How Your Mindset Dictates Your Fashion Choice

Do you ever find yourself dressing a certain way based on how you are feeling? On days that I'm feeling lazy I find myself dressing in easy to lounge in clothes like sweats. On days that I'm feeling really productive I will wear something simple and presentable like a basic t-shirt and jeans. 

This post was written by Janet Williams,  a part-time blogger and fashion enthusiast. After studying psychology at university, she has always had an interest in how the mind works. Unfortunately she hasn't worked out a way to curb her shopping habit yet!

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Photo by Michael Mandiberg

They say the mind plays tricks on you and that has never been more prevalent than when it comes to fashion.

The “Big Five” personality traits are as follows: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion,agreeableness and neuroticism.

These traits combine and make your personality. Openness is linked to creative thinking, adventurous and imaginative. Conscientiousness gives rise to self-discipline and organisation. Extraversion is associated with energy while agreeableness reflects individual’s concern for social harmony. And finally, neuroticism is the tendency to experience negativity.

Openness

AWinningPersonality describe openness as imaginative, creative and cultural human beings who seek out educational experiences. This is definitely the hippy in all of us. Imaginative dress with cultural significance , i.e. fair trade clothes or hand-made items rather than store bought, sweatshop produced, clothing. Openness is very much the hippy in all of us, that little spark inside that sees an unwanted item of clothing and turns it into something completely new. Or, if you’re a teenage girl, you buy it from a vintage store. Go to any festival this summer and you will quickly see how girls become so more open there… it’s a cultural revolution.

Self-Discipline

Methodical and well organized are hardly synonymous with fashion. Yet self-discipline is very much intertwined with fashion. It is the controlling factor that counteracts your impulses, without it you make a fashion faux pas similar to the Emperor with the invisible clothes. It doesn’t make the headlines as restraint and order are not glamorous, rather   functional. Those who lean more to the self-discipline side of style can be found in the professional workplace, which is awash in the colour neutral.

Extraversion

Extraversion is hugely influencing, It decides whether you are an extrovert or an introvert, which of course are two massive deciding factors in what goes in your wardrobe. Extroverts like to socialise and as such would have clothes that reflect their happy-go-lucky nature - a new t-shirt every Friday night etc. They are the type of people that crave to be complimented on their clothing. Introverts, quieter and more subdued, have a fashion sense that reflects their demeanour - well presented but nothing to set pulses racing but mainly because they are not trying to.

Agreeableness

Is probably the only one of the five traits that does not make a difference. Being kind to someone doesn’t have much relevance to fashion, but if it did, we say the clothes of mums. Everyone loves their mum and in truth, mum’s do have their own sense of fashion.

Neuroticism

The dark side. People who surround themselves with negative energy and have a negative outlook quite naturally have a rather negative palette when it comes to dress sense. Black has always been the colour, it is the  colour of death and the colour we mourn our loved ones, negativity equals dark, always has always will be. American poet Edgar Allen Poe, famous for The Raven, had an extraordinary bleak outlook on life, as reflected in his works, and was never seen out of black. It is the same today in modern society with goths and emo’s.

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Have you ever considered that your mindset can influence your fashion choice?