At a recent network I talked to Jane Dare, consultant in fashion and business, who works in direct sales for MISS Captain range of ladies fashion from the Captain Tortue Group. Jane often takes her collection to events. I had the ideas that she could come to one of my workshops, participants could look at her clothes and gain advice on style and colour at the end of the session. Jane mentioned a workshop on boosting confidence. I have trained in performance coaching and I was interested in writing a workshop on performance so why not include an element on confidence? That sounded like a really good plan to me after all who doesn't need a bit of confidence boosting from time to time? Even the most polished workshop presenter or the most skilled person at job interviews can need a little boost from time to time, right?
So I started writing and delivering confidence & performance workshops to focus on increasing our confidence levels for optimum performance, enhancing our resilience and resourcefulness.
So even if you feel confident most days it is always worth rethinking in a positive way any negative assumptions you make about how you feel about yourself on those less confident days. It can be really easy to focus on all the negatives however what about if we focus on the positives? What about if we write down every day 3 features we like about ourselves?
So I found myself at Jane's house looking at an array of beautiful clothes. She asked some really interesting questions that got me thinking. After some discussion I realised I sometimes feel like a chameleon, I really like black, like really like black which links to my upbringing at the height of the goth scene. I really like wearing flowing skirts especially when running workshops linked to wellbeing. I love making costumes for dance and often spend a great deal of time in workout dance sweats. Then there are network meetings.....I don't think I fit into perfect sizing..my arms are too long, my body tends to be too long for a lot of tops..the list went on before I realised it I had a whole list of all my negatives! (what was I saying earlier on that we tend to focus on the negatives?). Like a kind of magician Jane starting conjuring different colours, styles, skirts with zips, pin stripes, bright blue turquoise dresses, oranges, greens. She pulled out clothes in sizes that fit me but never asked my size. I went away with a really funky look and a desire to return for the bright blue turquoise dress. So I did not change my image, I did not go there and return feeling out of my comfort zone dressed like it wasn't me. Jane was more clever than that. I came away with what suits my personality and what I feel comfortable in but with a new cut that I haven't worn before and deliciously long sleeves! It all came out as a size smaller that I usually wear which put a smile on my face.
I would rather shop for antiques than clothes, I get excited about oak, but that morning changed all that. We had fun. I would like to recommend you get in contact with Jane and find out more about her collection if you are interested in this article www.JaneDare.co.uk or email Jane@JaneDare.co.uk. What is wonderful is you have a chance to try out her collection at your own pace and it is such a confidence boost to have Jane's personal style advice on shapes and colours that work for you.
My workshop will include a variety of elements including developing performance enhancing thoughts and strategies for mastering confidence so get in touch if you are interested.