Maintain wardrobe health – speed detox 3
We all want a beautiful organised wardrobe full of clothes we love and want to wear.
The reality often is not like that.
We go to our wardrobes and are filled with overwhelm. We pull out clothes we love, but don’t fit into anymore and feel frustration. We look at the expensive jacket we bought on a whim and have barely worn. We feel anxious that we spent so much money unwisely.
An end to wardrobe shame
But it doesn’t have to end there. Wardrobe shame is not forever. You don’t have to live with wardrobe shame for a day longer. It is really easy to move from feeling dreadful each time your open the door and peer in, to feeling in control, relaxed and happy each time you look at your clothes.
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If you haven’t read the previous articles on speed detoxing, they are here.
In the first, we address how to cut overwhelm. Essential help to clear out your closet
In the second, we look at creating a wardrobe that suits you, How to be the star of your wardrobe.
Today, in the third of this three part post series, we are taking a look at how to maintain what you have created.
The Working Frocks System of maintaining wardrobe health
When you sort your wardrobe out, you’ve walked through a new door. Now you need to close the door behind you and not turn around and go back.
To do that you need to be in touch with the decisions you have made and remember how you want to look.
Where to go from here. Next steps.
If you have read the previous two posts in this series you might have started to make some new decisions. You may want a different look. To change your style. You might want to make a new start in your life and are going to use clothes to convey that new chapter in your life.
It’s important to be in touch with the decisions you have made. That is how lasting change comes about. Don’t waste your time reading and then forgetting. Instead, read and implement.
At Working Frocks, we have a system for maintaining wardrobe health.
What we have learned is that change is great. There is a lot of energy around change. Quite often we believe that it is the energy that we put into change that will transform our lives. What we discovered is that it is what comes after the initial change that is the most important. This is the effort it takes on an ongoing basis to maintain your wardrobe health. The day in, day out, small steps.
I know this so well myself. I love change and strategy and ideas and creativity. What makes creativity and strategy effective, though is implementation. You might be involved in projects at work which require implementation, routine and habit. They are not the most fascinating topics to discuss. However, they are exactly what you need to succeed in your project.
Your wardrobe health is exactly the same.
Wardrobe health is tied to your mental health.
The importance of wardrobe health
The reason why your wardrobe may have been disorganised before may have been because you just never learned how to be neat and tidy. And you can learn that. Your wardrobe never needs to be disorganised again if that is why.
Most probably, though, your wardrobe fell into neglect or chaos because of what was going on in your mind.
If you have been through a time of scarcity you might have started to hoard. For example, hoard furniture, or food. Or clothes.
If you have had a major body change such as having a baby or losing or gaining a significant amount of weight for whatever reason. So you may only be wearing a small percentage of your clothes.
Or you may be super busy in your life and have neglected your wardrobe for that reason.
Managing your wardrobe is a mind activity.
What is going on in your wardrobe is what is going on in your mind.
What you are thinking
I know this myself. My life is in the process of changing right now. In various areas. All good.
This is how I am thinking:
I don’t have the right clothes to wear.
I’m only wearing a small percentage of my clothes.
I don’t like what I’m wearing…
….even further…
I don’t like my hair (not helped by all hairdressers being shut due to the global pandemic)
I think I look dreadful – I accept that his one in particular is probably at least 50% in my mind, and not true. Nonetheless it’s an indication of what is going on in my mind.
Which is: change; uncertainty; acceleration; fear.
What we at Working Frocks, help you do, is manage your life so that whatever you are going through, your mind and your wardrobe are on an even keel.
Small, non-sexy habits are they way to a happy life. You can have sexy habits too. But the implementation of them is sometimes not sexy. Our wardrobes are an intimate part of our lives. To be totally engaged with what we are wearing and how we are organising that space, is to be in control of your life. That’s what we want for you.
Get into self love, and out of self loathing
No more beating yourself up, remember. And no more self accusatory conversations with yourself.
You have also learned about how our emotions are wrapped up in our wardrobes. Sentimenality and guilt can stop us being decisive about what clothing to keep and which clothing may be better by going to the second hand shop.
To go back to my examples above, let’s look at how I am thinking when I speak the above sentences out loud When I say, “I don’t have the right clothes to wear” and “I don’t like what I’m wearing”. How exactly am I feeling?
It’s not hard to see that thoughts like that make me feel pretty dreadful.
Imagine the situation now for yourself.
How are you thinking about your clothes? Yourself? How you look?
How you are thinking will affect everything.
Part of how we teach an ongoing wardrobe management system is by looking at mind management. This is what will keep your wardrobe looking great. But it is also what will keep you look and feeling amazing every day.
Make your decisions stick
Back to the decisions you have made.
It is remembering quite clearly what decisions you have made that will help reinforce these new steps that you have taken.
For example, you may have decided, in the cleanout phase, that you are not going to wear jeans any more. What you are going to do is wear slim, straight black or navy trousers instead.
Wearing those jeans, though, is a habit. Quite a strong habit. If you are not determined to wear jeans because xxxxxxx and to wear black straight trousers because yyyyyyyyyy, then before long you will fish the jeans out from the bin or charity pile and wear them again.
So, be in touch with the decisions you have made.
Making your decisions stick and knowing what’s going on in your brain are part of a healthy system for ongoing wardrobe maintenance.
Your life will improve exponentially when you wear clothes that you love and that make you feel amazing. We should demand nothing less of our clothes. They are here to serve us
We look forward to seeing you as a member of Working Frocks.
Have a great day,
Sarah
