three times I have completed the 30DWC, perhaps one of the most profound for me was that letting go of clothing can serve as a metaphor for life. Letting go of other things in life opens the way for new beginnings and allows space for the universe to put new opportunities and people in our life.
The past few months have been a bit of a whirlwind for me in that vein. Many things have changed, ended or been released. Some of those endings were painful, even. But I have trust that the space opened from all that “loss” is going to be filled with more adventure, fun, and love in service to my highest good.
As I await these new adventures, however, I am embarking on my fourth “30 Day Wardrobe Challenge”! Follow me on Instagram to see all new outfits along with insights and fashion tips…. You’ll also get to see every scarf I own and that alone is worth the price of tea in China!
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