Personal style is an outward expression of one’s individuality. To define and blossom into one’s individuality as a young adult is much easier said than done, but what does this process of self exploration look like on a college campus? Do students dress as who they are? Or do they dress as who they want to be or who they think others want them to be?
People say that college is a time to find oneself, but the reality is one will never “find themself.” People are recreating themselves on a day-to-day basis. How one defines themself is constantly changing with their surroundings. It is a full-fledged myth to claim that college is the time that one finds themself, there is simply not one definition of self that individuals land on and identify with throughout their lifetime.
This directly relates to personal style and how one decides to display their sense of self. Personal style is an outlet that calls for individuality and is an opportunity for full fledged self-expression. Individuals tailor their closets to what best represents who they want to be perceived as, not who they really are or who they want to be.
Young adults are pressured to answer the question “who are you?” and to present themselves to reflect that answer, but there is not just one answer. An individual’s definition of self and how we display that definition is ever evolving, and so are our closets. One’s environment, financial status, relationships, gender and sexuality and other influences play a huge role in what self-expression looks like in every stage of life, not just in college.
Individuals put on a different version of themselves every morning. This version naturally varies depending on what they are doing that day and who they will be surrounded by. They must decide how they want to be perceived, which plays the largest role in self-expression.
What is worn on a day-to-day basis is often a reflection of a much larger transformation. It is an external reflection of the growth and change that occurs from the experiences of everyday life. It is who they decide to be after digesting the real world and how they translate that notion into outward appearances.
The translation is based on comfort; who individuals are comfortable with being perceived as and how they can display that — all in the name of relaxation. Relaxation is found when individuals are satisfied with how they look and how they will be perceived because of that. People create the idyllic version of their future selves accordingly. There’s a strange expectation that individuals put on themself to present themselves in a certain way; it’s a reflection of an internal gaze, influenced by an external one.
Self-expression in personal style is a mixture of finding oneself versus finding a version of oneself that individuals are comfortable with others perceiving — this rings true no matter what age one is.
The nature of finding one’s style is not about style at all. It is who one wants to be perceived as, and how they want to perceive themself. People will cater to the opinions of others rather than focus solely on their internal gaze, with an understanding that their style is a building block to who they want to be and how others perceive them as a vantage point.
Moral of the story: “finding oneself” in college is a myth. As individuals navigate the world around them, they are also reimagining how their appearance can best represent themselves and how one defines their past, present and future.
Edited by Cayli Yanagida | cyanagida@themaneater.com