The Synergy Game - A Journey From Death to Life
The Synergy Game - A Journey From Death to Life
Chapter 16 - Styled For Myself: Embracing Self-Love Through the Power of Personal Style
This is my book The Synergy Game.
I am serialising it here. Each chapter will be available for everyone to read because, after all, that’s why I’ve written it, to help others, to share what has helped me to rebuild my life. Paying members have access to the audio version also and extra content I share, poetry and insights from writing the book and rebuilding my life.
Chapter 16 - Styled For Myself: Embracing Self-Love Through the Power of Personal Style
"Fashion is about dressing according to what’s fashionable. Style is more about being yourself."
Oscar de la Renta
You know that scene in Eat Pray Love when Julia Roberts is in a boutique with a friend, and she's looking at a beautiful sexy nightdress, and you can see she is sad because her marriage has ended, and she's thinking she has no one to wear it for?
Her friend turns to her and says, 'Buy it for yourself', and she does because we see her in Italy in the apartment she's staying in, and she's bought herself some wonderful things to eat and is wearing the nightdress.
For herself! Just to feel pretty and sexy and beautiful.
Don't underestimate the power of that. Of looking good for yourself.
In the two years before I left my husband, I spent hours, countless effort and money in so many attempts to get him to notice me again.
You see, he did used to. He used to tell me all the time that I was beautiful, he noticed what I wore or if I changed my hair. He would even notice if I bought a new lipstick. Then, suddenly, I became invisible.
I thought it was because we had been together for so long, or that it was because I was becoming middle aged, entering my 50s, things were not as trim and perky as they once were!
I thought it was that I was getting old. I felt unseen and unwanted. I bought new clothes, new underwear, changed my hair, and on and on.
When I left, I suddenly realised that I didn't have to worry any more about what he thought of what I was wearing or how my hair looked.
I don't mean I didn't bother, I mean, for the first time in a long time, I was dressing for myself. I was looking in the mirror and liking what I saw, not wondering what he would think or wondering if he'd notice my new dress or that my hair and makeup looked good.
I saw myself properly, as just me. It was as if someone had turned the light on, and I could see clearly.
I wasn't old and washed up. I still looked young for my age. My hair was nice, and my body wasn't bad at all, considering I was 53 and had given birth to two children.
Incidentally, now, after over a year of yoga, I like it even more. I see how strong it is and I have an appreciation for it like I've never had before.
Once I could see myself clearly, and I only had myself to think about, and please, I started to experiment with clothes and buy things I hadn't before.
For the first time, I wanted to look good for myself. To look in the mirror and say, yes, I like you, I like your hair, I like the clothes you've chosen today, and I like the way you've done your makeup.
It was important to feel good about the way I looked. When a marriage breaks up because of betrayal by one partner, the other partner is bound to question why and feel very lacking in self- confidence.
What I realised, though, was that it was not me, it wasn't because I looked old or ugly. It was just something that happened. I knew it was important for my self-confidence to look after myself to be the best version of me I could be. Not to 'let myself go'.
Plus, a great motivation was my two daughters. Right from the start, I wanted to show them what a strong woman is. How a strong woman acts, how she lives. How she rebuilds. This included looking after myself.
I've always loved clothes and shoes and everything girly. I've always loved nice underwear, although for a long time I bought it only to wear for my husband, not for myself. It was saved for special occasions.
One sad day, when I was feeling sorry for myself and having a Netflix and sofa day, I happened to rewatch Eat Pray Love and saw that scene. I thought, why not? I can do that, too. I can buy things for myself, to make me feel good. It was like a revelation, something I'd never thought of doing before.
I bought a beautiful set of lingerie in a pretty red. When I got home and tried it on, I felt good. Not because I was wearing it to impress someone else, to look sexy for a man. I felt good because I felt sexy, and it was all for me. To impress myself.
Without discussing any of this with my daughters as it wasn't really a conversation I wanted to have with them, my youngest brought me back the most wonderful gift on one of her UK trips.
She had found a gorgeous vintage kimono in a shop in Oxford. She said she could imagine me wearing it, drinking my tea, and writing as I do in the mornings. It was perfect. It was in shades of salmon pink and red and went perfectly with a beautiful red silk nightdress I had bought.
I copied Julia Roberts and wore them together, eating a delicious meal and sipping a glass of wine. I felt like Zelda Fitzgerald or Daisy Buchanan. I felt beautiful; I felt invincible.
I don't think she ever realised how much that gift meant. It made me feel like a woman, and I looked at myself in the mirror and realised that I could do this.
I could rebuild and be strong. I could actually have a life again.
I read a book a few years ago about colour therapy. It was interesting to learn what the different colours do for your moods and what it means when drawn to certain colours.
For many years, I had dressed in dark colours. Always black underwear and mostly black and navy in my wardrobe, with some creams and greys thrown in for variety.
Suddenly, I was drawn to bright colours. I bought a red jumper, then a green one. I bought a beautiful deep red dressing gown, but before I had stuck to black usually.
It was as if my world was expanding via colour. I bought a pink t-shirt. I think it was the first pink thing I'd owned in many years! Spring arrived, and I bought a red dress and then a purple one. What was happening?
After not being seen for so long, suddenly, I wanted to be noticed. I wanted to feel confident. I didn't want to feel like I was someone to be pitied, someone that others feel sorry for. No, I wanted to be someone who people look at and think she looks good, she looks happy, she looks after herself.
I found that looking my best, just for myself, lifted my mood. On days when I woke up with a heavy, sad feeling I started to 'dress up'. I would often choose a dress, beautiful matching underwear, put makeup on and do my hair.
It didn't matter whether I was going out or having a day at home. It always made me feel better. To look in the mirror and like myself, helped me to change my mindset from "poor me, my husband cheated on me" to "what an idiot, look at what he's missing"!
Now, at first, I must admit that saying things like that out loud to myself in the mirror made me wonder if I'd finally lost it completely. But like anything, if you hear it often enough, you believe it.
It's all part of falling in love with yourself. This realisation came late in life, and I wish so much I had been taught it earlier.
The more I love myself, the more I have to give to others, and the more fully I can give of myself to others. It's self-care, self-respect, self-confidence and rebuilding myself.
It's been part of finding out who I am. After being with, living with, someone else for so long. Being so close to someone, loving them, wanting to please them, I had lost myself along the way.
I needed to be free to be me, but first, I had to find out who the hell me was!
I became the me I was so many years ago. But actually, that's not quite true. I became a truer version of me. Free of pleasing anyone, parents, partner or friends. Free of religious restrictions. For the first time in my life, it was all about me.
But that was just the beginning. I needed to know myself a lot deeper than that. I needed to know what I wanted for the rest of my life, what my goals were and what my core values were now. Which led me to my next healing tool, study.
Previous Chapter - Words As Anchors: The Transformative Power of Quotes in Life's Storms
Next Chapter - Lifelong Learner: The Path of Self-Discovery Through Study
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