chip off the block

A recurring theme that has been coming up in my life and the blogosphere lately is the idea of loving yourself. If you haven't yet, go read Moorea's post about her experience with her painful youth and coming to a place where she loves herself for who she is. I think that this is such an important thing for us as women and people in general to wrestle with. Everyone has hurtful experiences in their past which affect them now. The degree to which these experiences were hurtful or how much they affect their present selves varies from person to person, but we all have insecurities and have been teased or just felt inferior at one point or another. I feel like it's just a part of growing up and learning to be a confident person without needing other people to tell your you're awesome. As long as you need other people to give you your worth, you will forever be in debt to them, needing to please them to get that affirmation. As RuPaul says, "If you can't love yourself, how the hell you gonna love somebody else?"

I'm super thankful for my family and parent and the confidence they instilled in me. I can only hope that when I have children, I can give them the same sense of confidence and security. To my parents, I was always beautiful and always could do anything I put my mind to. I'm also thankful that my mom let me wear whatever the hell I wanted to, even when it was ridiculous or weird, and I definitely went through some odd sartorial phases (including a phase when I was in 4th & 5th grade when all I would wear was sweatpants, sneakers and baggy t-shirts...gross. There's photographic proof, too. I should find it and make a post of my worst outfit moments as a kid). But I'm glad my Mom let me be me. She never made me feel like I was ugly when I wore weird outfits and had huge, frizzy, tangly, uncooperative brown hair and I think it taught me that no matter what I looked like, I was still incomparably beautiful to her. I didn't need to tame my crazy hair or wear cute outfits to have value or beauty. It's a little bit early for a mother/father's day post, but I think that every time I look in the mirror and feel beautiful, it's in large part thanks to my parents. It's amazing to me that parents have this incredible power to instill such overwhelming confidence in our children. I'm not a parent yet, though someday I hope to be and I think that is the one thing that is very intimidating. The power to shape another human being and give them a positive (or negative) self image is quite daunting.

vintage dress/courtesy of ToBeDetermined :: shoes/forever 21 :: hat/claire's :: necklace/handmade

Sorry for the lack of outfit posts lately. The rain has been a bit of a bummer lately and I just haven't gotten up the energy to go outside in the soggy coldness. Usually I'm really excited to take photos, but lately it just hasn't been my cup of tea. Luckily it wasn't too cold and wet yesterday and I got back some of my outfit-photo-mojo. I've been really trying to experiment with different skirt/dress lengths lately. It's been fun learning how to wear and style longer dresses.