When I woke up this morning I was thinking about couple of things - how to use clothes to be the version of you that you want to be - more broadly, how you can alter your physical surroundings to crete the reality that you want - to me, magic is the power to wield a narrative. what is magic if not creating the reality in your mind? What is creating the reality in your mind if not influencing yourself, influencing others, via wielding narrative. Look at [[Cadmus of Miletus]]. In myth, he was a Phoenician king who embarked on an epic quest to find his sistter after she was abducted by Zeus. On this quest, he avenged his people by slaying a dragon that killed them, planted the dragon's teeth, and an army sprung forth to fight for him. However, although it is unknown for certain, he is credited transporting the [[Phoenician alphabet]] to Greece, According to other ancient historical accounts, he created prose and designed certain letters of the Greek alphabet. - what if he was just some king who had top notch literacy, and his writing skills, allowed him to effectively organize his troops. - magic is the power to wield a narrative Coming back to clothes. I've thought at length about clothes the past few years since I left college, but didn't write much of it down. One of my UX bootcamp projects was closet organizer app, wrapped in the goal of encouraging people to be more intentional about clothing. Why? Once again, if magic is the power to wield a narrative, beyond the written world, clothing is one of the strongest ways to impress a narrative about who you are in someone's mind. You're wearing a uniform? You're a student, or a nurse, or in the army. You're wearing a suit. Well, it depends on context. But if you're on the subway, and it's 7AM, and you're wearing a suit, you're probably some sort of professional services worker, maybe accounting or banking or law. What kind of suit can tell us even more. Military uniforms would be a very interesting rabbit hole to go down #dough When I was young I struggled with clothing. I didn't really have control over what clothing I could wear, for one. And with the clothing that I did have, I couldn't figure out how to make it look good, how to make it match my taste how to make it evoke the image I wanted to project. Another layer of it is that I was unsure about who I was, and therefore unsure about what image I wanted to project at that age. Probably, I just wanted to be part of the popular kids and emulate them. Maybe what I wanted was a closet full of velour Juicy tracksuits. 😂 Memetic desires would be an interesting rabbit hole to go down here #dough Currently I'm in a state of figuring out what I want my clothes to say about me. To some extent, I want to be part of that working young professional woman ingroup, right? I want my Aritzia blazers and lux tops and pencil pants. But I also want to go a bit deeper than that, explore more of the story I want to tell when people look at me. Someone who loves European art and history. Someone who's curious about the history of design. Someone who's exploring her Filipino roots, what she wants her Filipino identity to mean in her life. Someone who...for better or for worse...enjoys luxury goods, but wants it to be interesting, well crafted luxury goods with a story. ---- Created: July 28, 2021 Last Modified: July 28, 2021