Dress for the day you want to have
Here's a stupid-simple thing I've been thinking about since I said it out loud on my own podcast: what you put on your body in the morning is a decision about who you're about to be that day. Not in a woo-woo, manifestation way. In a very literal, "your shoulders are actually different in a starched shirt than they are in yesterday's leggings" way.
I noticed it on myself twice in one week, in opposite directions, and both times it was the right call.
First time: I went to the gym in the morning, and then I had a facial booked, so I just... stayed in my gym clothes. Didn't get dressed for the facial. Why would I — I wanted them to scrub my face, not admire my outfit. Then I had a couple of calls where I could show up with a fresh face and nobody cared what was below the shoulders, and then I had a bunch of errands. So I stayed in athleisure all day. And it was so comfortable, and it was so obviously the right call, that I actually caught myself thinking, "wait, this was the right call" — because usually I don't feel that settled in sweats.
Second time: same week, I had a full day of podcast recording, including an important conversation with my co-host. I was home. Nobody was going to see me but her, on a screen. And I still put on a crisp white shirt that I'd had dry-cleaned with extra starch, because I'd been saving it. I wanted to feel a certain way going into that conversation, and I knew exactly what would get me there.
Neither of those was about being "dressed up" or "dressed down." Both were about matching the outfit to the actual day I was trying to have.
The dress just tells the truth about what you actually believe
I have a friend, Emily Shimwell, who lives in a small logging town outside Vancouver — the kind of place where everyone's in athleisure, all day, every day. She works at her local Starbucks. And she shows up in a floor-length dress. Not for an event. For a regular Tuesday shift. People used to ask her where she was going. She got over answering that question a long time ago. She's told me flat out: "wear the damn dress." She's even lent people dresses with the tags still on, because to her, saving something for later isn't saving it — it's just letting it sit there doing nothing for you.
My friend and co-host Lauren admitted something similar recently, and I don't think she's alone in it: she has a drawer of "good" underwear she doesn't wear, because she's saving it. She'll put on the pair with a hole in it before she reaches for the nice one — because she's "just working from home," or "just around the house." Meanwhile the good stuff sits there, tags basically still on, waiting for an occasion that isn't today.
I get it. I do the same thing with clothes I've been "saving." But here's what's actually happening when you do that: you're deciding, quietly, that today doesn't count. That you don't need to feel good today, because today isn't the important one. And then you wonder why an ordinary Tuesday feels like nothing.
This is about showing up as a certain person.
There's real research behind this — it's not just a vibe. What you wear changes how you carry yourself, which changes how you show up in a room, or on a call, or in an email you're about to send. If you're sending something that needs confidence behind it, and you're doing it in the outfit you'd wear to nap, you're working against yourself a little. Not because sweatpants are bad. Because you didn't choose them on purpose for that day.
So the version of this I actually believe now isn't "dress for the job you want" — that's dated, and it's also not quite right, because plenty of days aren't about the job at all. It's: dress for the day you want to have. Want to feel like the fun mom who's rolling around on the grass playing soccer? Wear the thing that lets you actually do that without worrying about it. Want to feel like a boss walking into an important conversation? Wear the shirt you've been saving. Want to feel like yourself on a random Wednesday with nothing on the calendar? Then decide what that person wears, and put it on.
Wear the good underwear. I mean that completely literally, and I also don't just mean that at all.
Want more of this?
If you want to listen to me and Lauren yap about ull-on pants, and other random things that we have found on the internet, tune in to this yap episode. We literally had no agenda, just two friends yapping about what’s actually on our minds.
This episode also covers a TikTok dance neither of us can do, a home organization trick called "frictionless access" that changed how I store literally everything, a mysterious Keds order neither of us will take credit for, and a fairly wild shopping-app scandal. It's a lot. Give it a listen.
