Okay, I want to tell you a story about two fish. Stay with me because I think this might change the way you look at your closet tomorrow morning.
In 2005, the writer David Foster Wallace gave a commencement speech at Kenyon College. He told a story about two young fish swimming along when an older fish passes them going the opposite direction.
The older fish says, “Morning, boys. How’s the water?”
The two young fish keep swimming for a while until one finally looks at the other and says, “What the hell is water?”
HA! I love this story.
Because I think we all have our own version of water.
It’s the feeling you’ve been living in for so long that you don’t even notice it’s there anymore.
Maybe it’s a worry. Maybe it’s that nagging feeling that you’re behind, that you don’t have enough, that you’re not doing enough. Maybe it’s the Sunday “scaries”.
I call it your default.
And here’s what’s fascinating. Most of us didn’t consciously choose our default. We’ve just been swimming around in it for years.
But what if that feeling is making more decisions for you than you realize?
Including what you wear.
Think about it. When you wake up feeling invisible, what do you reach for? When you feel insecure, overwhelmed, or like you have nothing to prove to anybody because nobody’s looking anyway?
I’d bet your closet knows the answer.
Your default picks your outfit before you do.
Whoa, right?!
And here’s the beautiful thing. The minute you recognize your default, you have a choice.
You can say, “Oh, there you are again. That old feeling of not enough.”
And instead of letting it dress you, you get to decide something different.
Because the water you’ve been swimming in isn’t necessarily the water you have to stay in.
PUT ON Before you open your closet today, ask yourself one question: What’s my default?
Give that feeling a name. And then, just for fun, reach for one thing that feeling would NEVER have picked.
I’m curious: what’s the feeling you’ve been swimming in? Have you ever stopped to name it?
