New Year, New Attitude
So, it’s the beginning of the year and everywhere I look people are committing to new behaviors and wellness routines, and generally setting goals for themselves. My current goal: confidence.
Confidence, of course, comes from within. But fashion, for all its faults, can play a huge positive role in boosting your self-esteem. Something as basic as a belt can change the way you feel in your own skin.
Power Dressing
A belt is for confidence. It’s a nudge out the door. It’s for acknowledging within oneself a dual nature and celebrating that fact. It’s for exploring, experimenting. It is the power accessory.
It doesn’t matter what kind of day I’m gearing up for, I feel more up to the task when wearing a belt. This mysterious accessory has such a strange sway over me. The slight sensation of a strap reminds me I am present in a highly capable body. It reminds me to stay rooted to the most basic things.
Something special about wearing a belt, I’ve noticed, is that it plays up both one’s masculine and feminine qualities. It has utilitarian roots, and is often made out of harder materials, which gives the wearer the sense of strength and stability (traditionally masculine) and, contrastingly, they often dramatize a particularly feminine silhouette that always makes me feel like I’m gliding through the universe on a palanquin, a la Cleopatra.
The demands of a belt are real—posture, awareness of the figure—and they can do a lot to make you feel grounded, assertive, and focused. A lot of us know that you can change your mood with a simple sartorial tweak. To that end, the considerable psychic weight of wearing a belt is not to be underestimated. It’s like changing out of a pair of heels and into some sneakers. Don’t you feel like you can run around the block several times? That you have never been so happy to be on flat ground? When I wear a belt I feel this same kind of relief, of symbolic even ground.
It might sound like an exaggeration to say that wearing a belt makes me smarter, more confident, and happier, but I tell you, dear reader, I know it to be true.
We've added a bunch of new belts to our online store. Check them out here: http://store.mbaer.com/collections/belts