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5 ways your wardrobe is affecting your quality of life- Psychology of Clothing

Writer's picture: Devanshi AroraDevanshi Arora

Updated: Oct 31, 2024

Women, I know you are busy! Busy building your lives, busy fulfilling your duties, busy trying to make it in your careers, busy being good daughters, moms and wives and juggling everything in between.


Amidst providing and nurturing for everyone around us we women sometimes forget to take care of ourselves. More often than not we put the lives and needs of our loved ones ahead of ours and in that well-meaning pursuit several aspects of OUR lives end up taking a back seat.


One such area is our wardrobe. I notice that much more because it is my area of work too.


psychology of clothing

What we wear has a profound impact on our lives, yet this aspect remains on the side-lines. We must remember that by taking care of ourselves we are able to take better care of others. As they say “you can’t pour from an empty cup”. So today I am here to remind you why you need to be mindful of what you wear because it deeply impacts your quality of life on a day to day basis.


Many of us don't realise that clothing holds more importance than just covering our body or making us look good. Clothing also it impacts our state of mind on a daily basis- this is called the psychology of clothing. You will hear people say phrases like “It does not matter what you wear” but the truth is that clothing has a visible and scientifically proven impact on us. And it first impacts us before anyone else and only then it ripples out to the people we meet. So the journey of its impact is from inwards to outwards, where it then impacts people’s perception of us.


So let us see 5 ways in which clothing impacts the quality of our life.



Confidence


Confident woman

Recall a day when you remember being very well dressed. Now try to remember how you felt that day? Was there a bounce in your step knowing that you looked your very best and the clothes on your back made you look smart?


Now recall the opposite- a day when you were not so well dressed and you met someone who didn’t expect to meet that day. How did you feel then? A little self-conscious, looking for a place to hide?


You are the same person but on two different days you felt entirely different just because of your appearance.


This shows that clothes have the capacity to make you look and feel great. They have the power to put you in a good or bad mood. Most importantly they have the power to alter your level of confidence you feel on a day-to-day basis.


Imagine feeling the confidence of the day you were well dressed EVERYDAY. What's stopping you from doing that? Doing this can help you change your perception of yourself also known as your self-image.



Focus


focussed woman

Again, try to recall a day when you were wearing an ill fitted shirt or an old pair of pants which has gotten tighter around the waist or which is uncomfortable at the crotch.


Do you remember struggling to manage your poorly fitted clothes more than normal? Adjusting the too low of a neckline, fidgeting with your waistband just to breath properly. I bet you were very conscious of the fact that they are coming in the way of you accomplishing anything that day.


And you may have wished you had picked something different to put on that morning. You might have felt very aware and concious, thinking if people can notice your discomfort. Because you are hyper aware of your discomfort.


What is happening is when you wear the wrong clothes for your body you are constantly distracted by them. You are not focussed on the important stuff be it at work or family time, whatever you are out to do. Clothes have the capacity to put you at ease so that you can focus better. You don’t just look and feel great you also perform better.



Perception management


image management

Whether you like it or not people make judgements about you based on how you appear to them, especially if you are meeting them for the first time. Based on your appearance they derive how educated you might be, what might be your financial situation, how good of a leader you might be, how good you might be at your work. These are called first impressions.


When you wear the right clothes for yourself you feel confident and that is the kind of energy you radiate when you interact with people around you. People subconsciously pick this confident energy from you which creates a positive impression in their minds about you. When you are dressed well, they start seeing you as the confident and focused person that you are. So, by choosing your clothes wisely you can define what impression you create on people’s mind on any given day.



Personal Brand


personal branding through clothes

Additionally, your clothes give you the capacity to create your own personal brand which is now more necessary than ever, given that you need to stand out more in a saturated market and everyone is present online. To stand out from the crowd you need to portray an image which serves you & your purpose. Personal branding can give you that needed edge over others by adding an X-factor.


You could be focused on gathering an online following or could be a new entrepreneur or just want to position yourself as an expert in your field, wearing the right clothes for your goal can help you create a sense of being a one-person brand.


I will give you my example here: I was a Fashion educator before becoming a Personal Stylist and I taught Fashion & styling to college level students.

On the days I went to teach- I wanted to appear Knowledgeable, Creative & Authoritative. So I chose to show up in clothes that communicated that message. By doing that I positioned myself as an expert in my field in front of not just students but also other faculty members and seniors in my field.


Opportunities


career opportunities

Lastly, the positive first impressions and/or your personal brand created on people’s minds, you begin to slowly create an image. People know you as a confident, capable, person who has so & so qualities (leadership, knowledge etc.). They know, like & trust you, and so they don’t hesitate to recommend you as soon as they get a chance to do it. They let other people know about you.

With the right kind of clothing & grooming you are able to create positive impressions on people which results in you getting better and bigger opportunities.

You get recommended for bigger projects, new initiatives or even romantic prospects. Its like marketing yourself.

So these were the 5 ways in which your clothing is affecting the quality of our life.


Let me know your thoughts around this topic in the comments.

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