How to Find Your Personal Style 101: Rediscover Who You Are Through What You Wear
Before you build a capsule wardrobe or learn your color season, start here: how to find your personal style begins with self-awareness, not shopping carts.
"Style is something each of us already has, all we need to do is find it." –Diane von Furstenberg
Most of us aren’t taught how to find our personal style—we’re taught how to consume fashion. We’re handed rules, trends, and curated identities. But true style doesn’t come from a lookbook. It comes from knowing yourself. And that knowing takes time. It asks questions. And sometimes, it starts with feeling completely lost in your own closet.
Style vs Fashion- Why the Difference Matters When Finding Your Personal Style
"Fashion you can buy, but style you possess. The key to style is learning who you are, which takes years... It’s about self-expression and, above all, attitude." — Iris Apfel
In a world flooded with micro-trends, five-second outfit videos, and aesthetic “cores” that expire monthly, it’s tempting to lump fashion and style together—but make no mistake: they’re not the same.
Fashion is an economic pursuit. It’s built to sell. Fueled by algorithms and driven by the need for constant consumption. It’s an industry that survives on self-rejection. It needs you to be constantly longing to be someone you are not, and on your willingness to believe that what you wore last season is already tired. Yes, fashion can be artful and exciting. But let’s not ignore its foundation: turnover, profit, and the pressure to keep buying.
At times, it’s even at odds with itself. Designers with vision often clash with investors; creativity doesn’t always align with commerce, and it shows.
Fashion can feel exhilarating in the moment. That new-drop, just-out-of-the-box rush is real. But it’s temporary. Soon enough, you’re scrolling for the next fix: a new aesthetic, a new vibe, a new sense of self.
This isn't an anti-fashion manifesto. But it is about reframing how we interact with it. Fashion, at its best, is expressive and imaginative. The problem starts when we treat it as an identity.
Style doesn’t operate on that timeline. It’s slower, deeper, and harder to fake. Style grows out of self-awareness. It’s built on trying things, getting it wrong, and finding what feels like you. It requires curiosity—and the confidence to stop chasing what everyone else is doing and to start cultivating who you are.
In a culture obsessed with newness, style is your anchor. Fashion will keep spinning. Style lets you step off the ride—and show up looking like you know exactly who you are.
Style Is a Skill—Not a Secret
Contrary to what fashion marketing might suggest, a blueprint to develop personal style isn’t something you’re born with. It’s not reserved for the effortlessly cool or genetically blessed. Style is a skill—and like any skill, it can be learned, practiced, and refined.
The myth of “natural style” can be intimidating. We assume some people just have it while the rest of us are stuck copying Pinterest boards. But real style doesn’t come from mimicry—it comes from self-awareness. It's built when you start paying attention to what makes you feel grounded, confident, or quietly powerful in your clothes and get inquisitive about why. That kind of insight? It takes practice.
For more on the psychology of self-expression, see The Psychology of Personal Style.
Learning style is about noticing patterns: What silhouettes do you keep coming back to? What colors make you feel most like yourself? Where do your instincts pull you when no one’s watching?
It’s also about editing. Not everything that looks good on a hanger (or an influencer) will feel right on you. Developing style means being okay with getting it wrong sometimes—and trusting that those missteps are part of finding what works.
And like any skill, style grows when you give it time. It doesn't need to be perfect—it needs to be yours. So stop thinking of it as some elusive aesthetic and start treating it like what it is: a creative muscle. The more you use it, the stronger and more unmistakably you it becomes.
When Style Becomes a Prison - Style Misalignment
"Fashion should be a form of escapism, not a form of imprisonment.” —Alexander McQueen
At its best, style is liberating. It's how we tell the world who we are—without saying a word. But somewhere along the way, many of us start dressing like we’re performing a version of ourselves we no longer recognize.
After my second child was born, I quietly began dressing the way I thought a “mom” was supposed to look. My signature plaid flare pants became skinny jeans and Birkenstocks. My puff sleeve blouse with Victorian lace and button details gave way to performance fleece and Lululemon knockoffs. I did not have the mental capacity to think about personal style, and convenience and conformity took center stage. It wasn’t bad—it just wasn’t me. After a while, I had lost sight of what my personal style ever was, and it took me a decade before I realized the power of regaining it. In those years, I felt invisible.
This is style misalignment: when what you wear doesn’t feel like an extension of you, but a costume to blend in or meet expectations. What starts as adaptation turns into subtle erasure.
McQueen’s quote hits harder than ever today. We scroll through curated feeds and capsule wardrobes and think we’re supposed to pick a lane and stick to it. But that kind of rigidity doesn’t leave room for evolution, nuance, or contradiction. It turns personal style into personal branding—and that’s where freedom disappears.
Escapism, in McQueen’s world, wasn’t about fantasy for fantasy’s sake—it was about permission. Permission to change. To break your own rules. To dress for the life you actually want.
If your wardrobe feels like a mask, it’s not asking for a makeover—it’s asking for honesty.
Finding Alignment - The Path to Personal Style
There’s a temptation to treat personal style like a problem to be solved. One closet edit, a few mood boards, and voilà—new you. But style alignment doesn’t happen overnight. It’s not a makeover moment. It’s a slow and, at times, uncomfortable return to self. And you can’t speed-run self-awareness.
Have you ever missed a social life event because you felt you didn't have anything to wear? Ya, me too. I wasn't showing up in my life because my style and, more importantly, my sense of self were neglected. Style, when aligned, becomes an outer reflection of your inner identity. What you choose to wear becomes less about fitting in and more about showing up. Authentically. Deliberately. Even imperfectly – (the imperfectly part is important- don't miss life because you don't feel perfect!).
How to Find Your Personal Style
Don't worry, this isn't some doom and gloom project of delving into our pasts and dredging up emotions (it might bring up emotions, but we will handle them together). We are going to have fun while we embrace a new way of thinking and questioning our style. We’ll explore style languages and tools not to box you in, but to help you break out of the ones you didn’t know you’d built.
Think of these tools—color analysis, silhouette theory, essence typing—not as rules, but as mirrors. They help reflect back the parts of you that may have gotten buried under trends, expectations, or life transitions.
You don’t need to have it all figured out. You just need to be willing to get curious. This is where alignment starts. Not with perfection, but with permission.
This week's assignment is to go back in time and try to remember three outfits that made you feel 100% yourself, and journal what made you feel that way. If you don't have all the answers, no worries. “It could be as easy as it made me feel good” or “I got a lot of compliments”. Example- A lavender chiffon butterfly detailed dress I wore to the 8th grade dance (very late ‘90s Delias catalog) that made me feel airy and ethereal. A Grecian draped maxi dress I wore to my cousin's wedding that felt like it was made just for my body, even though it was off the rack. And a wide leg plaid trousers with a silver cowl neck satin spaghetti strap tank with a light grey puff sleeve crop cardigan that made me feel like I owned the room.
