0:00  
Really you need your closet with your clothes in it,and your dresser, a mirror and a little bit of time, you may want to invite a friend because that could make it a little more fun. But I would caution you to not get too caught up in what other people think looks good on you. That's not what this course is about. This course is about determining what you feel individually, and how you feel lit up. And when you dress in a certain way that feels like, yeah, this is me, whether that's way different than what your friends do or really similar. It could be either. Ultimately I want that choice...I want you to cultivate the ability to choose for yourself what feels really good. Not necessarily I'm a pear shape, so I should wear this, this and this, but more like wow, I really love this. And I feel really amazing in it. And I want to wear it.  And so we're going to get through that process so that you're sewing clothes that you really love and not sewing clothes that maybe are made for somebody else's body or somebody else's style. That's what we're shooting for in this session.

1:14  
Welcome to the first week of sew clothes that you love, I'm thrilled that you're here. And I'm excited for our journey, our path, our adventure towards not only discovering what it is you love to wear and what lights you up, in clothing and what helps you to be your most authentic, dynamic self. But also figuring out how to plan well for those projects and how to adjust your pattern in a way so that you have less fitting to do later on. 

1:44  
I know that you all know but just to be clear, this is not a fitting course we're not going to go in depth into fit. But we are going to talk about my favorite tricks to take your pattern adjusted to your body before you even begin and then You are so much further along in the fitting process. Because, as I'm sure you know, sewing clothes from a pattern is similar to buying clothes from the store, and that the pattern was made for one body, probably not your body. Just like clothes in the store were made for one average body who seems to fit nobody. You know, I used to think that I had a really hard to fit body that I was somehow abnormal or that my body was wrong. And it used to feel that way to me. I've been teaching sewing now for several years. And I have found that almost all of us think that even the people that have come into class that I would think, this is my judgment, but that I would think have no body issues whatsoever, like they seem "perfect" to me would come into class and talk about how they can't find anything that fits and they just seem to lose this little weight here, or tone up this part of their body there and I thought, Wow, we all think this and it was eye opening for me that we all think that our body is wrong and that's just simply not true. The problem is, is that sewing patterns, like ready to wear clothes, again were made for one body, they were designed to fit one sort of average human and none of us are average. Maybe there are like 2% of the population that are. I actually don't have the scientific data. But it's just, it's a crazy phenomenon that we work with. So sewing your own clothes, as you know is a way to break out of that and as a way to have clothing that fits your unique human body, your perfectly you body in a way that feels really amazing. Because as you know, wearing clothes that fit you is incredibly empowering and incredibly flattering to your body. Then we're going to top that off with not only having clothes that fit you, or at least beginning on that journey, we're going to choose clothes that feel like you, that feel like they you on the inside. So let's begin. 

4:17  
All right, week one, we're going to begin by doing a closet check. And the reason we're starting with this is because, quite simply, it's the easiest step. We're going to take the clothes that you already own, we're going to look them over, try them on, and feel how you feel in your body. Do feel good to feel like...gah, this used to fit but it doesn't anymore. Do you feel like this is not my color, all of those things, you're going to go through that process and I'll talk you through that step by step here in a minute. But that's where we're going to begin.  We can choose to go through what we have to further define what it is we want more of in our in our wardrobes and in our lives and how we want to present ourselves and show up in the world. And so next week, we're going to go a little deeper and broader, rather into that subject. But this week, we're going to see what we already have. 

5:10  
So I'm going to ask you to go through the worksheet if you have not already. And the worksheets going to walk you through that sort of closet check, through the several steps of that, but they're pretty simple. And I'll rephrase them right now. First of all, you're going to pull out everything your own kind of a Marie Kondo, sort of a lesson, but pull out everything that you own, and try it all on. And if it doesn't feel amazing, and if it doesn't light you up, and you'll know that when you look in the mirror, like look at your demeanor, look at how you hold your shoulders.  Are your shoulders are back, or are they clenched forward, or whether you're like ugh.  When you see it, where you're kind of lights you up, right? Think about all of those things as you go through. 

5:55  
The only materials really that you need for this particular lesson are your clothing, and a mirror and some time, and you might want to invite a friend along on this journey, although I sort of caution not doing that, simply because we're looking for what lights you up individually, not necessarily what feels like other people are telling you is what you should wear or what you look good in. Like really we're trying to find the things that you love, and whether that's considered to be fashionable or considered to be within the fashion the rules of what your body should be wearing, or your coloring should be wearing, or whatever that might be. 

6:44  
I want to I want to do away with that idea because really, this course and the purpose of what I'm trying to share in the world is that there's nothing more beautiful than a human that is comfortable in their skin and comfortable in the clothing that goes on top of their skin, right and that's a tall order. And I understand that. This is just a little bit of that process. 

7:09  
Let's go back to when I was a teenager. My grandmother was a seamstress, and she worked in a factory by day and sewed dresses, wedding dresses, bridesmaids dresses, things like that and just things that she loved to make in the evenings and on weekends. So she made all of my fancy formal dresses, like my homecoming dresses and my prom dresses. And I can remember distinctly being at Joann fabrics, at the table, the pattern table, going through books, and trying to choose what style of dress I wanted, and then picking fabric to match that pattern. I do want to be really clear. I was not always very good at picking the fabric to the pattern. My grandmother was sort of a saint and she just went with it. Somehow, I think I think I picked out like a home decorating fabric for one of the dresses. And yet, it somehow still worked out.

8:12  
So when my grandmother was at our house making these dresses for me, she would say to me, you better pay attention because I'm not going to be around forever. And I was 17, 16, 15 or whatever I was, I was too busy. To be sitting down with my grandmother and learning how to sell. And then when I turned 18, my grandmother passed away, unexpectedly. And I never got to learn from her. And so I've always been a maker my entire life, but I never made clothes until I was in my late 20s. And in my late 20s, again, I had this body that I thought was wrong, that didn't fit into clothing that was out there. So I thrifted this knit dress that fit my body really well. It was a handmade dress that somebody else had made for somebody else's about it, but it fit my body to a tee. I always thought that was kind of interesting. Like, I wondered who out there was walking around in my area or had been walking around in my area 50 years before that, whatever it might be, with my same body. I just thought that was kind of fun. I kind of wished I could meet them. But so I have this knit dress that I love that felt really good on my body but I didn't love the color of it. So I decided, it was in my late 20s and I decided, I'm going to recreate this dress, how hard could it be? I know how to use a sewing machine. And I'm a maker and I'm a problem solver. I can make this work. 

9:35  
So I took the dress and I traced it out on a Sunday newspaper. And I went to and I bought fabric, a quilting cotton. If you are familiar with fabric, which was assuming you are, you know that quilting cotton is not interchangeable with a knit fabric. Knit fabric stretch. Quilting cotton does not. But I cut it out and I sewed it up and it just barely fit, like I had to really contort my body to get it on. Because it had no zipper because a knit dress generally doesn't need a zipper. So it barely fit my body. But I was elated. Like it was colors that I loved. The fabric was beautiful. And it fit my body once I got it on. And it was the beginning of my sewing journey. 

10:20  
And so after that point, I dove right in. I learned all I could about sewing clothing and determining what it is that I loved and getting really intentional about my making, about the clothes that I sewed, because, like probably a lot of you I sewed a lot of clothes that did not fit well. I sewed a lot of clothes in that process that I was like, I don't really want to wear this thing that I saw somebody else wearing that feels like them and not so much like me. So I got really intentional with that. And that's what I'm going to share with you about process in the next several weeks. 

10:55  
So I'm going to share another little story that I have as well.  On getting intentional about what lights you up. So maybe three or four years before that story I just told you about learning how to sew clothing. I owned a bookstore. And when I owned the bookstore, I would show up most days and ill fitting jeans, t shirts, sweatshirts, maybe a sweater, things like that. Things that I liked well enough, but things that did not light me up, things that I felt sort of like I was hiding in to some degree, I put on a bit of weight when I owned the bookstore, and I was not feeling my most beautiful self, I guess. So one day, I got home from the bookstore, and in my mailbox was a catelog from a company that had larger size clothes. And I want to take a side note here and just say, this journey that we're on isn't about weight or size. My journey to some degree is, but your journey may be very different. I simply share my journey because you may find some insight in my journey, or you may be able to just commiserate or whatever that might be. But know that your journey does not have to be weight related, but it could be just about figuring out who you are and what lights you up, because maybe you haven't spent the time to do that in your life. So I found this catelog, and I had never really seen women that looked more like me, portrayed in such a beautiful way, in such a confident, playful, beautiful way. And it really was a shifting point in my life, because I believe that we can't really get to where we want to be if we can't even imagine it being so and for me, this was my first imagining that the body that I have right now, right then, could be everything that I wanted it to be, right then, I could show up in the world exactly how I wanted to be, right then. I didn't have to wait for some change to occur, I could just be who I am. 

13:04  
And soI want that for you too. And maybe you already are there and you're just in this class to sort of fine tune your sewing process. Or maybe you're really far from that and you're looking for some help or some group effort to get you closer to that point. That's what we're here for. I'm going to encourage you to jump on the Facebook group. If you get a chance. I think it's going to add a lot of connection and dynamic energy to this group activity that we're doing. And I think that you're going to get a lot of both encouragement and advice there from both me and your fellow students, the other ladies that are doing the same thing at the same time. 

13:46  
Alright, so let's go back to this week's lesson, if you will. So I want you to collect your clothing. Try it all on, look in the mirror and be gentle and honest with yourself. Look at how you hold yourself and how it feels, sift through your piles and have a pile of things that you love. And I also want you to consider...what do you wear when you need to show up in your most... as your most empowered, dynamic self? What do you wear to a job interview? What do you wear on a date? What do you wear if you're going to go meet a girlfriend for coffee? What would you wear if you were going to go to a high school reunion? What would you wear if you're going to present in front of people? 

14:32  
And I want you to take note of that because I think there's a ton of power in knowing what it is that we intuitively choose when we want to be our most authentic, dynamic selves. 

14:44  
And I have a little story for that too. So, I'm gluten intolerant, but I didn't know I was until eight or nine years ago, but probably 15 years ago, when I used to go on...either I was doing public speaking or I used  to go on a job interview or something like that, I intuitively knew not to eat bread before I went. I couldn't have even told you that that's what I was doing. Because at the time, my knowledge of nutrition was that bread and grains were part of a really healthy diet. And they are for many people, but they weren't for me. But I intuitively knew not to choose those things before I had to show up in my most, I'm going to use her powerful, in my most powerful way. And I would choose things that that weren't high in sugar and that weren't in the grain family, I would choose is a lot of salads and a lot of other meats and things that would, I would feel really strong in. And it wasn't until eight years ago that I got really sick and I realized that I'm gluten intolerant. And I had to cut gluten out of my diet and it was around that time, that I was thinking back to all the ways in which I sort of knew, internally that I had a problem with gluten.

16:08  
And I thought back to those times when I didn't eat that, before I needed to show up. I thought, that's really amazing. Right? My inner wisdom showed up for me, when I couldn't really understand what was happening, like I was intuitively not eating things that made me feel crummy when I needed to feel my best. I think that's amazing. 

16:32  
And I think that we have that capacity in everything that we do. I think that we have the capacity to tune into our intuition and live from that sort of intentional place, and really shine. 

16:45  
And so the next little bit of exercise that I have for us, is I want us to think about your intuition. I think that's a really powerful player in determining what you want and being intentional about bringing things into your life and how you show up in the world. I've been working on trying to heed my intuition for a very long time. And sometimes I do really well. And sometimes I fail miserably. And I think that's probably going to be my journey throughout the rest of my life. My intuition is a very quiet voice. If I'm not quiet and grounded and listening, both figuratively and literally, I can't hear it. 

17:28  
And so one of the ways that I sort of fine tune that voice for me, and like sort of cement what it feels like in my body is this exercise I'm going to share with you. So, I began by asking myself out loud, internally, whatever, just make it loud enough that you are focused and hundred percent present with it. I asked myself a question that I know to be false. Like, as an example, I very much am a female human and I identify with feminine energy. So I'm going to tell myself that I am a man, right? And then I'm going to say this to myself and I close my eyes because that's my process just to kind of quiet the world a little bit so I can hear this really quiet voice inside of me. I can feel it in my body. So I close my eyes. And I think to myself, I am a man.

18:23  
And I feel what that feels like, in my body. I feel what happens... I actually got like this tiny little shiver, but also I feel this little like contraction, right? Like my body sort of contracts and pulls in because it's not truth for me. So then just to sort of calibrate what it feels like. I also asked myself a question that I know to be true. So my question in this example would be or my statement rather, because it's not so much a question, it's more of a statement... would be, I am female. I identify with feminine energy. And I feel what that feels like in my body, I get quiet and I listened. And I feel that my body expands a little bit when I asked myself or tell myself a statement that is true for me.

19:18  
And so I do that several times. And I do it to this day. I've been doing it for years. And I continue to do it to this day, to sort of calibrate and remind myself of what truth feels like in my body, and what false-ness feels like in my body. And I know that we're talking about clothing, and that can feel a little bit frivolous, if you will. For some of us. 

19:41  
We're not really talking about clothing. We are. But we're talking about it as a means to show up in the world in your most powerful, empowered, authentic way. I have another little exercise to help fine tune the intuition as well. So I will sort of force myself into a situation, imaginary, an imaginary situation and see how I respond to it. So as an as an example, when we're looking at, like, let's say clothing, let's say I'm wearing, I put something on, and I'm not sure whether it really resonates with me or feels good for me, I'm much better at knowing that I immediately at this point in my life, but let's just say I didn't know. And so I have it on and I might be looking in the mirror, and I might say to myself in the mirror, okay, this is what you have to wear when you get on stage to talk to 1000 people like this is it, this is what you're wearing. And it has to kind of forceful and kind of like, this is the thing. And then I don't know if this is my inner rebellion coming out, or what, but I will have one of two sort of visceral responses. And my visceral response might be like, um, No, I am not wearing this. Or it might be like, cool. Yeah, this feels good. And so that actually is something that I use to make all sorts of decisions that I'm uncertain about which direction I really want to go in. I sort of forced myself to an answer, again, in my imagination, and see what bubbles up for me. And almost always, I will, like bulk against the idea that I didn't actually really love or want to do in the first place. And so I wanted to share that little exercise with you as well. 

21:23  
I think that can be helpful in determining what you love because when you're trying on your clothes, I do not want you to second guess yourself. I want you to go with that gut, intuition, inner wisdom reaction, because if you go and you say...well...my aunt gave me this and I actually like it pretty well if I do this or this with it.  That is not good enough. It simply is not. If it's not a yes, it's a no. As far as I'm concerned, and obviously that's a strong statement and you have to temper this as you wish but I'd love it if you could come at it with that energy and those no's, pass them along, get them out of your life, donate them to somebody else, move them out because you don't open up space for more things that resonate and feel great, too. 

22:14  
So that's this week's lesson. I'm so grateful that you're here. I can't wait to talk with you in the Facebook group and the live q&a later this week. And I look forward to next week where we're going to go broader. And look at things that you love and resonate with you that may not already be in your world, things that you want to bring into your world. We're going to do some mood boards are going to move beyond what currently is into what could be. So have a lovely week. And please feel free to ask me any questions you might have about this training.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai