Wearing "Ugly" Clothes // Finding Freedom

Whenever my mom visits me in Tallahassee or I go home on school breaks, my mom and I like to be lazy, cozy, vegetables. We do projects around the house, marathon guilty pleasure TV shows, rearrange furniture, cook big dinners, and just generally be homebodies. Even though we do accomplish things and have a life sometimes we don't change out of our pajamas until late afternoon. Or if we do get dressed we wear comfy-around-the-house pants and old t shirts. And we rarely do our hair and make-up? HA! Jokes.

This kind of relaxed-I-don't-care kind of style reminds me so much of when I was little and would just put on whatever I wanted to wear and played around my room or in the backyard all day.

My family is a big DIY family so there was always a project going on. This inevitably led to multiple trips to the hardware store, craft store, grocery store, etc. And we would just go looking all kinds of messy and comfy. I'm talking mismatched socks, paint-splattered pants, and sweaty faces.

My mom and I would always joke that we would probably run into everyone important that we ever knew ever when we looked like that. SO we had a plan- We'd go run the errand "Incognito"! That means that we pretended that we didn't know anyone and if we saw someone we knew we'd create a diversion and "hide".

We also are really good at acting like we are having a really important, in-depth conversation with dramatic facial expressions and hand gestures so that if anyone saw us they would think "Oh, they are having an in-depth, serious conversation right now and I better not interrupt them". (Sidebar- this technique works very well for avoiding buying Girl Scout cookies if you are always getting tempted by the thin mints...)

Now I don't remember ever having to actually use the plan, but it gave me a kind of freedom. I could do whatever I wanted and look however I wanted because no one I knew would see. We would act silly or make side trips to other stores and errands because we were on a roll and just goofing around in our lazy clothes.

This summer has been the ULTIMATE lazy summer and it has been perfect. I can't tell you the last time I wore for real make-up or a real "OOTD". I'm feeling like when I would go "incognito" when I was little. I realized that it is just that I kinda don't care anymore what random people in the store think about what I wear. Or people I do know for that matter. Try letting go and going incognito sometimes. It is very freeing to let go of what everyone thinks! It's totally OK if you like to wear make-up every day or most days and like to be more put together in your downtime- I even have those days too! Do YOUR thing! Whatever makes you feel comfortable.

I recently purchased a pair of Tevas. (This is relevant I swear). They are not the most fAsHIon foRwARd shoes every or super trendy, but they are summery and comfy and FUN! Whenever I wear them, which has become every day + walking the dog, I feel like the anti-fashionista version of going incognito.

The moral of the Teva story is that a silly pair of shoes has helped me let go of putting together a perfect outfit for everything I do or always being on trend. Something I used to spend waaaay too much time stressing over.

To piggy-back off of my post about Bell's Palsy, I wanted to talk again about how you are not defined by and should not define others by what they are wearing. And realizing this can give you freedom!