How to Embrace Your Authentic Self - #82

How do we move forward with our DIY projects, decorating our house (or even the choices we make with our appearance!) without worrying how it's perceived by others? In today's episode, you're going to talk about the poignant experiences that happened this week to me and how I came to the realization that we must embrace our authentic self, no matter whether its the decisions we make when decorating our house or how we move about in the world.

Have you ever felt the need to explain away or make excuses for your decisions, whether it was the way you decorated your home...the way you dressed or styled yourself...or any of the decisions that you've made? What happened? I want to hear all about it! Click to send me an email or send the email to serena@thriftdiving.com. Follow me on Instagram @ThriftDiving to share your story!

PROJECTS MENTIONED

• BEFORE & AFTER: French Provincial Vanity Makeover
• How to Make DIY Roller Shades

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Transcript

Heeeyy! I’m Serena Appiah from ThriftDiving.com, which is a podcast, blog, and YouTube channel that helps YOU decorate, improve, and maintain your home w/ paint, power tools, thrift stores, WITHOUT sacrificing your budget, the environment, or style! 

Welcome to Episode #82 of the Thrift Diving Podcast! Today we’re talking about embracing your authentic self and style. You know how I like talking about relevant topics to what's going on during the week, right? Well, sometimes, it's because of this podcast that I'm allowed to sit and think about how my week went so I can think about what I'll talk about on the podcast. And sometimes that thinking time allows me to link together experiences that I might never have otherwise seem the references to one another.

But this week was interesting. Today, in fact, is what sparked the topic of this today's podcast, but then I saw that it was a common theme throughout my entire week. You see, an older woman today; she must have been in her 60s, at the grocery store told me, "You have beautiful legs." 

Let me rewind this story a bit and share that she and I were in line together at a salad bar in the grocery store. She started asking me about the salad I was ordering: Can you finish that whole salad in one sitting? How long have you been a vegetarian? Are your kids vegetarian? I shared with her that no, the salad was huge and is usually split up in two meals...And by the way, if you live near the College Park, Maryland area, you have to stop into My Organic Market, otherwise known as "MOMs" in order to get one of their salads or meals from Naked Lunch, the fresh food counter in MOMs. You get a TON of food for super cheap! 

Anyhow, we chatted about my vegetarian experience of stopping meat 20 years ago and how easy I found that to be, along with raising vegetarian children. We said our goodbyes, and I got in line. While checking out, she approached me and asked, "How old are you?"

I responded with, "I'm 44." 

She then told me, "You have beautiful legs." She proceeded to pull up her pant leg and briefly flash me her leg, full of blue-green stripes that looks like tiger strips. She quickly pulled it down and told me the story of giving birth to her son and how she believed that caused the varicose veins, and how she had considered getting laser surgery. She learned that laser surgery will make them become invisible but that it will kill the vein, and that she didn't want to do that kind of damage to her body.

(Honestly, I was never sure how laser vein surgery worked, but I looked this up, and it says: "Laser heat damages a vein, which makes scar tissue form. This scar tissue closes the vein. A closed vein loses its source of blood and dies. After a year or two, the vein is likely to disappear."

I had shown the woman my own problematic vein in my right leg (which I never liked; it's been there for years). I told her that, I, too, had always considered laser surgery an option if the veins got worse.

Anyhow, after talking to this woman and realizing that the laser surgery literally kills the vein, I am doubtful that I would ever want to get that done. I don't know....I'd have to research that a little more and see what the risk factors would be.

But at that time, I confessed to this woman, "You know, at the beginning of summer, I made a goal to wear shorts again! I have always been embarrassed of my legs, which I felt looked like 'chicken legs.' I've lost and maintained about 14 pounds of weight loss and I was determined to wear shorts again instead of hiding my legs. So your compliment is sooooo appreciated, you have no idea!"

I proceeded to pay for my groceries and walk out of the store. In the parking lot, as she was packing up her groceries into her car, she continued talking to me across the parking lot, once again saying how she was considering the surgery, but she just wasn't sure. I told her that she should just rock the shorts and not be concerned about the varicose veins and embrace them!

She and I shared a smile, a laugh, and a wave, and went on our way.

But this interaction left me thinking about embracing our authentic self. I had always found it difficult to embrace my authentic self, which is why I previously wore hot, long jeans to cover up my own legs, afraid of how they would appear to the world. Today when I pulled on my super short Lucky jeans cut-off, I thought that I had finally come to that actualization of acceptance. (In fact, there are the jeans that had a huge rip right near the butt crease and for years I swore I would patch up these jeans, which were my favorite. But instead, recently I just decided to cut them off into Daisy Dukes. Some of you know what Daisy Dukes are, right? You know her from the Dukes of Hazzard, but those of you who like my genre of rap music, you know Daisy Dukes as super short cut off jean shorts! In fact, there was a song by the 69 Boys: "Come on, baby! Kick them Daisies! Let at them girls with the Daisy Dukes on! I want you to look at them girls with the Daisy Dukes on! Everybody!"  

Well, that is what I was wearing today: Daisy Dukes. Yes.....me....at the age of 44, was wearing some Daisy Dukes. And I felt goooooood. I felt firm, tight, well proportioned, toned, and I felt good. Nothing was hanging out, no slippage. 

But even before I left the house, I second-guessed myself. The kids and I were going to go over to my mother-in-law's house, and I would have put money on her calling me out in her African accent: "Ahhhh....you want to wear short shorts, huh?" I considered changing, to avoid the questions, to avoid my husband looking at me funny or any comments he might have said.

I was not embracing these shorts as much as I thought I would.

I felt a little awkward walking around in my mother-in-law's house, thinking that she was looking at my butt any time I walked past her. I'm sure she was....But she didn't say anything, thankfully. But I was questioning if I should have worn that, if I looked too inappropriate, if behind my back she was "tsk tsk"ing. (By the way, she and I have a good relationship, not that typically "mother-in-law-daughter-in-law" relationship). But still, I worried about what she would think and say. Not so worried that I changed, but worried enough that I started to feel a little uncomfortable and "aware" of myself and my choice.

Afterwards, I went to the grocery store and that's where the older woman complimented my legs, reaffirming that I can, and I did, make the right choice to rock those Daisy Dukes. 

But when I got home, I pondered those interactions today. Why did I still feel like I needed external validation that the choice I made was the right choice? Why couldn't I have just worn the shorts and felt good in them, no matter whether someone else affirmed how they looked or not?

Which then made me think about the external affirmations that we need for so many other things in our life, including:

• how we decorate our home,
• how we raise our children,
• how we express ourselves,
• the career we choose for ourselves
• ...the list goes on.

In fact, let's talk about how we decorate our home. This includes furniture makeovers, paint colors we choose, pictures we hang, even where we purchase our home! So many of these choices we allow others and what we feel they will say (or actually do say!) to dictate what we do. And if we continue on with our decision, we don't embrace that decision with our full chest. Instead, we rationalize to others...explain...make excuses...all in hopes of others seeing it "our way" and give us a pass or a nod of approval for making the choice that we did.

For example, just this week, I have been working on a sewing cabinet makeover. It's this $40 sewing cabinet that I picked up about 10 years ago from the thrift store. It's oak veneer, was in decent condition, but nothing fun about it. It's useful, but just blah. Minwax is sponsoring it and wanted me to choose some of their products to make it over. I chose this solid stain that can be tinted with over 200 colors. It has more coverage over wood, but still allows some of the wood to show through. Well, I chose PINK.

Yep....pink. The same color palette that I chose for a vintage French Provincial vanity several years ago and posted on YouTube, only to get told by some, "OMG, you ruined that antique!" First of all, 1980 is not an antique. Secondly, it wasn't ruined; I actually improved it because it was just some cast-off at the thrift store that someone didn't want. By the way, I'll include the link down below and you can see how it turned out for yourself. That video has gotten over 3M views on YouTube since I posted it 4 years ago!

So this week as I started on the sewing cabinet, I had some doubts swirling in my head. I thought things like:

• People are going to hate pink.
• This video won't get many views.
• This shed is going to look too juvenile, like a daycare, or something, with all this pink!

While I kept moving forward, I still held onto those doubts that the direction that I was going wasn't going to be good enough.

But the truth is that I absolutely love pink. It's feminine....and pretty...and makes me feel light-hearted inside. The pinks and blues, pastels, and floral patterns that are starting to emerge in my shed (or should I call it, my "studio") is what I have always envisioned being my "happy place." Growing up, although I was a tomboy, there was a part of me that was still very girly, that liked boys, that wanted to be frilly and feminine. I wanted a bedroom that was frilly and feminine, too, which I didn't have. I don't think it was even decorated. LOL. It was just a simple bedroom. I remember always being envious of my younger cousin, Danielle's, bedroom. She had a pretty canopy bed--remember those??--with the ruffles on the top of the canopy. Everything was pink. And she had buckets of toys, lots of things to discover. I loved it! And I remember feeling like my own bedroom was nothing like that, although I wanted it to be.

Years ago when I was maybe 23 or 24, I made a list of "Things I Want to Do Before I Die," which some of them were more like "guidelines" or just a "Wish List." And one of the things I wrote down was that I wanted to have a sunroom with lots of pastels and bright light, where I could watch my favorite feel-good show, The Golden Girls. When I finally get my "she shed," with the 6 windows and 4 skylights, where it's light, bright, airy and makes me happy, I could only envision it with those pastels, and florals, with splashes of vibrant colors with a white, crisp clean backdrop of walls. That's why I chose those pretty florals for the DIY roller shades, which you can see in the tutorial link down in the show notes. 

So although my shed/studio is turning into--very slowly--the pretty, bright space I have always craved, even from my childhood, I still feel a bit awkward showing parts of it to friends and family, and even to you, the Thrift Diving community. I wonder how many people will be thinking, "Oh, that just looks childish and juvenile." In fact, I showed one of my male friends a picture of the pretty file cabinet makeover that I just posted recently, and his comment was something to the effect, "Wow, that looks great! It would look nice in a kids room." Sometime to that effect. He wasn't being a jerk. He really liked the project. But.....well...it was blue on the outside and pink on the inside. It looked like something that could hold diapers! LOL

But how do we move forward with our projects....with decorating our house....decorating our office...or even displaying--I don't know!--a ceramic pig collection without worrying how it's being perceived by others? How do we wear what we want without a genuine care about how it's going to be perceived by others even though we think we look amazing in it?

There's a big difference between what's appropriate (for example, not wearing a swimsuit to a black tie event; you know what I mean) and what's no appropriate. But what I mean is the fine line between what others expect of you and what you want for yourself.

My only advice here is to push the envelop and give that thing a shot that feels authentic to you. It could be your love of antiques but your sister thinks your antiques are "tacky" or "dirty." It could be the fear of your mother-in-law commenting on an outfit that you absolutely love but she thinks is too "young" for you. It could be a painted piece of furniture that you did that you're proud of but your Facebook friends are all saying you "ruined" it.

And then the next part is to embrace it. Don't make any apologies or feel you have to explain yourself. If your sister comments that your antique desk doesn't fit in with any of your decor, you tell her, "I think it looks amazing here next to my bed."

If your mother-in-law makes a "tsk tsk" at the Daisy Dukes, you say, "I know...don't my legs look great?!"

When your Facebook friends tell you that you ruined that piece of wood furniture with paint, you tell them, "I had the best time painting this piece of furniture!"

When your friend tells you your project looks great.....for an infants room....you tell him it makes you smile because it turned out so awesome!

It's not about insulting them for their insult (whether intentional or not). It's about waving away any negativity and highlighting the beauty of that which you love.

It's about embracing your authentic self.

It's about making no excuses for your decisions or feeling like you have to explain why you made that decision.

It might feel uncomfortable for us at first, but the more we practice saying, "Because it makes me happy" when our decisions are questioned (or when we fear we will be questioned), is how we start to embrace our authentic self.

So how about you?

Have you ever felt the need to explain away or make excuses for your decisions, whether it was the way you decorated your home...the way you dressed or styled yourself...or whatever the example? What happened? And did this message resonate with you during the episode? I want to hear all about it. Email me serena@thriftdiving.com, or hit me up on Instagram @ thriftdiving.

Just a quick update on my mini-split! For those of you following my "she shed" updates, remember I told you in the last episode that I have been waiting on a Mitsubishi mini split for 11 weeks?? These supply chain issues have been horrific. Well, I decided I was going to put my "impatiently waiting" skills to work. I took to the internet and found another supplier outside of my HVAC guy's supplier that has an indoor unit about 4 hours away from me! When I did my research, I found that the indoor unit for my mini split is back-ordered until Oct. 26th! No way in the world I wanted to wait another 8-10 weeks for this mini split. I've been dealing with the portable AC, which has been working ok since I got the skylight shades installed. But it still gets up to 85-90 degrees on a really hot sunny, humid day. That's uncomfortable to work in. So I did my own research, found another supplier that actually had one in stock, and my HVAC guy did the ordering. Now, I have to drive 4 hours to pick it up. I'm actually looking forward to this little one-day road trip! The trek is going straight through my hometown of Hagerstown, MD, so on the way back, I'll stop off and hang out with my mom for a couple of hours for a short, impromptu "Mother Daughter" day. 

And on Wednesday I'll be heading down to Orlando for the FinCon conference, which is a conference for financially bloggers. While that's not my niche, per se, I've always loved this conference because it's with people who love money: investing, real estate investing, saving, being thrifty, retiring early with financial freedom, being debt free.....This is my tribe of people and relative to Thrift Diving. I'll be back on Sunday so there may not be an episode this coming week, but we will see! Perhaps I'll record on my phone and upload. Could be a great way to get an interview with someone at the conference, maybe with some money-saving tips or investing tips that you might enjoy. Stay tuned for that.

Alright I hope you have enjoyed episode #82! Be sure to come back again for Episode #83. I'll see YOU next episode!