About 8 years ago I lost 25 kilos. At the time I was using food to fill an emptiness in me, although I now see how I had learnt to control my eating and weight but never really dealt with the issue underneath, so it popped up again in a different form – this time through buying clothes.
When I was a child we didn’t have a lot of money so my mum and grandma would make our clothes. My sister and I got a new dress each year in October to go to a show and if we made our first communion or confirmation, then we got two dresses that year. As I got older and had clothes made for me, I would pick a pattern and design how I wanted it to be made. It was always a joke in my family that I would never get a dress or pattern without wanting to make changes to suit my body.
Before I got married I remember buying three new dresses. I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them. Then when I eventually got rid of clothes, they always looked as if they had never been worn and that was because I hardly wore them!
After I had my second baby, my mum and sister took me shopping. They thought that I needed to get a few things as I was still wearing my maternity clothes nine months after my baby was born. That day I bought two outfits that I could mix and match. I loved what I bought, especially a bone top and a khaki pair of long shorts. I felt beautiful in them. I also remember buying a beautiful grey tracksuit. I wore these clothes all the time; I didn’t put these clothes in my cupboard and not wear them.
When my first marriage ended and I shifted to Brisbane, I started to buy more clothes. At first I would buy really expensive dresses to go out in the evening. However I didn’t go out, so I didn’t wear them, and they would sit in my wardrobe. I spent more money on those ‘good’ clothes that I didn’t wear and not on things that I could wear each day. I stopped this and then started to look for a good bargain and I would find myself saying, “It only cost $10.” But I did wear them.
Two years ago I started work in a clothes store and I began to buy clothes on sale. They were now quality things that I was buying because they were on sale, so cheap and such a good buy and I was saving so much money… never giving any thought to, “Do I really want or need this item?” I had gotten sucked into something that I was losing control over. Sometimes I would stop and have short periods of saying to myself, “No, you don’t need that,” but the moment I bought something, it would start all over again. Pretty scary!
I knew my needing to buy clothes was about something else. I felt something was missing. I was missing something and I was using clothes to fill up this something. I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt.
I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.
I got to a point where I could feel a change in my body as I would buy something. It was like my body was telling me something, but I didn’t want to stop and feel what it was, – I didn’t want to listen to my body. I noticed how I would start to feel racy, disconnected, unsettled and guilty all at the same time.
One morning I added up all the dockets that I had spent on clothes since I had started working in the clothes store. I was pretty shocked at the amount of money I had spent, and when I looked into my wardrobe, I could feel how I didn’t really like the clothes that I had bought. This was an even bigger shock, as I do wardrobe makeovers with women and support them to buy things that they really love. Looking into my wardrobe I could say there was very little that I loved. Looking into my wardrobe made me feel sick.
It was at this point that I realised that I had an addiction to buying clothes that was no different to any other addiction. I was using something to make me feel better about myself. I was trying to fill something up with clothes, an empty feeling. There was something out there that I needed in order to make me feel better about myself because I didn’t feel ok about me, just being me. I looked the part – confident, well groomed – but I still felt I wasn’t good enough, and I thought that by buying clothes I would look and feel better and that this empty feeling would go away, but it never did.
I continued to buy clothes, with more awareness of what was going on, but I could still feel that I didn’t want to get to the bottom of why I was spending so much money on clothes. What I felt when I went to my wardrobe was the energy that I was in when I was buying the clothes, and that was what was making me feel sick. I had to really stop and feel what was going on and what choices I was making when I bought these clothes. One of the things that I noticed about this addiction was that I had stopped buying for anyone else. It was all focussed on me, what I wanted. That was a big eye opener for me.
What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?
The clothes we choose to wear can support us far more then we realise. When we buy clothes in the energy of ‘I’m not enough,’ we are setting ourselves up each day to feel less, like we are watering down who we are, our power as women. If I’m hooked into anything that is not about me feeling the fullness of ‘me’, then what am I truly reflecting?
It feels like I have now taken a step back to observe what I had been doing. I was on a roller coaster. All that I needed to do was STOP and FEEL. I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness; I couldn’t bear to know what it was. I know this seems crazy now to even think that about myself, but when I was hooked I was not thinking clearly.
When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience. There is no thinking from your head, “Do I love this or not?” There is no part of you that has to get a second opinion: your body is there to tell you. The way you hold yourself, the way you walk, the way the clothes feel on your skin, these are all the signs that you need and they are a true confirmation.
In my raciness, I had forgotten this amazing connection that I used to have with my clothes; how I love wearing clothes that my body feels great in, clothes that I can feel on my body. When I buy things in a need from my head, I don’t feel the clothes that I’m wearing, I don’t get to feel what my body is saying.
Now when I work and the sales are on, and I feel like I want to buy something, I allow myself to stop and give myself the space to ask myself, “What is going on? Why do I want to buy something when I am already enough, already beautiful?” Buying with an addiction is like continually selling out on myself. When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.
Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.
By Denise Cavanough, Beauty-full Woman, Wife, Mother, Organiser/ Wardrobe Makeovers, Brisbane
Further Reading:
Fashion Styling – Embracing and Appreciating Ourselves
What is Swag and Who Has Got It?
Dressing to Impress: Are You Ever Enough?
Body Image – Beauty Comes From Within
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
This maybe a wise lesson to learn, ‘Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that.’
Lorraine I had missed this gem of a statement, “Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that”. Is so true, only YOU can be the answer to your misery, harmony etc, which is saying it’s within you and not outside of yourself. So stop searching out there…
“but it never did” The truth about any addiction, that it is never the truth.
Denise, my addiction was to not buy clothes and I hung onto clothes that were way out of date. I had a wardrobe makeover once, and she commented how outdated the clothes were, and yet I was not in the position of buying expensive clothes that this woman’s taste was from.
I realised I carried this belief from my family, don’t waste money on unnecessary things and save so the house could be bought and paid off. It is only in the past 2-3 years that I have been buying gorgeous clothes, and need an event to wear them. Wearing uniforms, seldom allows me to wear day to day clothes, but every now and then when I go out, I wear dresses that hardly took the space of a wardrobe.
We need to observe these behaviours and how it impacts us, if we are left feeling yucky, then that needs to be looked at. I LOVE the kind of shopping, when there is no doubt and only absoluteness that this is it for my body, that’s my kind of shopping, more of it please…
Are we not tested all the time to keep us from feeling our essences or Soul (one and the same)? And when connected this allows the relationships we have with the test through simple observation to becomes one of awareness as a responsibility to become detached from the obvious distractions that will try and distract us from the Truth of our Soul-full way of living.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.”
Oh yes after half of my life hiding, I too feel ready for my own beauty.
“I was missing something and I was using clothes to fill up this something. I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. ” How many of us have done this – be it with clothes, shoes, bags, food etc. Interestingly you say ” The more I bought, the worse I felt. I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” I always find it fascinating how in contrast decluttering frees up not only physical space around us but a feeling of freedom within opens up energetically.
Sue, decluttering is something I realise I need to do more often, and when it occurs, I love the space it creates in the whole place and the effects it has on others too. It kind a feels the place is alive and fresh for more to be given to us – I love this too. A working progress and yet very doable…
It’s still a confronting read for me and a very welcome exploration of why we get addicted to clothes. I liked how you shared that a purchase can be from need which doesn’t honour the fullness and beauty we already are, lots to explore here, thanks Denise.
Addictions come in many forms and some may be judged more than others – for example it is often judged when a person has an addiction to drugs or alcohol but then we celebrate a person who is addicted to work, studies or exercise as we excuse this as being ‘healthy’ for them or ‘developing’ themselves. However, an addiction is an addiction no matter what it is about – addiction to watching a TV show, addiction to chocolate etc etc. Addictions do abound and are a fantastic ‘symptom’ for us to realise there is an underlying issue that is not being addressed.
Yes addictions – in any form – are messages for us to take note of – an opportunity for learning.
Addictions in varying forms are so common, and are usually a sign that something is amiss, ‘I knew my needing to buy clothes was about something else. I felt something was missing.’
It is a very revealing moment to look back and take stock of how much money we have spent on clothes or on food or on entertainment etc. and to realise where we may be pouring our funds. It can reveal much that we may not normally want to be honest with. And from here can come the position that we are in a power to make a choice and hence instigate needed changes.
Denise thank you for your honest blog which shows us we can have addictions about anything really.
And how we use these addictions to either dull us or fill the emptiness as you say that we cannot stop feeling. How many of us actually feel confident and content in our bodies? Until we can feel this contentment then anything we do will always be trying to fill the gap.
What are we trying to do with our addiction, ‘ I was missing something and I was using clothes to fill up this something. I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt.’
It never ends well when we try to buy clothes that fit a picture or fill a need.
When we force it and buy in a need it never ends well. I just consider the days I go out shopping with no intention or picture of what the day will bring… you walk into a shop open hearted and presto there seems to be 5 things that would suit. Compare that to needing something (whether a particular item or something from the experience), and how that tries to fill the emptiness which is by its nature an all consuming, bottomless pit.
“It feels like I have now taken a step back to observe what I had been doing.” – Simply and truly observing and being honest about what we’re sensing or picking up on can really support us to initiate lasting and true change.
“I was missing something and I was using clothes to fill up this something. I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt”. This is always the case with using something out there to fill you up rather than reconnecting to the stillness and completeness within me. When I am in the chase to get something out there its almost impossible to think of stopping and reconnecting, but the more I do it the more natural it is to make these stop moments.
Well worth implementing this in your life, to take a stop moment, to reconnect and feel your body, ‘When I am in the chase to get something out there its almost impossible to think of stopping and reconnecting, but the more I do it the more natural it is to make these stop moments.’
We can use anything to fill an emptiness, but only our love is enough to ensure that the emptiness is not there in the first place.
Spot on Viktoria, and when we fill it up from the outside, this is really only a temporary fix, whilst when we connect and fill up from within, there is an endless supply of the warmth and love – the same and actual thing that we have craved and still crave to begin with. Staying with this connection is of course a challenge in our current world but well worth the effort.
Yes, a connection which is worth deepening and holding onto. For without it all the clothes, jewelry and goods in the world will never be enough.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness’ and that’s never ending until we are willing to be honest and start the process of saying no to what is not love and saying yes to self love.
Annelies when we start to say yes to self love having felt the connection within ourselves I’m fascinated by the fact that even though we feel the connection it seems there are times when we still fall back on our old ways or addictions. This happens until we build the bridge that is so strong there is no going back when we can feel such a strong sense of self that we do not want to harm these feelings in any way.
Humanity has an endless smorgasbord that it uses to fill the emptiness, and it takes so many forms. And yet deep down we all know, that the only thing that will assuage the emptiness is the connection within.
A great call, Denise. It’s amazing how we can turn anything into an addiction to not feel the truth of who we are when the same act can be just as much an opportunity to confirm and appreciate who we are.
It is easy to tell if someone has dressed for themselves or not, the difference is in their natural flow – one effortlessly glides and the other is quite stilted. It is beautiful to feel the freedom within oneself when we buy clothes that are a reflection of ourselves as it reflects the joy we feel within.
That’s the thing about addictions your are always left wanting more because we are disconnected to our truth and the love within the addiction remains an addiction until we turn back to ourselves and build a loving relationship with ourselves.
True, with an addiction you are always left wanting more, ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” This is a very powerful way of understanding any addiction.
Someone once said, ‘there ain’t enough corn chips in the world to fill that hole’ and I remember thinking oh, how true. When you are having a snack attack (be that corn chips, icecream, chocolate, popcorn, cheese & dips etc…) or a bender on drugs and/or alcohol, it can be like there would never be enough and you never want that packet to end. But as you say – we are not filling an emptiness, we are feeding it. Because unless you fill that hole with you, it will always be relentless and keep wanting to be filled up with other stuff.
The relationship between dressing up and self-worth that is worth exploring. We talk into that relationship all the time in different ways. Do we need clothing to feel our beauty? Do we give ourselves permission to dress up beautifully? Do we adopt I do not care approach to dressing? Do we use dressing to shift everybody’s attention away of how we truly feel? Do we dress in accordance to our inner beauty?
Do we need clothing to feel our beauty, or is it a natural expression of the beauty already found within? The difference is stark and so easily felt.
Any addiction when your in it you are absolutely in it and don’t even realise there is an addiction. Just after the next fix, anything to avoid feeling the emptiness inside that is full of hurts and emotions that we don’t want to feel or admit are there.
I love this distinction between filling and feeding an empty feeling. It seems an important point to make because I wonder how often, in the thinking that one is filling – there is also room for making excuses, to justify the behaviour. Whereas to be honest about the feeding of an emptiness, at least we are on the path of starting to take responsibility.
When you graph globally the amount of money spent on advertising, it correlates precisely to the rise or fall of anxiety in society… Extremely revealing.
Looking into my wardrobe I could say there was very little that I loved”. I recently did some wardrobe sessions and one of the questions that Jenny Hayes, the practitioner would ask was, “Do you love it?” This is a great question which I now think of when I go shopping. It exposes all the potential purchases because…its cheap/on sale, it will do, its near enough to what I want etc.
“What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?” What a brilliant realisation and a great reminder to us all to appreciate ourselves every day because that fills us up in a way that nothing outside of us can.
Always great to be reminded of the importance of daily appreciation of self, ‘When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.’
I can relate to this on so many levels and when I read this ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ it made me consider what haven’t I looked at in my life that I need to. This is also really important that you shared ‘Buying with an addiction is like continually selling out on myself. When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them. Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.’
Current fashion is so much about how it looks but not really about how it feels, how the clothes feel on our body and if we can feel comfortable in them for a whole day or not.
Well said Denise. It is interesting that all addictions come from a lack of connection with ourselves, this is what is missing in so many addiction programs out there that only deal with treating symptoms but never get to the root underlying cause where the true healing can occur.
Yes, treating the symptoms does not address the underlying energetic cause so will never be truly healed.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness’. There is much to ponder on in these wise words when it comes to the concept of being addicted to anything.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” – This is an important distinction to make and one that I have fallen for many times, thinking that I was fulfilling a need of mine by going to a behaviour, hobby, or food, to not feel that emptiness and believing that it was filled, only to realise later just how much MORE empty and disconnected I now felt (with guilt and shame to add to it too) after resorting to the distracting and self-destructive behaviour.
Clothes shopping is a great marker of how we are using our personal spending money which we have earned from our work and commitment to service. Do we use this money to feed back into our purpose, or spend it on items to fulfil an empty feeling without checking IN (not checking out haha) on why this is?
The thing is, we can be addicted to anything… Just have a look at eBay, and what people are buying, collecting, hoarding, all to fill a hole that cannot be filled by material possessions.
“I knew my needing to buy clothes was about something else.” – I think when we can have this kind of honesty with ourself we then can open up to a deeper awareness of what’s going on inside of us that is being reflected in a behaviour or habit that we know is damaging…
There is such a difference between buying clothes that express who we are to buying cloths to cover up what needs to be expressed.
Clothes shopping can often be a reward or treat that we go to in order to thank ourselves for a challenging time, a job well done or just a way to escape the stresses of life or the day. If we purchase clothes for this purpose what is the quality in which we are wearing them for others to enjoy?
And how soon do we need the next reward or treat?
I had a similar thing with buying books (plus other things). I had shelves of them, most of which were unread. But I never had an issue with books, like you with clothes. But I did have a need that was being met by my buying thousands of dollars worth of books, I was filling and feeding my feelings of emptiness too, my feelings that I had to be seen as someone. I love how I made no effort to stop this pattern, it simply stopped the more I felt me and realised that there was nothing to fill, because I was already full.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ And there is no end at feeding our emptiness, it keeps asking for more and will not stop.
When in connection with ourselves, the way we are with all things changes – not only in buying clothes – the body is an amazing barometer of what is true for it or not and when we stop and listen, it expresses very clearly.
“When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience. There is no thinking from your head, “Do I love this or not?” There is no part of you that has to get a second opinion: your body is there to tell you”.
I love the awareness you are sharing here from your own experience with clothes. I can absolutely relate to what you are sharing here!! Your offering to look at how we already set ourselves up by which energy we are buying clothes, is great. My relationship to clothes since I was young until now reflects absolutely my relationship to myself! One part I can add is, that clothes, even if they look amazing, colours suit you, material is very lovely, can be used as a way of mask/ protection. Actually you can read through clothing and how the person feels like in it, everything about that person.
“It was always a joke in my family that I would never get a dress or pattern without wanting to make changes to suit my body.” I love this, such a natural expression to make the clothes suit you and not fit yourself into the clothes.
Yes, you can really feel the fullness and innocence of Denise in this statement, super beautiful! It is an absoluteness without any questioning. Clothes should reflect your pure inner beauty, but never put something on for you. It does support you but should not change you. How we dress is the mirror of the inside in the outside expression- a great part to explore and reflect on!
“The more I bought, the worse I felt. I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness” I can totally relate to this but not so much for me for buying things (although that is there), it is more eating for me. The more I eat, the worse I feel and it does feel there would never be enough corn chips in the world to fill the hole. Slowly but surely I am also exploring why I feel the need to eat like this, and it is lessening its hold on me more and more. Thank you for sharing so honestly about addiction and how to explore it. Its a worthy cause 🙂
One of the worst things we can do when going clothes shopping is to have a picture in mind of what we want to buy, and what that item is going to look like and then the whole shopping trip is a slave to finding that perfect image.
Whether I choose to shop on the internet or go out shopping it is one of the same except that I have found that I thought I could hide and justify the disconnection to myself and to others more easily when I was shopping on the internet! My relationship with internet shopping has now finally caught up with me and what a blessing that truly is… a work in progress focusing on a commitment to love.
That is very interesting to hear, that internet shopping did help you to hide and to be a little more in comfort, as it was not so much exposing your disconnection! Great point!
Losing myself in shopping I can very much relate to and it has been something I have been exploring recently. What was exposed the most was when I would shop on the internet because I thought it was easier and the impact it had on those around me! It really did made me stop to question my relationship with clothes and shopping.
Gorgeous to expose all our needs and investments, for when we are in connection to our body and the stillness inside that is so fulfilling all we want to do is share that love.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.”
– such a simple yet profound distinction.
Yes, we can think we are filling the emptiness, but are we really just feeding the emptiness…’ The more I bought, the worse I felt.
I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ When we stop and feel we can bring more understanding to the situation, and make new choices.
In life, we may choose not to have a relationship with space. Yet, we can never get rid of the tension of such choice. Hence, we have to do something so we do not feel it. Food is a ‘great’ option. The emptiness we fill with food has to be dressed up with bigger clothing sizes. The ‘good thing’ is that we have come up with ever bigger sizes to accommodate the fact that emptiness is not just empty, but also that is endless. An ever-expanding physical body is the best way to avoid feeling an ever-expanding space. This is actually our first and foremost addiction.
When I first heard the concept of emptiness I was terrified of feeling it but what I have come to know is we simply feel the emptiness, yes it is not nice but as soon as we really feel it and start to appreciate our inner beauty we start to feel amazing, it is that simple, so not scary at all, very beautiful in fact.
“When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.” Yes I find this too Denise there becomes more of a flow and ease to shopping in this way because we are not moving from a need but rather from our own beautiful rhythm. Awesome thank you.
I love the points you make here especially this one Denise . . . “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” . . . This is such a great point. As with any addition this line reads true.
“I was using something to make me feel better about myself. I was trying to fill something up with clothes, an empty feeling.” How many of us have used clothes-buying – or spending on other treats to try to fill that void, when in fact, as you say, “Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.”
” I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.” I love this Denise. I have occasionally found myself walking into a shop- not really knowing why I am there – and the right garment just jumps out at me. Just such a recent aquisition has become one of my most loved items of clothing.
Always great to feel into what is driving a pattern or addiction, ‘I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me.’ Once we have more understanding, we can choose to heal the root or source of the problem.
I recall as a teenager I bought clothes for recognition, I wanted to stand out. Then things started to shift and I used clothes to hide in. Funnily as I write this even though as a teenager I said it was about recognition, it was also about hiding. Hiding me in way out clothing, all so I wasn’t seen, only the way out clothing. Now I buy clothes that are comfortable, practical (most of the time) and fun.
The clothes I love the most and I feel the best in are those I have bought, quite often on impulse and when I have been feeling really great within myself.
It seems we can get addicted to absolutely anything in order to deny ourselves of the most amazing thing that money just can’t buy.
Denise this is very relatable, I find the buying of clothes quite a big topic because even if I do need something I still may not truly buy what I would love to wear or feels right to me. It’s also something we continually need to do, buy more clothes, so I appreciate the detail and honesty with which you shared what you discovered here. The emptiness that motivates the buying is something we can all relate to, and it is a great reminder that the emptiness is a signal we have something inside us to reconnect to and be full of.
Any sort of shopping addiction is particularly insidious… Self-worth, financial peril, so many things intertwined…And how wonderful to come back to oneself.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ Great point Denise, the emptiness is always hungry.
Buying clothes in the past used to make me squirm, because it reflected me back the low level of self-worth I was living in. The more honesty and awareness I allow in those moments now, the more love for myself I connect with. There is a growing acceptance of my shape and emanation, before and after I wear the clothes and this makes me enjoy bit by bit more, and celebrate the woman I already am. I feel now much more my essence and wearing clothes instead of a fight with myself, is becoming a confirmation of my inner and unique expression… and I celebrate it!
Amparo how wonderful for clothing to be a celebration of the beauty of our inner essence.
Beautiful to feel an expression of truth being lived, love being shared and joy celebrated…my favourite garments of all.
Great question Brendan, it does take awareness and discernment as far as where we are placing our investments and the quality of those choices.
Taking stock and allowing ourselves to feel what is behind our choices is an invaluable tool that supports our evolution.
We can essentially use anything to fill or to feed that sense of emptiness that we may have, clothes, food, movies. This never works, so we end up using that behaviour more and more so that we don’t feel where we are at. Its amazing that you recognised this behaviour in yourself but even more so that you no longer that behaviour because there is no longer an emptiness. Buying clothes now can be a real celebration of the connection that you have with yourself and a confirmation of all that you are.
This was good for me to read. Many parts stood out for me here the main being ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ and ‘If I’m hooked into anything that is not about me feeling the fullness of ‘me’, then what am I truly reflecting?’ A great blog with great sharing and honesty, thank you. And also it is very awesome that when customers walk into your shop you are now reflecting to them that they are already enough and already beautifull such a difference to what you were reflecting before when you were addicted to buying clothes .. again something great for me to ponder on and what I currently reflect to others.
Shopping can be fun and wearing clothes to express the fullness of who we are can be a beautiful daily ritual.
I feel like I am just at the beginning of experiencing shopping without the overriding need to fix myself. There are the first signs of it being a confirmation of my developing, respectful and appreciative relationship with myself.
Buying clothes can be great fun but only if we do not use it to make ourselves feel better. It ought to be about having fun expressing our fullness and our divinity.
This is a great point you have raised here Elizabeth. What about taking the moment to feel our fullness each time we put on the clothes we already have rather than searching for new clothes to fill up what is waiting patiently to be revealed from inside.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Great revelation here. There is an emptiness we can feel within, so we want to fill it up with things, distractions and the like. But what is so true about what you have shared here is that, filling and ‘feeding’ are very different beasts. When we are feeding, it is a deliberate choice to really take ourselves away from who we are.
I love shopping for clothes and even browsing, but there are only so many clothes one body can wear. Sometimes when I am not particularly looking for something I find the greatest treasures, it is more a quality I am in that is confirmed in the purchase.
I have felt the same Victoria – when I am not looking but appreciating a moment, a day, a week I am often offered a great treasure that is half the price when I get to the counter!
Yes, these days I take the opportunity to buy items I find and love, even when I have not had the intention to purchase anything. I am also happy to go shopping and come home empty handed if I don’t find anything that is absolutely right.
I am with you on that Martin, feeling comfortable in our own skin is priceless. Your comment is a blog in itself, which I am sure many can relate to. It is extraordinary the prices that are paid of some clothing, handbags and shoes… that are actually more ‘wearing’ us than us wearing them.
What a great insight this is Denise, “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” There is nothing outside of us that can truly fill us, only when we connect to our inner-essence we find it is full and overflowing. We can then sip from love and not lack.
The clothes we choose to wear can be a beautiful extension of our expression and appreciation for who we are, and in that we are ‘wearing’ an energy that supports us and others all day. And I know the opposite too when I’ve dressed to hide myself or to try and impress others or meet a picture I think I should look like, from a lack of valuing my true expression, which does not feel so great…!
“All that I needed to do was STOP and FEEL.” this is true, as it is only until then that the momentum we have been living in can be addressed and stopped for good as we are not longer trying to manage life by relying on addictive behaviours but take it head on with what is coming up moment to moment without affecting our quality within.
‘When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience…your body is there to tell you. The way you hold yourself, the way you walk, the way the clothes feel on your skin, these are all the signs that you need and they are a true confirmation.’ – `This really sat with me and makes so much sense, as I am someone who used to buy clothes based on how they looked not how they felt – so I now have a very different relationship with my body and with clothes,
I love to buy clothes as a celebration of me and not to glorify and make me look good. When I make it about the look alone I often find that when I wear them later on they just don’t feel honouring or supportive and may not even look that good any more! When I make it about the connection and celebration with me I find that the love I purchased the clothing in stays with me whenever I put the clothes on again later.
” nothing can ever fill a place inside me . Only I can do that .I am already full of my own beauty ”
This is so true and living ones beauty maintains the fullness of the place inside you .
When we get a true understanding of what emptiness is all about then we get an understanding that if we do not get to the root cause there is a simple replacement always waiting in the wings. So what is emptiness? When opened up to our divine connection their is a full-ness that is felt in the heart and when this is maintained we become re-connected to the Soul and this is a complete lack of emptiness.
So is emptiness in the being or the doing? Could it be in being connected we live a life that is being decent and respect-full, thus we are being-full in a life with true purpose, so we are in a flow from one moment to the next? If we are caught up in the doing then could it be possible that it is just are trying to please others? Then are we being of service, or are we doing service and which one feels energetically true?
Then what is a replacement? Lets say we are doing drugs and we feel what it is doing to our body so we stop and go through all the rejection or symptoms of withdrawal and then in that process we start to drink more wine this is considered a replacement and it is the same with foods that we could indulge in or any other pattern in our life that keeps us from healing thus returning to the Soul.
“The more I bought, the worse I felt”. This doesn’t make sense if buying clothes actually fulfills a need or emptiness within us. But as has been shared it ends up doing the opposite by confirming and feeding the emptiness. The lovely clothes arrive and the ache of emptiness is still there. How simple to just stop and feel what is driving the emptiness and put a stop to it, as it is a lie being fed to us that stops us from feeling our gloriousness.
Thanks Denise, this is very powerful to read and I’ll be back many times to review and reflect on the wisdom you have shared from your experiences. I would also like to share how much I appreciate the fullness of your honesty throughout the blog – it’s a very endearing quality. It’s such a big learning curve to feel and appreciate how amazing we are, we spent years in disconnection and filling the void of that emptiness is so normal, but it’s completely worth challenging every behaviour that feeds that emptiness so that we can be full with ourselves.
When we do not dress ourselves in the garment of truth, we experience a nakedness that has us seeking shelter by way of adopting costumes that will hide us from the truth of what we are choosing.
So true Liane, the garment of truth is transparency so everyone sees all of us and this is without dressing our-self down but being open like a book so we can easily read and be read.
We all know when something is out of control, when we do something ‘to excess’. It stands out because despite what you know is the right thing to do, you end up going ahead with this thing anyway. It can, as you show Denise, destroy and eat away at the natural trust that is there in us. But all of this changes when you bring understanding to yourself and see that we all miss the connection to God that is there naturally. Like a tree missing it’s trunk it only makes sense that we go looking for a replacement instead. So there’s no need to be hard on ourselves just help us to come back to this beauty inside.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” – Great realisation – this is something I remind myself of if I find myself craving something I know isn’t good for me. The only way to genuinely fill ourselves up with love and to be truly content and at ease within our-self is found within us first.
Clothes can be a reflection of the essence we are choosing to reflect in all of its beauty and grace, and others can feel and see that sparkle and give credit to the outfit you are wearing, but they are essentially feeling your amazing shining through.
Clothes are of course an interesting reflection …. If we invest in true quality we will be served for a very long time
We are fuller than we can possibly imagine and the perceived need for something to fix us actually keeps us away from living this fact.
No wonder we have coined the term ‘retail therapy’ – you make it very clear that this therapy doesn’t work because it does not address the reason why consumers buy things they do not need or even truly want and that can even make them feel sick.
Yes and definitely not a true healing ‘therapy’ when it is used as a distraction from what we’re feeling inside.
This sharing sounds all too familiar – clothes, shoes, scarves you name it all bought in a moment of hurt, numbing and not wanting to feel what is truly going on. It is when we stand back many years later and look at the extent of this buying we can appreciate that buying clothes to confirm the body and walk in this confirmation is the key to support ourselves and what this reflect to others.
When we get a true understanding of what emptiness is all about then we get an understanding that if we do not get to the root cause of being empty then there is a simple replacement energy. So what is emptiness? When opened up to our divine connection their is a full-ness that is felt in the heart and when this Love is maintained we become re-connected to the Soul and this is a complete lack of emptiness. And before Love comes our way of living there is a self-loving way of existence that is needed for a foundation, which is part of our evolution. Then to set the tone for self-love we need to be at-least gentle because from an empty-ness self-love can be too big a leap.
As an empty vessel I first tried to hide behind my humor and jokes, then I went into sports, then smoking by the time I was 10, then at 15 I added drinking, then at 19 I added drugs so what a repertoire and add to this a very addictive diet of pizza’s and junk food I was totally empty, but if anyone told me all that I would have laughed at them. What great vision hindsight gives us?
Then at 40 I finally stopped all this pollution to my mind and body or so I thought, then I to discovered what I was then doing was just as ugly, which was only burying my emptiness behind a wall of arrogance because I was a vegan and a health nut, but my body was still empty, and racked with all sorts of pain.
At 51 after attending a Universal Medicine event presented by Serge Benhayon my whole word was turned upside-down and I started to get an understanding about true health and being at least gentle with myself to the best of my ability.
Thank you Denise, this is a great expose of the way we can approach buying clothes for ourselves whether we buy items from an emptiness and lack of self-worth which usually ends up costing us and arm and a leg offering little relief as the void still there, or we purchase something in connection to our quality within which more often is what is perfectly needed and also a great bargain!
I totally agree when we buy clothes or makeup from the sense of not feeling enough, we are looking to the external to create an image that is not felt inside.
I can very much relate. I used to hide and dress down all the time and still find myself doing it at times but am loving the confidence that I have these days to just wear what I feel good in and not worry about a thing!
Clothes are an interesting thing, we like to wear them obviously, but they can be something used to celebrate who we are or hide. They can also be used to protect and blend into ones surroundings. There is so much about our clothes that tells a story about how we feel about ourselves.
To stop, feel and connect is so useful in so many areas of life – from food to clothes shopping. As I clutter clear – again – it supports me to feel what is true for me to keep and what to get rid of that I have kept and not used/worn for far too long.
Great to consider whether a purchase is about trying to fill a hole, a need or whether it is a celebration. No amount of clothes will make up for what we can give ourselves in terms of appreciation and nurturing. It is wise to look at this and reflect on why we buy!
I love that you have shared that our attempts to ease a sense of emptiness are futile when approached from the outside and the acquisition of something. It is in our relationship with ourselves and a willingness to be honest with how we feel that we realise there is no emptiness, simply the need to let out (expand) who we truly are.
For moments in my life I am able to connect to a feeling of warmth and joy inside my body. It’s like I feel everything is on fire in the greatest way – like a car that purrs, an oven crackling up your roast at exactly right temperature, or the sun hitting your face on a chilly day – its a feeling of saying ‘Yes!’ to everything today. What would it be like to live this feeling all the time? The fact that I do not, helps me understand why I go looking for substitutes like the dresses you mention Denise. But what could be better to wear than my own joy and celebration.
I love the honesty of this. Whenever we have a need like this for something our alarm bells should go off as in truth we need nothing as we have it all inside.
There are so many ways to numb ourselves away from feeling and thus reading all that is happening both within and around us. But reading energy is a vital tool for life and it must not ever be discounted as a very natural part of ourselves and our relationships with each other.
When we eat, we are consuming energy as well as the physical compounds.
‘Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.’ Beautiful Denise.
It is interesting when I think about my relationship with clothes – when I am happy in myself and feeling confident, I find my relationship with clothes is easy – but when I am feeling unconfident or plagued by self-doubt, I have a tense and difficult relationship with clothes, wanting them to make me feel better or more confident. If i go clothes shopping from this point then I am in trouble because I know everything I buy will be tainted by this – I won’t see myself for who I am but through the lenses of all the ideas I have around how I should look.
I love this too Denise for I also find that the things that I love and suit my body figure and height, down to a ‘t’, find me… thus I do not have to spend a long time shopping which I am happy about as going in and out of shops for hours on end is very tiring and draining, which I no longer do.
It’s refreshing to read your experience with an addiction. Throughout my years in drug addiction and after that hell, shopping addiction which is definitely not as messy I can relate a bit to your feelings, I at a young age was quite traumatized and spent the next 20 years trying to deal with it or perhaps runaway from it. At first I just wanted to feel “happy ” but after countless years of therapy and rehab s I learnt how self centered I was. All I was really doing was trying not to accept my past and put my needs of feeling better ahead of everyone and everything else. It’s almost always not as simple as you put it and I’m here if you continue to struggle
When I cleared my mum’s wardrobes out a couple of years ago, she had certainly shopped to cover her emptiness and I could feel how I was following her pattern too. It was a time to look at what and why I was doing that and feeding the behaviour as you rightly explain Denise. When we are aware of that, it is quite easy to stop and re-imprint the behaviour.
Certainly awareness is the beginning of the arrest of ill behaviours, then comes some understanding, self care and a dedication to commit to life.
I used to buy lots of clothes in the past . This has changed now, my needing to have new clothes changed, it is now more about how I wear my clothes, the quality of how I wear it and which combination reflects me for the day.
I notice that I still save things for ‘special occasions’ rather than appreciating that any day or even everyday can be a day worth celebrating.
Oh yes Fiona I know that one too, saving clothes for special occasions, I can still do this, but it is now much less than before!
Yes I know this one too. But as you say, every day is worth celebrating. I also save clothes I haven’t worn for ages for a ‘just in case’ moment. Time to let go of this one. What am I waiting for, in either situation?!
So do I Fiona… this is something I need to look at too.
Great point Jane. If we feel solid in ourselves we will not be swayed by prices, gimmicks or pretty colours and we will be able to choose things that truly support us.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Wow this applies to all addictions. Truly wise words.
I agree Leonne, well said, it brings a new light in understanding all addictions.
It is so different when you buy clothes from a need or emptiness compared to buy clothes that will confirm and support these amazing qualities in you to be lived in full. The clothes could be exactly the same however but it is the intention you buy them with that makes the real difference.
Shopping in our society is set up to entice and to lure and often comes with hooks and clearly an imposition or an expectation or even a manipulation to get you to buy. It takes a lot to feel this, see it for what it is and not fall for it. How amazing would it be to enter a shop where there was no imposition or expectation to purchase anything, and that you were free to really feel if you needed/wanted to buy something.
We can so get caught up in attempting to fill the void within with either shopping, food, activities, drinks etc etc. In the end these are all distractions for not wanting to feel an inner emptiness. But to allow oneself this awareness is key. And then from here we can understand our behaviours and hence begin to make changes from a point of understanding and not criticism of ourselves.
What an honest and reflective sharing on our addictions and emptiness and need to fill ourselves and how beautifully loving to read and feel for ourselves.
It’s only when you bring this focus to become more steady within yourself that you really begin to feel, just how much marketing is not designed to support us feeling connected and content within ourselves. The more settled (internally) we become, the more we can feel all the hooks and temptations that are designed and promoted for us to abandon our connection with ourselves to buy or eat something we have allowed ourselves to be convinced will make us feel better in some way.
There are a million different things we can choose, a thousand different styles and cuts, a huge variety of colours ‘out there’ but only one true essence of us. We pursue all kinds of past-times in this life to make ourselves feel we ‘alright’ but none of them will ever suffice. For we are designed to live, walk, strut our stuff, knowing we are all amazing. Anything less than this is out of keeping with the way we have been fashioned to live. Thank you Denise for this honest and open account.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.” It is our inner beauty claimed that makes all the difference to our cloths and shopping with ourselves becomes a lived and lasting delight.
We have what we call issues, that seem to move from one part of our lives to another, always finding new ways to be expressed and perhaps even to stay hidden under the radar of our conscious mind, sustaining themselves continuously so that every time there appears to be progress it can pop in again to say no, not yet, you’ve not solved this one and so you are not resolved. It is a demoralising cycle that keeps many of us kept in stasis, without feeling like we are going anywhere but backwards and forwards over the same spot again and again. But maybe there is another way. Maybe it is not the issue that needs or even deserves our attention as it plays the game of hide and seek as we try to improve. But rather, maybe, it is the glory and wonderment of who we actually are that deserves all the attention in the world. Maybe from here issues loose their power and life becomes simple and joyful again.
This is so true Jane. i have clothes in my wardrobe that I wear over and over again as when I put them on they feel good, and like they are an literally an external expression of how I feel about myself inside. Whereas some of the other clothes I have hardly ever see the light of day as I do not feel they reflect the same joy and vitality that I feel inside when I wear them. Clothes shopping is never a great idea when we are having an off day, as nothing can change how we feel inside other than a willingness to take a look at and be honest with what it is we are trying so hard to avoid feeling.
When I have on off day and go into a shop to buy some clothes, I cannot find anything or am not able to decide what to buy. It only confirms my own discontentment in that moment and basically my body is telling me to come back to myself and my self worth.
I love buying clothes and always have. Growing up clothes were very functional, practical and they didn’t really mean that much. As I have become more aware of things I feel it’s not that clothes are now more important but they have become apart of how I am, who I am, the quality I am. For example in winter I would pretty much wear the same clothes as summer, possibly I would wear a jumper and yet I was always cold I just didn’t want to put anything else on. I didn’t like wearing long pants at all. As things have changed, as I’ve changed now it has become almost second nature to take care of myself and wearing more clothes in winter is a part of that care. People will comment regularly about what I wear and I appreciate what they say but it’s almost like a surprise in a way as it’s just become a part of my day, a natural part of me.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ This is a great point Denise – in trying to fill our emptiness we are in fact feeding it and are missing the connection to the fullness of our true selves, which is always there.
This subject of clothes is so revealing! I’ve felt I’ve been not appreciating myself which has brought in comparison. I’ve wanting to copy the amazingness I see in another woman’s and her choice of dress rather than appreciating my choices.
Through this reflection and though I liked what I wore I did notice that perhaps what I wore wasn’t fully expressive of my new
awareness of my value.
Wearing clothes in the celebration of our true beauty and exquisite preciousness brings our clothes to life- for our living quality cannot be denied.
What a great subject to write in, I can say that I relate a huge amount to what you are sharing. I have always had issues with shopping for clothes, which is clearly reflecting a deeper issue. I have never had an addiction but some woman very close to me have and it is a very common among woman. A common run if events for me is buying things that I end up not liking. Or coming back with things that were just repeats of clothes I already had but not getting things I actually needed…. I loved shopping at the time I was buying things but it would leave a bitter taste in my mouth when I got home.
After a while, shopping also became a stressful experience, having to check at every place I went what the return policy was, anxious that I would dislike what I choose later. Leaving tags in for weeks, after reading this article I realise that all of this suggests a contraction and disconnection.
The more I connect to myself and shop with a true intention, the more I love what I bring home.
I love this expose of addiction and how it governs and controls us until we choose differently; it can take many forms but the impact is similar – it keeps us in disconnect from ourselves, relationships and life.
‘Buying with an addiction is like continually selling out on myself.’ This is so true of all addictions Denise and all those times we choose to overindulge ourselves.
Can an addiction to buying clothes be a bad thing? It isn’t harming anyone, but hmm lets take a deeper look at our behaviours, isn’t buying excessive things just filling an emptiness we feel inside? which is the same as other forms of drugs :O omg
When I go shopping, it is so busy, I often wonder where all the people come from. But you explain so eloquently Denise, how we can bury our heads in the sand, with all our hurts, and look for any outlet to relieve a pain we are feeling without sorting it out. The problem of course is it returns because it hasn’t been sorted, it works much better to deal with it and reconnect to the Love we all are. And much cheaper too!
As we can see in the shopping streets nowadays a lot of clothes shops are gone and have made place for food/takeaways/restaurants/teahouses. Currently food works much better to fill us up and buying dresses and other things aren’t that great any more in fulfilling a ‘dulling’ need. Same demand, different supply.
We can buy clothes to fit so many different pictures of what we want ourselves to look like, rather than feeling into what truly supports us.
I never really enjoyed clothes shopping and did it as quickly as possible getting what I needed. Now I am experiencing it in a different way.. the more I connect to myself, my essence the more I shop to express this and what I buy is what I feel will do this. A completely different experience not governed by the latest fashion or designs.
Addictions are a movement away from our divine essence and hence hold us back from our true selves. When we undo these movements we begin to steadily build and deepen our relationship with our essence and uncover the true value and richness of our internal make up, which re-connects us to who we are and we no longer need the clothing, alcohol, food or drugs because we are then full of loving particles that then permeate our every cell outwardly so.
I don’t think we acknowledge enough that the moment we purchase something, the reason behind it, our quality and everything we’re feeling, that moment holds an imprint that effects our relationship with that item once we own it, and it’s ability to really support us or not.
It is no coincidence that we are offered the words “retail therapy” as the ultimate excuse to shop when we are choosing not to truly look at what is at play in our lives.
There is always 10 steps before the physical outcome we all see.
What an incredibly beautiful blog, we are worth a clothing that is us in full, without any holding back. That which is expressing us as a whole. It is a beautiful and very powerful tool to express ourselves.
We tend to buy clothes to improve our appearance of the way we look or are perceived by others, but what if we loved our bodies so much and let this be reflected in our movements? Then there would not be a void to fill with any addictions as our essence would the mighty reflection of our soul.
This is such an awesome blog to read, reminding us that we are all already beautiful and nothing we can buy that can be more rewarding than choosing to connect to our inner beauty.
I have found that 95% of the work is becoming aware of something like shopping for clothes in an addictive way. The other 5% is then to bring more and more awareness to this addictive way until we can drop it. The 5% may take seconds or years but it is quite doable.
Do we buy clothes that confirm our inner beauty or do we buy clothes that we think will impress others? The attitude we buy the clothes in will determine what we reflect to others when we wear the clothes. We have a responsibility to women in how and why we wear what we wear.
Yes, we do have a very beautiful responsibility to reflect to each other the gorgeousness of expressing who we are with what we wear, not more adherence to a dress code imposed by expectation and/or fashion.
“I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them.”
I know this very well and have started to change that and use the opportunities that I have to actually wear and enjoy my “good” clothes, especially because my job requires me to wear uniform.
We can have addictions to anything really so long as it is filling up the emptiness inside then we feel like life is ok. It’s only when we start to realise that this way of living is actually not what brings us true joy and that we are avoiding something that we desperately are seeking.
Awesome to be aware that any addiction works in a way to give us a false sense of being full but doesn’t last long and in my experience addiction certainly does not fill our emptiness, only feeds it.
I was in a clothes shop yesterday and noticed how the dance music being played could add to how people get absorbed into their shopping. It was quite hypnotic and I could feel a pull to keep going with looking even though I wasn’t buying. Staying with my body this didn’t affect me but I could feel how this could really entice the shopping mode people are in.
Yes, Jill, it is in those moments when we are about to do something and our bodies tell us that it’s not true for us, that we have a golden opportunity to listen and learn.
Unless we deal with the route cause of our symptoms we will never truly heal, only appear to have “gotten better”.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness’ – In those moments where we’re feeling raw and ‘just have to’ eat a certain food, binge watch TV or shop to make ourselves feel better, this is actually cementing the emptiness we feel and there are other ways (particularly moving, walking and talking things through) that can help us to deconstruct the emotions instead.
I loved what you have shared Denise, I am slowly starting to feel how clothes feel on my body instead of buying something that looks good but sits in my cupboard un worn. Feeling in the body is the way to go and I love this line ” When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.”
This is a massive question and possibly unbelievable for some of us – ‘What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?’
How many of us have constructed ways of living to try to feel this sense of worth, amazingness, that we’re ok – to stop that inner feeling of emptiness? Within us all is this quality of divines, that endlessly is filling us, if we but go there! It’s on tap, we just need to turn it on.
Often I feel our strengths are turned against us. Denise, do you have an ability to present yourself well through clothes, an eye for detail and a care for everything that is there to be cared for? An addiction to buying clothes turns all of these strengths into a weakness by using all these strengths to deprive ourselves of life energy, i.e. money.
We use excess weight in a few ways. One is certainly to fill an emptiness, as Denise describes. Another I’m getting to really feel for myself is to feel safe in the world – to have a dense physical presence so I don’t have to feel all that’s ugly out there; to bury my sensitivity so I have a pseudo-sense of strength (as opposed to vulnerability). The task now is to make friends with my sensitivity, and accept my fragility.
You must now bring so much more appreciation to your working having given youself the same blessing/make over.
“I got to a point where I could feel a change in my body as I would buy something. It was like my body was telling me something, but I didn’t want to stop and feel what it was, – I didn’t want to listen to my body.”
I deeply appreciate this level of awareness and honesty Denise, i can relate entirely, its so remarkable how are bodies are constantly responding and talking to us – there is so much to appreciate and learn from this dear companion!
Yes, especially the detail of response when we listen and the love and care in those responses as strange as it sounds.
Shopping has now become a major pastime for a lot of people and this just shows us the level of emptiness that people are feeling if they have to fill their lives with shopping. Isn’t it time to stop and have a look at our lives and how we are living that is bringing about this emptiness inside?
I’ve bought many clothes with the belief of ‘well I just need something to wear, I have nothing!’ In a energy of lack, like I’m not enough unless I’m sporting a new outfit. It’s really interesting all the angles of shopping and buying things for ourselves… there’s comparison, competition, lack of, keeping up appearances etc. Whenever I buy something from a lack I then need compliments to fill me up, whereas when I buy clothes and wear them feeling full and gorgeous from inside if there are compliments I don’t ‘need’ them it’s just confirming what I already feel and know.
‘Buying with an addiction is like continually selling out on myself.’ and then the clothes you purchase constantly remind and confirm the need you were in when you purchased them.
Yes, we lose twice, perhaps three times. We don’t buy what supports us, we have less money and we have something unsuitable in our wardrobe that is not our expression when we do wear it. An expensive combination.
This reminds me of how I could feel not enough, or the idea when this changes or I hoping that life will be different, I have done this, clothes will not fufill us, expression from the inside out rather than relying on the outside, will.
It is so interesting that in every aspect of our lives we can learn in one way or another how we conduct ourselves in life and when we honestly can look at that what what is beneath. The line “I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness; I couldn’t bear to know what it was” says enough to me as that indicates that we do have behaviour that is in avoidance of that what is there to be felt, that aspect of life that is offering us a bigger picture to life, more freedom in choosing to live our way so to say.
Whenever I go shopping from any need or desire I never can find anything I want. When I shop in connection to me and drop any ‘pictures’ I have, I always find the shopping experience more playful and will always be drawn towards clothing or items that are more honouring and supportive of me.
What an amazing sharing on shopping addiction and the true understanding of what is going on “what if i was not filling my addiction but fueling it ” This is a very different understanding and makes sense and of not wanting to feel our amazingness and all we are. When being with ourselves the whole experience takes on a joy confirming who we are beautifully.
‘When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.’ This explains why shopping experiences can be so different. When I am connected and go shopping, the whole experience flows and tends to be super short and sweet as what I need just appears.
This emptiness many of us feel is an interesting one to look at, many of us think we are not feeling empty even though we fill ourselves up and our lives up with stuff and things to occupy ourselves…I know I felt an emptiness that I do not now, I am reconnected from inside out and do not need or want distractions, from this feeling like I once attempted when I felt empty.
Yesterday I brought a dress and I just knew without even trying it on I would love it, like you say there is no doubt when we listen to the body it is either a definite yes or a definite no anything else in between is game we can play yet at the end of the day it comes to have we listened to our body or have we listened to the mind that wants to be recognised in a certain way.
Indeed Samatha, our body knows even which shop to go to where we will find just that piece of clothing that we need to celebrate the glory that we are.
This is a very honest and enormous realisation that there is ‘clothes’ buying addiction – i’m sure many of us women can relate to this to some degree – what is likely that we have in common is that we buy clothes from some deficit, – such as ‘I’m not good enough, so i will buy clothes to keep me unseen, or i will buy clothes to look amazing because i don’t think i’m good enough, underneath these reasons many reasons its to fill or feed an emptiness within. Clothes buying can be a very powerful opportunity to dress us up as women, as an expression to how amazing we are – we start with the self worth rather than the deficit. so how we buy our clothes reflects our inner world, our relationships with ourselves – so there is so much more to buying clothes.
As with any addiction, there is always something underneath that is driving it that we do not want to look at, let alone address. Being addicted to buying clothes is an interesting one as it suggests that by making oursleves look different by wearing something new, it will change how we feel about ourselves on the inside. And although this may be the case for a short time, it is very temporary and can never replace the willingness to look at and then to accept what is fuelling the addiction in the first place.
Yes, Denise, life is one big roller coaster until we stop and feel, surrendering to our inner knowing and the constant messages from our body. From then onwards, things become much more simple and clear.
“What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?”
I clock more and more that I tend to avoid my amazingness because amazingness has nothing to do with indulging but with responsibility.
‘When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.’ This is a complete gamechanger in how we are guided to shop through misguided marketing.
I am all too familiar with buying things out of emptiness and then later when I get them home actually thinking that I did not like the item or left it in the bag, and then eventually it would end up in the cupboard but not worn – probably due to the energy the item was brought in. These days I can be a little bit more discerning when I buy my clothes because I am aware that I do not want to fill my house with unwanted items.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ – It takes true honesty and self-awareness to call things out for what they actually are and by that, be open for true change and true healing.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ This is very wise. Yes, unless we get to the very root of the issue feeding the addiction we will not really heal. The emptiness has to be dealt with at its foundation, its inception. It is similar to working with people with what we might call ‘behaviours which challenge’. We may successfully change the behaviour on the surface level, but if we do not address the root cause another behaviour will take its place.
It’s revealing that we have clothes that we feel better in than others… and this isn’t dictated by price or style, but how willing we are to choose and wear things that we feel amazing in everyday – and not just on certain occasions.
When we value ourselves, their is true appreciation and love, then all choices come from this level of acceptance.
Hi Denise, yes the appreciation of who we are . . . the appreciation of how far we have come and the appreciation of ourselves in general is the key to staying steady and fulfilled within ourselves
I think this addiction can be also much bigger to simply buying in general – i know for myself and others that be it clothes, food accessories etc, there is just something slightly addictive about buying things. I know as a child I wasn’t great at saving my pocket money because I felt like because I had money, I could spend it – I wasn’t spending more than I had but I also wasn’t keeping it and saving up for something and even now as an adult I occasionally feel the same pull – oh i have a bit of spare cash, what do I need, what should I get? We are in a world that is constantly telling you to buy buy buy and we often literally buy into this mentality – but there is also something very supportive in stopping and feeling what’s right for you and perhaps choosing to wait and save the money for another day.
“…What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?…” Appreciation has to be something that we all, especially women do not do enough of… which is simply confirming and enjoying our own unique quality and love.
Yes I love that too – buying clothes in connection with me. I am learning how I really clearly can feel what is right and what not, everything matters from the fabric, to the color, to the style. Yet the key is to not make it that mental tick box exercise, only our bodies truly know what is working for them and I found if I just go for looks often I buy it and not wear it at all.
When in conection whatever is needed comes to us, it is clear and straight to the point and most often than not also a bargain! Thank you Denise.
I really appreciate your honesty and openness Denise. I would say I have had an addiction to buying clothes too. Whenever a purchase is made from a misguided belief that it can make us ‘better’ in some way it can not be truly supportive. Supportive purchases start with our relationship to ourselves.
When we are full – from the inside – we don’t need to go searching for things from the outside to fill us up. These things only last a short while, until we feel the emptiness again and go in search of the next fix, be it clothes, food or other forms of stimulation.
I have started to appreciate how my body feels when I wear things that are truly honouring of myself. This is particularly true of shoes. I really notice the difference when I have shoes that are supportive of my feet and how I walk. Movement has become more and more important to me and having really good shoes is such a vital ‘step’ – excuse the pun – in embracing this fully.
Recently I looked in my wardrobe and here were so many clothes that I realised i used for “dress ups” Different roles I felt I needed to play, rather than clothes that are true of me in any situation. Clothes that are a reflection of me rather than an outfit I am trying to hide in.
A day of steadiness is a day of simplicity and life hums beautifully – no need for thrills when there are these choices.
‘Retail Therapy’ in general can be a great distraction. Sometimes I find I even use a visit to the supermarket for a distraction and it might be cleaning products I need, nothing to do with clothes or even food.
How complex we make our lives by all the diversions we use to not feel what is truly taking place and ask ourselves ‘What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?’ Reading your blog is certainly another stop moment for me to go deeper and not discount all that is taking place. As you say Denise when we no longer come from a need things naturally flow towards us…….and consequently our lives flow with an inner beauty that supports us to be all of who we are in our day.
To go beyond the emptiness to the place where we really feel is the way we deconstruct the power and control that the emptiness has over us – for me it continues to be incredibly liberating to shine light into the shady corners where ‘vacuums’ reside.
Your words remind me Denise just how much we like to make life all about objects, appearances and physical things. We indulge in having more of this or of that, create big stories about which food is good for us but tend to be much more unwilling to look at why all this happens in the first place. It’s like we all know deep underneath that life is first and foremost about the energy and light we align to, but we persist in looking in the cupboards and wardrobes instead. But the Love doesn’t live there – it starts in our heart.
We can buy clothes because of connection–we have outgrown what we have and it’s time to renew our wardrobe. This buying comes with absoluteness there is no doubt in what we are buying nor is there doubt on if we are spending too much money. It is just an absolute honoring of ourselves.
This is the type of buying that supports us in expressing deeper what we have felt.
The clothes we wear can be beautifully confirming of us, when they are chosen from our inner connection. The feel of the fabric, the pattern, the colour the style, every detail communicates. It can be a fun way to express.
Recently I’ve realised that its not only about accepting our hurts, but also accepting our amazingness. How can we every move forward if we don’t start to even consider the fact that maybe we are Devine, maybe we are absolutely amazing underneath of it all, and maybe just maybe, we are all just pure, love?
Feeding and filling the emptiness within manifests itself in so many ways, with often these ‘ways’ becoming addictions. Of course, as you have pointed out Denise, these ways and addictions only take us away from feeling and living our true glory.
“When I buy things in a need from my head, I don’t feel the clothes that I’m wearing, I don’t get to feel what my body is saying”.
Buying clothes from my body for me -what an awesome way of being. When I buy from the head need always gets in the way and need comes from an emptiness within.
I remember always being dressed in the same clothes as my sister growing up.
I always loved this, but my sister did not. I was considering why this was not an issue for me and I think it was because I looked up to my sister and loved her so much that for us to be dressed in same cloths was like a confirmation of the bond we had as sisters. My love for my sister has not changed and we still love similar clothes even though we do not wear the same outfits any more, not that I would mind if we did.
The reason I was did not like being dressed the same as you, dear sister, was because at that time all my friends were wearing mini skirts and fishnet stockings as it was the 60’s and I felt embarrassed dressed the same as my little sister in gathered waisted dresses, with a bow at the back and high white socks and black mary-jane shoes. Then one day Mum did buy me a mod dress and I loved it and was invited to a friend’s birthday and when I arrived wearing my very groovy dress for the very first time I found my friend dressed in a gathered waisted dress, with a bow at the back just like the one I used to be sent to parties in! I found myself making excuses for my dress because I could feel her embarrassment at being dressed by her mother. It was the one time I wished I had been in my old party dress.
I held pictures of how I thought I should dress to be liked and to fit in that lead to a lifelong obsession in clothing and feeling if I could just get my clothes right everything will be ok. I will be accepted and liked. Nowadays I dress for myself.
Such a different energy runs through the body when buying clothes with a view to express all of ourselves with what we wear on a daily basis. Having choice colour/styles in the wardrobe is such fun but, as you share Denise there is a point where buying clothes to fill a ‘need’ or to numb out is a whole new situation to work with. Having clearly myself been a person to ‘hide’ away and ‘numb’ out to extremes with food and clothes it was a huge realisation to watch how I allowed the full outplay of all the tricks to grab my attention away from experiencing if it was a need or a truth that purchasing clothes or eating in a certain way would benefit this amazing body. Lets face it – those moments last for a very short time periods until the next urge kicks in when emptiness would be felt again. No bargain purchase would ever fill that need! How we are on the inside is so reflected out to the world – no clothes worn can ‘bring’ that naturally beautiful emanation.
I also remember I use to buy clothes and as they looked so beautiful I would keep them in the wardrobe for a special day and then realise months and years later I had not really worn them and they no longer felt right so would give them away. I use to use clothes to feed to an emptiness too.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty. ” This is beautiful and a great confirmation for us, that we are full of our own beauty and nothing can fill that place inside of us. Just allowing our own connection to feel and it pours out.
There is such honour and stillness in the moments I am living and knowing that I am full from within not solved from without.
Wearing beautiful things and not keeping everything for best occasions is such a beautiful change in my life allowing a far greater appreciation and joy with myself and my every day.
The addiction to shopping and so many other things comes from the energy we are choosing and the appreciation of ourselves is what makes all the difference to our choices and the love we feel and know from within.The more we live this love the more consistency and joy with everything we are,wear and do becomes.
I can relate to this, I would not buy new things all the time, there are many charity shops in the UK and I would go there to buy a bargain or a good quality clothing, especially if I feel a bit funny and wanted to feel up an emptiness or agitation I was feeling. I have become aware of this and began to observe it rather than fall into it. I have cleared my wardrobe out a few times, due to size changes and have been aware that I have filled it up again with just in case stuff, rather than being very clear about what I am worth and require to support my body, expression and life. Great discussion that so many women and men can relate to.
” got to a point where I could feel a change in my body as I would buy something.”
Through living in a way that fosters and supports greater homeo stasis/settlement within our bodies, we are able to clock when something stimulates. I bought some food in the supermarket for my children the other day and felt a strangely uncomfortable eagerness in my movements, I realised that I was using the justification that it was for my children when in fact it was me who was craving the food.
I like the phrase “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness” as this is exactly what we are doing if we buy anything out of a need instead from our fullness to confirm who we are. We are feeding the emptiness and thus maintain its existence by our own choice, we are maintaining this self created way of being and in that avoid to live who we truly are..
Yes, this is a great quote which exposes the futility of our pursuit to fill an emptiness with acquirement, when in truth this sensation of emptiness is simply the disconnect from ourselves and what we feel and does not actually exist when we surrender into building back our natural connection.
Actually you could say that in feeling an emptiness we have two choices, either we fill it out of a need or we fill it with that where we come from and belong to which is love. Actually you could say we are invited to become more love as there is an empty space in us, void of the quality we belong or ought to be.
When we make ‘the love that we feel for ourselves’ the most important thing when buying something, we are far more likely to come out with a piece of clothing (or whatever else) that will support us to deepen this relationship with ourselves.
We all have a million different ways of feeding the emptiness within, but none of them work bar the inner connection, the love that is within.
Great point Heather, if we used the same amount of time and energy that we do on distracting ourselves and feeding our emptiness and instead put the focus on loving and appreciating ourselves, how very different our lives would be.
‘I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them.’ – I too used to have the attitude that I needed to save certain clothes for a ‘better’ occasion, only to find that when they were ready to be cleared out of my closet they had hardly ever been worn…
Yes Eva, this is an interesting aspect of life to look at, why are we doing that and what purpose do we serve with this? To me I can say that having clothes in the closet that I rarely wear I always have bought them from an image from the mind and not from how I felt that what would support me in my delicateness and in my expression, claimed from the body. Although by clothes out of a need is something that is still happening to me but I do not hold on to these pieces of clothing anymore, as I simply renounce from where I have bought these and then discard them from my closet, otherwise I continue to fool myself with the idea that one day I will wear this piece again, but in fact I will never do and with that only feed the emptiness in me that is not at all in accord to who I am.
An addiction to anything simply means that we feel an emtiness inside that we desire to fill with something from without. We can be strict with ourselves and stop the behaviour, or we can look deeper and bring love into our own lives and fill up from within. The latter means we do not have to look outside of ourselves for satisfaction anymore.
I used to spend a lot of money on clothes, and so looked forward to a day out shopping but would often end up with clothes that I thought reminded me of other people, rather than myself. Now I go quite infrequently but when I do, I find clothes that I can look in the mirror and see how all of me shines back.
A very clear analogy that explains it perfectly. Whenever I got to the end of a roller coaster ride, I’d either want to get off because I felt so sick or scared….or be desperate to do it again, both of which are pretty hideous states of tension to be in!
What I have also found has changed hugely is the way I shop in that now that I am so much less impressionable, I can shop with much more purpose. There is still celebration to be had and fun to be had, but the decision making process is infinitely clearer and speedier. And also I find that I don’t get drained by it all. Clothes shopping used to exhaust me. Not so anymore. Where there is purpose, there is energy.
I have been a serial victim of fashion, labels, ideals, images…a multitude of forces that have infected my choices. But more and more I am choosing what feels right for me, for that day, for that purpose. It’s very liberating.
As your partner and your friend I have observed this shift in you, and what I see is that you no longer use your clothes as a protection, to project an image of yourself, you now wear clothes that reflect the settlement in your body, the openness and celebration you now feel in expressing who you truly are. For someone that works in central London, in fashionable districts such as Soho, your reflection will be a mighty breath of fresh air!
‘When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience. There is no thinking from your head, “Do I love this or not?” There is no part of you that has to get a second opinion: your body is there to tell you.’ – Beautifully shared and this principle applies to everything we purchase.
Yes, I love this simplicity of knowing from the body too in which I can trust and feel solid and unwavering in what I choose. A great article Denise, thank you.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Its interesting when we are addicted to something that we think we are filling ourselves up with so that we dont feel whatever it is we dont want to feel, whereas it is in fact a self perpetuating situation that doesn’t go away until we choose to look at why and what it is we are trying to fill.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.” Denise I love this, it is the answer to all the worlds problems if we embrace our part and our responsibility for our connect to Soul then everything will naturally take care of itself.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.” Awesome statement and a true gift to us all. We have no need to seek outside of our selves in any shape or form because we all carry the warmth and beauty we seek inside, we just need to connect to it.
I have still problems to say this cloth is supporting me and this one not, as I made the experience when I am full of love and expressing this this will be seen no matter what kind of clothes I wear.
There can also be an addiction to charity shops and buying clothes at bargain prices. It is the same thing. It is important to cut the energy that feeds the drive to always want more, not appreciate what we have already and who we are.
Spending money that doesn’t come from the fullness of who we are will just feed the emptiness that already is in us. Admitting this and (still) appreciating myself is a process I am still in. To me the honesty in this blog is inspiring. Only through honesty am I able to have a clearer view on myself. Am I willing to go that road and share more and more of the light and love that I am? Do I choose to buy and wear (!!) clothes that reflect everything that I am or do I dress down? I remember myself buying a new, very colourful and beautiful shirt and as soon as I got home I put it in the cupboard. After a few weeks I talked to a friend and shared my doubts about the shirt. During that conversation I felt that I was actually afraid to wear the shirt as I would be (more) seen. After wearing it for the first time, it became my favourite shirt. Since then I can feel there’s a forever evolving relationship with clothes.
Ah thank you Denise, you make it so unmistakably clear that connecting to just who we are is the essential ingredient in life. We are all designed to wear our own Love everywhere, otherwise there is an emptiness that is there. Then it really doesn’t matter what flavour or shape that it takes – there will be an intensity and addiction that comes to fill the gap in. All of this need not be if we just hold on to our quality and feel how truly beautiful and lovely we are.
Beautifully said Joseph – bringing all of ourselves in full and living in this expression is all we are here to do.
I have realised that i actually keep clothes for a very long time – I still have a couple of pairs of shorts from when I was 18, that’s 20 years ago – time they go in the bin. It feels like holding on to clothes is also related to not letting go.
It’s interesting that “when I buy things in a need from my head, I don’t feel the clothes that I’m wearing, I don’t get to feel what my body is saying.” So in effect we can say that we can either buy clothes that deliberately make us less, or we can buy clothes in a way that support us to be all that we are.
There’s a lot of consciousnesses about needing goods such as clothes, food, a car etc. What often misses is the heart, a true impulse to buy something. That’s how we’ve created a world together where goods are IT, instead of making the love that we feel for ourselves the most important. This blog clearly shows that we are able to turn the tide and make different choices!
Shining from the inside out is far more beautiful than any sleek and well managed exterior!
And not to mention that the shiny exterior doesn’t hide a thing.
We can really trick ourselves even with the way we use the word addiction, and only see it as someone who is addicted to smoking, drugs, drinking, food, sport etc, but what about within our daily lives, have we formed habits or rhythms? Great to look at the details of our day and what may or may actually be an addiction that is truly not serving us.
Food cannot fill an emptiness, it can only distract us from feeling how empty we are, that is why it has to be a continual food fest so we can numb ourselves from feeling.
Addictions can only exist when we are choosing to not live the fullness of our inner beauty and expressing who we truly are.
I have always had a difficult relationship with clothes… no matter how hard I worked to find what suited me my wardrobe would never truly hold me.
Like Denise, I have discovered that I simply need to be willing to feel and get more connected, then I don’t need to go out searching because what supports me shows up without effort.
As Denise mentions, the addictions we use to try not to feel our discomforts will never fill that emptiness, instead it feeds the emptiness; the illusion that we are not enough or something is wrong with us.
There is soo much we can learn about ourselves from the relationship we have with our clothes, how we wash and wear them.
“In my raciness, I had forgotten this amazing connection that I used to have with my clothes” yes when we get too involved in our lives, we get busy and into a drive, we can loose that connection, not only to our clothes but also ourselves.
I love how you have exposed how easily we can substitute one addiction with another and what we may consider a ‘better’ addiction – the games of distraction are seemingly endless and it takes deep honesty and awareness to truly break these patterns.
It is amazing the extent of emotional attachments we develop to things.
We can often be hesitant to apply the word addiction to a behaviour, saving it for the obvious addictions of drugs or gambling – but what if we develop the same kinds of addicted behaviours with our phones/computers/games, with food or TV or sports – anything we do that alters our state of being so we don’t have to feel?
Great question Denise; “If I’m hooked into anything that is not about me feeling the fullness of ‘me’, then what am I truly reflecting?” A Question to ponder deeply when we do not feel the fullness of who we truly are. A gorgeous reminder, thank you.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.”
How our tricky spirit craves constant feeding of its own emptiness in so many ways, that we don’t recognise as an addictive behaviour. It is great to bring awareness to the wardrobe and its contents in this way.
Yes, Denise. Everything we choose, what clothes we buy and how we wear them, is an expression of our inner state of being, reflecting so much if we are open to it.
As I child I can remember feeling absolute joy when shopping for clothes and loving the time with my mum as we played around with different outfits in different shops. It’s interesting how since then shopping became a need and a time where I would criticise how tired and drained I looked or that I didn’t feel the clothes suited me etc., I feel it’s time to take some of my childhood playfulness with me next time I go shopping for me.
From a certain perspective being addicted to buying clothes could be seen as fairy innocuous when compared to other addictions out there, however as with all behaviours that stem from lack or an emptiness this is a serious symptom that speaks loudly that all is not well. To have taken an honest look at it, recognise it for what it is and to feel into why that behaviour manifested and to clear it is inspirational.
A reality about hidden addictions and the underlying truth about why we have them allowing true healing to take place. Then the what to choose and wear from a fulness comes alive and shopping can become about truly supporting ourselves instead of from an emptiness and need . What a difference this would make to us all.
Until we actually get to the real root cause of our pain and emptiness, our addictions merely change shape. The more we return to our inner essence and allow this divine quality to occupy our entire body, the more our addictions fall away. What is truly surprising is just how the more subtle ones come to light the more we return to our true and delicious qualities.
Where the world is at today it supports and encourages you be to caught up in the material and consumable world. Be that clothes, technology, food it doesn’t matter which one they all have the same quality if we are buying them in a way that is to numb what we are feeling and to avoid it at all costs.
So many people must experience the same thing with buying clothes. But how many of us stop to think about the reason behind it? The awareness here is awesome and will help bring other people’s issues and behavioural patterns to light.
Denise, I can feel how true this is, having bought clothes that were ‘ok’, not too pretty or that stand out too much and definitely not too expensive, ‘When we buy clothes in the energy of ‘I’m not enough,’ we are setting ourselves up each day to feel less, like we are watering down who we are, our power as women’, when I do wear something that I love and have bought in the energy of me being worth it and not having bought it because it was cheap then this feels very conforming of my beauty and power.
We are already away from our self or otherwise we would not indulge in addiction.
That was a great reality check, adding up all the documents to know exactly how much you were spending. We then know the exact amount and this often shocks us back to sensibility.
Our addiction to buying clothes ends when we accept and claim our innate Love, worth and beauty. Often, buying clothes fills a need, an emptiness, we try to match false pictures held in our heads. Without that inner connection we usually, miss the mark, make the wrong choices and feel less.
I learnt a while ago that the difference between shopping when I’m full of myself, rather than in a need for something, produces a totally different result. In particular, clothes just jump off the rail when I’m in the flow – effortless and gorgeous as it should be.
Your sharing shows us that we can fill the ‘gap’ – or rather the separation from our Soul with a vast array of things, such as buying clothes, food snacking, watching serial TV episodes one after the other, drugs, sugar, busy-ness, computer games… the list is endless… and these can easily become repetitive behaviours leading to dependancy and addiction. Your sharing shows that you can get to the nuts and bolts of why and turn around and bring an end to such addictions by the choice to self love.
I wonder if the fact that buying clothes is an expensive habit is also important here? Why the need to deprive yourself of money? It sounds trite but there are cheaper ways to fill an emptiness, many of them.
It is fascinating how our minds think we have ‘dealt with’ an issue, and yet our bodies constantly reflect our issues to us… until we have truly determined the root cause and taken responsibility for that choice. How wise and powerful is the intelligence of our bodies.
Denise, what you have shared here makes for a greatly powerful blog that I know I can certainly relate to. I found myself skipping over the words “All that I needed to do was STOP and FEEL” as there was something about them that I didn’t want to stop and feel upon reading! And that was the simplicity of this choice to recognise and stay with the body at a time when something else (a series of thoughts and beliefs) that don’t belong to us is running the show. This powerful message can be used and applied to any (and every!) situation in life if we apply it.
‘One of the things that I noticed about this addiction was that I had stopped buying for anyone else.’ I had to read this several times and reflect on my clothes.
Clothes are such a great point of reflection. Years ago I would literally wear the scruffiest, baggiest clothes ever! And my figure was great but I felt horrible about myself because I was carrying not weight but energy that I found distasteful so I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. And last week I discovered many trousers I have are about 3 inches too large around the waist – how did I not realise this?! Hiding again.
So I have considered clothes in relation to others – not wanting them to feel the yucky energy I was carrying and now, as I let go of this energy and feel my essence more, I would like to wear clothes that do express how beautiful I am within. So actually buying clothes for others to see this beauty and be inspired is something I am on the cusp of exploring as I am inspired by many beautiful women who are celebrating their sacredness and beauty.
I love the quote “I wasn’t feeling the emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness” – when we do that, the hole gets bigger and bigger, so we need to buy more things, eat more food, and have crazier thoughts (trust me I know this one!), but the settlement of feeling the void and healing it cannot be compared to any sweet, expensive clothing, or even the greatest idea!
“When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.” I love it when I buy something from that space I always feel so lovely when I wear it and as a result as you say Denise “There is no part of you that has to get a second opinion: your body is there to tell you.”
When I was younger I was super service when I went shopping to the point that I would revisit the same shops multiple times before making a decision. Now I often find that the items I truly require are much easier to find and feel right from the start.
This is true Michael. When we know who we are and true to ourselves finding clothes to confirm this becomes much easier.
It is amazing how when we don’t deal with the underlying issues we just shift the abusive behaviour to another action. We really have to deal with the root causes of our tension and disharmony.
Exactly. When we find that root cause we then have a choice to deal with that root cause and often the behavior disappears completely. Sometimes, there can be more than one cause but finding each cause makes a major difference.
Addiction to suffering, misery, being less, reducing ourselves to be so much less than we naturally are may be the number one addiction right after our incessant need to create an individual ‘I’; actually both going hand in hand. It makes no sense to the human being experiencing such disharmony and at times extreme perversion, but not so for the spiritual inhabitant of the body that is voraciously seeking more of it Self, ie identification as an individual.
If we don’t look at why we are needing to fill, comfort or distract ourselves we can easily replace one addiction with another.
There are so many distractions we use that take us away from feeling and being with ourselves. We put great effort into swapping one thing for another to kill any space that would naturally otherwise be there.
Very important point you make here Linda – “In not wanting to feel the emptiness I was also avoiding feeling my true beauty underneath.” Isn’t it just strange that we will go to such extents to not feel and connect to that beautiful being that is us? How awesome the world will be when humanity has gotten that we are all amazing beautiful beings equally so and then there will be no more comparison, striving for things or the need to fill up perceived voids.
This is a great tool to use when buying clothes and one I will take with me:”When I buy things in a need from my head, I don’t feel the clothes that I’m wearing, I don’t get to feel what my body is saying.” I have done this with buying shoes, and my body totally lets me know and I am fully connected when I buy them, I have not truly extended this into buying clothes to the detail that you have described here, so that will now change, thank you.
Oh what a realisation – “Looking into my wardrobe made me feel sick.” – And that from you working as a wardrobe make-over person for others, wow. How awesome that you got to feel this in such detail and the changes you were able to make after and being in full appreciation of the amazing being that you are – awesome sharing, thank you
This is such an awesome realisation: “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” When we truly look at our lives what we do, there will be many things we do to feed this emptiness, it can be with food, alcohol, excessive sport, gaming, social media – all just feeding the emptiness as it makes us want to do it again and again … all in order to not feel.
Addiction comes up in various forms until we call it for what it is – an addiction that the body craves to not be us. It is a trick of the spirt and it is great to be honest about this and call it for what it is.
Very true, we often fool ourselves by substituting the ‘bad’ with so called healthy choices instead of bringing our awareness to the root of the issue.
‘What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am and that I don’t need clothes or anything else to fill me?’ – The things we do to avoid feeling our own amazingness is utterly clever and cunning.
Our clothes can be very confirming. I know from experience that the way I dressed/dress (and what I consequently confirm) is very different in a withdrawn state, to one where I am willing to be seen. I don’t mean showy, just simply dressing the real me.
Whether it is clothes, food, alcohol, tv, sport etc, nothing can actually make our bodies feel full of love and joyfulness apart from the love and connection to our soulful essence.
It goes to show that we are forever moving on and out-growing our former mark of evolution.
Hear hear, we are cracking the old stagnation and responding to the pull to greater awareness.
Reflecting on our behaviours and choices and our true intention behind them and what we gain from adopting them is well worth considering wisely.
It is interesting to feel how we have been addicted to all sorts of things as a way to get out of feeling what is really going on. When it is about food, we make the issue about dieting and losing weight, when it’s about clothes, we make the issue about not having enough money. We have to take steps further back to feel into what is the energy causing the addiction, what feeling we are trying to escape from, rather than trying to sort out the addiction.
Shopping can be so supportive, it really comes back to our willingness to honour ourselves as you have shared.
Spot on Abby – intention is everything.
The rush of buying something new and bringing it home and wearing it is very addictive – I used to feel down if I went out without coming back with something new. Now that need for the quick pick me up isnt there because I have worked on deepening my relationship with myself.
Pondering on addiction I realise just how we can get addicted to pretty much anything, whether it be buying clothes or indulging in thoughts that allow astral energy in – the latter of which I realise I have not being saying no to with an absoluteness. I therefore realise I have been addicted to allowing the astral in so as not to claim full responsibility for myself and all that that entails.
It is when we leave ourselves that we give space for the raciness to take over, when we are steady and with our bodies the raciness has no place.
looking at the debt I had on my credit cards it is clear of that I had an addiction to buying clothes. I would spend a fortune with no concern as to how I would pay it back and forever feeding the need to statisfy the emptiness I felt within.
“The clothes we choose to wear can support us far more then we realise.” The quality that the clothes are made in to start with can either support us or drain us. Cheap clothes made in sweat shops around the world come imbued with that energy. It is still an ongoing lesson for me, but the more I take time to really feel the quality of the clothing I am buying, the more enjoyment and use I get out of it.
I love clothes and having sorted them out makes a great difference. I now wear those clothes which I have never or seldom worn, because they were too precious to wear daily. It shows me more that I am worth to wear clothes which are not second choice but first choice.
A great moment to reflect and realise our relationship with clothes is when we come to clear out our wardrobe, and discover clothes that we haven’t worn and even some with the tags on!…
Reading your post again Denise, i’m looking forward to cleansing my wardrobe and really having a feel as to which clothes really are confirming [of me] and which aren’t. It’s a super exercise in feeling spaciousness and in this – appreciation.
Hear hear – me too on my return to Australia soon – I can already sense a lot will leave…hopefully I will have something left to wear 😉
A buying-clothes addiction is not so uncommon I suspect but one far more easily rationalised as ‘a woman thing’ (generally) than something considered in the same light as heroin or alcohol. It’s affect if we’re truly honest and as they say in Vietnam… same, same but different.
This is really interesting. Although I do not buy clothes in this way all the time, I am definitely a binge buyer of clothes. A point to reflect on what is happening when this happens.
It is easy to look at a heroin addict and tell that they have a problem coping with life, much harder to look at someone who fits the mould of normality and see that they equally have their own coping mechanisms that are just as dysfunctional.
Valuing ourselves and the love that we are innately, are what others truly notice first. When we are full of our own love, then the clothes we choose to wear are just reflecting the love we hold for ourselves. The most beautiful garment that we could ever wear is our own self love.
The idea that if something is cheap we have to buy it is so ingrained but I love your point and it is indeed important to feel if we really want it instead of just buying it because it is cheap and a ‘good buy’!
Yes, the marketing companies have gotten it ‘right’ and have found the weak spot in humanity – the lack of self-love and self-worth hence ‘cheap’ is where it’s at.
What a amazing realization Denise – and so many people getting on this. Retail is supporting this habit/issue with clothing that is worth it just one season – if at all. So much clothing is in a very bad quality – we would not buy this if we would be connected to our true worth and own high quality. Thats the one thing – the other is: I know for my own how it is to buy cloths to hide and/or fulfill an emptiness. Than I buy clothing that is ‘so beautiful’, to cover my insecurity and to ‘buy’ me some beauty – denying and negating my own beauty, which is always there, but comes with the responsibility of being divine and powerful.
Its a viscious cycle we perpetuate in codependent relationships be it with people or objects.
Nothing can replace the value of who we are, it doesn’t need the most fancy or expensive things. Time and time again I come back to feeling this truth, the wealth is within.
Absolutely – treasuring our divine brilliance is well worth every moment of living this truth.
So true, who we are and the value that we bring is not to be found in our clothes or status or anything but in our connection to our selves and to others.
I used to also save what I deemed my ‘good’ clothes for ‘special’ occasions. Then I considered what was I calling a ‘special’ occasion and realized this was a concept and so decided that every day was a ‘special’ day. I now wear what ever I feel to wear and it is great, because my ‘good’ cloths get worn and are not just sitting in the cupboard for a ‘special’ day.
It is a very sobering thing to add up your receipts and hold the tangible proof that all is not well. This can be applied to any aspect to bring an honesty to what’s going on, recording our feelings and behaviours when viewed en mass can highlight what needs to be addressed – when otherwise our mind can make all kinds of excuses for the seemingly harmless, intermittent one-off occurrences.
You make a great point here Denise that when we are fully connected to our bodies no second opinion is needed: we just know, with every inch of our body whether something is true or not. When we’re in our heads trying to figure it all out, or needing verification from others, it’s because we’ve shut down from what we can feel in our bodies so then it feels like we don’t know, when actually we do.
That commitment to return to who we truly are is absolutely a step by solid step process. No shortcuts, no quick fixes.. we have to be willing to see all of our failings and weaknesses, and work on them partly by appreciating all the amazingness that we bring.
Addictions can be anything from clothes to coffee and everything in between. But what you so beautifully share is that if we don’t look at the core issue to why we are numbing ourselves with what ever vice we choose then we will just transfer it to another one. Seeking support and true healing which I too have done with the support of Serge Benhayon, I have been able to truly heal the issue and enjoy being with myself, so no need to seek anything to full me up.
“When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.” I agree, and always observe with wonder how things constellate without any effort when we are simply going with the flow.
Buying clothes is a very delicate process for me. It’s about honouring and cherishing myself. Allowing myself to be joyfully me. Or powerfully me, or playfully me etc. Since taking more care of me in regards to buying clothes it has been an interesting and forever expanding and unfolding experience. Recently I can feel how I am wearing more ‘adult-like’ clothes. The clothes really ignite the power that resides within me. Getting to know me through buying and wearing clothes, how sacred and lovely this is!
Amazing – no matter how full of beautiful clothes our wardrobes may be when we come to realise that it is how beautiful we feel in ourselves then we are free from the need for anything outside of us to confirm who we are.
‘However I didn’t go out, so I didn’t wear them, and they would sit in my wardrobe’ – In the same way that we bury our feelings, observations and issues, when we shop in emotions then the items we buy become representations of that emotion and are thus shut in a dark cupboard just the same.
The ‘Stop and Feel’ moment is key here, the moment of honesty where we are willing to admit that something is wrong and we actually know what it is when only we allow ourselves to come back to what we already know within the body. This then is a moment of choice – back into the old or open up for what feels true.
Buying clothes out of a feeling of emptiness satisfies me for a few hours, but ultimately it magnifies the emptiness, as that is the energy in which they were bought. There is no real joy in it. Buying clothes when I need them or out of the joy of celebrating myself feels totally different. We can apply this to anything.
I love the title: Addiction to buying clothes! It is very rare that we name behaviours like this as an addiction. I feel that I open up to understanding what addiction actually means. A repetitive behavior that isn’t loving that we seemingly can’t stop. And that we are not to judge ourselves or another. Recognizing and understanding are very powerful. And a great start to feel what is really going on. That there’s always a need, an emptiness that we try to run away from. Everybody does that. We’ve all ran away from our loving essence. In a million different ways. What if we would treat each other from the foundation of appreciation and understanding. Not mentally, but from our very own body. That receiving and giving support will return to being normal again!
I find with clothes that you can either buy things that support you to move forward in life, or buy clothes that keep you stationary. Buying clothes that help you step forward and claim what’s ahead of you is a massive support – and I don’t mean if you are dieting buying a smaller size, but buying an item that when you wear confirms that “yes this is who I am, and this is where I’m going”.
Until we actually address the emotions underlying our addictions, we will just hop from one to another. You gave up food, but got addicted to ‘Retail Therapy’ instead. I gave up smoking and started drinking alcohol. What is common for both us is that when we were encouraged to re-connect to our innermost, we have been able to address the root cause of our addictions, a separation from true self. (The Gentle Breath Meditation being a key tool in this process) Once we connect, the drive in the addiction begins to crumble and our behaviour naturally changes.
Denise this is such an important article to write, as we all need to really look deeper into the reasons behind the things we do and the lengths we go to, to not feel how gorgeous we all are and the energy behind it all.
Has anyone shopped for clothes in Vietnam and felt the pleasure of connecting to the shop owners and the joy that this brings. There is never an addiction, when shopping to claim and share our Love. An addiction is that which is toxic and poisonous to the body because it keeps us from connecting to the Soul.
‘I stopped this and then started to look for a good bargain and I would find myself saying, “It only cost $10.” But I did wear them.’ What I love about clothes is it is not the cost of them that matters it is how we feel in them when we wear them that counts.
I spent years fueling an emptiness with buying clothes. I would get caught up in the initial buzz and then feel deflated, it was like living on a roller coaster of emotion as I searched outside of me for the answers which I held within.
Doing something that costs money without receiving value – if we do that a lot we make want to look at the money side of it, why we are depriving ourselves of money?
I never used to enjoy clothes shopping and I now realise this was because I didn’t appreciate how gorgeous I actually am. I always wanted to look like something I am not, which would never have come close to the fullness of me. Now, when I try anything on, if I don’t absolutely love it, I won’t buy it, because I’m worth more than clothes that just feel or look ok.
“I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them” – classic Denise, I had this with ‘work clothes’ versus ‘going out/good clothes’ and would never wear either set to the other aspect. When I started to live more wholly, or as-one and enjoy ‘me’ and ‘my body’ more, I found this distinction disappearing and would (and do) wear whatever feels great for me to be wearing that day.
‘At first I would buy really expensive dresses to go out in the evening. However I didn’t go out, so I didn’t wear them, and they would sit in my wardrobe.’ – this reminds me of a false ideal that I have held, that a very expensive dress will make me look more beautiful, which, of course it never can. Beauty comes from the inside out, from the knowing that we are beautiful and the living appreciation of this fact. Our beauty is then expressed in our every movement.
Its an interesting and almost easy to miss line at the start of this blog about losing weight but not addressing the issue. Dieting need never occur when we address why we wish something in the first place. If we can accept food is used to comfort and dull senses and feelings then we have a great basis for understanding our feelings better and why we wish to block this.
My addiction has not been buying clothes, it has been worrying, which is another way of avoiding feeling myself fully in the present moment, and appreciating who I am and what I bring to that moment, it might be lightness, grace, playfulness, delicateness, or love. We run away from our innate beautiful qualities, when it is so simple to make another choice.
Yes, especially when we are ready to deal with the consequences of that other, more loving choice, which is a great choice.
We can buy clothes for many different reasons other than just for the enjoyment and yumminess of wearing them; great insights are gained when we get honest and then look deeply into what is behind our addictions, no matter how harmless or inconsequential they might seem.
This touches on a very important subject – about the addictions that go unnoticed in all of our societies today.
When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them. Yes Denise, I find the same thing. When I feel to buy something and I am in my fullness, I always find exactly what I need that confirms and supports me, and in the right colour for me.
I notice how much I have been driven to buy certain items of clothing with images of seeking approval and recognition. In the past I went along with these thoughts without much consideration to how they affect me and quality of my expression. I had no awareness how my choices also affected others, but now I understand how every choice and the quality of my thoughts and expression not only affects me but everyone around me and beyond. I still have these thoughts and images come through but the difference is I am so much more aware of how harmful they are. By being aware of the quality of my thoughts, I am able to discard images that seeks recognition and as a result allows space for me to reconnect and appreciate the beauty that is naturally within me that seeks no form of recognition what so ever.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ What you say here Denise, reveals ‘the nature of the beast’. Emptiness is like a gaping hole that can never be filled and it is always starving and devours every morsel like a hungry dog. It drives us to continuously seek its fodder until we eventually face the fact that it is an insatiable void and we start to feel what is really going on – we are missing ourselves, the love that we hold within. Once we reconnect to that, the emptiness can no longer exist, just as darkness is banished when the light is turned on.
I love the way you have expressed all of this Sandra. And its true, darkness is banished when the light is turned on.
After many years of wearing second hand or second rate, cheap clothing I came to the point where I could see that the clothes I was choosing to wear were holding me back. I didnt feel like they were a reflection of where I was at. In the last few years I feel the time when it feels true to go shopping for clothes, these times are when I feel really connected and often it feels like the clothes I find are just waiting for me and when trying them on my whole body lights up.
The deepening appreciation you now have for yourself is gorgeous, Christopher, and reflected in your new wardrobe.
Love your sharing – I had not heard that from a man before and to hear your joy in expressing how your body lights up now is beautiful, thank you.
Christopher I love your description of how the body ‘lights up’ , indeed it does when something is right and equally it feels very dull and lacklustre when we’re about to make a decision that doesn’t serve us.
“There is no thinking from your head, “Do I love this or not?”” – I find it is just a knowing and my body says ‘yes I love it’.
Me too Sandra, I put something on and it just feels right and I love it
Yep, I find once I have to ponder upon if I like it or not or if I feel awesome in it or not or worse to come – have to ask someone else what it looks like on me – it’s all over, it’s not it.
It’s a great point how we can just transfer an issue from one behaviour to another if we don’t truly resolve what is playing out within us – we may stop a harming behaviour but if we don’t also get underneath what was driving us to behave in that way then the energy remains and gets expressed in a different way…
It is so true, that unless we stop and feel the underlying issue that we are self medicating with a compulsive behaviour or substance we will simply switch from one addiction to another.
Indeed, and at some stage when awareness gets more and more, these addictions can be very subtle indeed…
It’s an important lesson to understand why you do things.. How you carry out the same daily behaviors – are they really supporting you or not?
My ill-behaviour is eating to numb the pain. I have done this for as long as I can remember to the point now I’m in constant pain in my digestion. This numbing behavior is now hurting myself more. Instead of ‘being hard’ on myself and forcing unwanted behaviors I now honour my inner beauty that was not honoured and this starts with my own love that I know – inclusive innate tenderness and utmost love and delicateness.
I like how you have exposed another hidden addiction some may have. I never allowed myself to buy anything new until the last 5 years or so because before that I was caught in the not valuing myself enough and the oh I am saving the planet if I wear someone else’s old clothes! These days I appreciate myself more and I enjoy buying myself a nice piece of clothing if I feel to but for me luckily it is not an addiction.
Fascinating isn’t it Rosie how buying too many clothes can be an equal indicator or inner disharmony as not being able to buy any. I,like you, fell into the category of not being able to spend a decent amount of money on new clothes due to a lack of self worth. That feeling of not really valuing myself permeated into all areas of my life and set the stage for what I was therefore going to experience. I now know that it is how we feel on the inside that then sets up what we experience on the outside. A loop, if you will that will keep going round and round until we actively make moves to step out of it and consciously make our own tracks. And those tracks will then eventually lead us back to God, whereas the loop will forever keep us away from him.
Yes, lack of self worth also led me at times to spend all my money on my animals but none on me… No money for a massage or a Chakra-puncture session but the animals were taken care of. I laugh at this now as I make sure I am on the top of the list!
Could choosing to not value ourselves be another form of addiction? What is an addiction? My understanding is, it is a behaviour or pattern of repeated movements and choices that is driven by an ill energy that seeks to drain our life-force energy, therefore has the potential to create much harm. I realise now that this doesn’t happen by chance but by ones choice to align to the ill energy first.
Well expressed and so true – the choice to align to something other than our true self must come first for the thoughts to be given to engage in behaviour that does not confirm us as the truly amazing beings that we are.
An interesting point you raise Chan Ly regarding not valuing ourselves as being a possible form of addiction. As I have let this sink in – yes, I would agree- and anything that is not love, even in very small details, could easily be an addiction to a consciousness that binds us to it, without us even truly knowing it until awareness is developed.
Its very powerful how much our clothes reflect how we feel about ourselves. I had a fairly long period in my life where I did not buy myself many clothes, and when I did there always seemed to be a compromise as in I bought something as it was on sale, because I liked the colour or because I had seen someone else wearing something similar and thought it looked good on them. Needless to say I ended up with a wardrobe that was a bit of a miss match and nothing that really reflected all of me. However in the last few years this has changed enormously and I now love to choose clothes that are another part of me and my expression as a gorgeous woman.
What I’ve realised is that we can buy clothes not only as you postulate “What if what I didn’t want to feel was how amazing I was, how simply divine I am” but also we can do the opposite and not care about our clothes and wear them year on year to not recognise “how amazing I was, how simply divine I am”. I know I went through the latter in a phase of life that I had totally withdrawn.
Our clothes are a tool from which we can share our expression. Thank you for sharing how we can often use it to hide or to numb other aspects of our life that may not be seen on the outside but felt deeply from within.
I can really feel how different I feel wearing certain clothes and we really must be more aware of this as it affects those around us too as we are all reflections for each other. The other day, I realised what I was wearing really had to go. There was nothing wrong with it, no stains or anything, but just a bit too big for me and I felt old and daggy in it and who wants to waste a day feeling less than amazing when you know how good it feels to dress with clothes that really support you to be you.
To buy cloth that really fits you on all level makes so much fun and than to wear them with the knowing that everyone can feel it makes it even more fun.
‘I was using something to make me feel better about myself.’ – A fabulous expose Denise – how common is it to look for a distraction when we feel something is out of sorts rather than allowing ourselves to feel what is going on, it is so true what you are saying, the emptiness cannot be filled from the outside no matter how much we distract ourselves, it will only take us further and further away from ourselves and our inner beuty and power.
We are all looking to constantly stifle our gnawing agitation with anything we can find. It does not matter if it is heroin or shopping, it all serves the same purpose and that is to quash and cover up our bubbling angst. An angst that ultimately arises out of our separation with our fundamental selves, the truth of who we are, our everlasting selves.
This is quite a profound statement Denise… “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Our patterns of behaviours can be so subtle and devious but it can be a fascinating process to expose what is not true, then choose differently next time, and observe how much our world and the way we live changes.
Some clothes I would buy regardless of the price (over £100) if it was a dress I particularly liked, for example, but recently, while waiting for all my expensive clothes to arrive by ship, I had a lot of fun looking through second-hand shops called Op Shops here in Australia, and bought one or two outfits that suited my new slim figure – because they didn’t cost much I felt I could have fun experimenting.
I used to buy a lot from Op Shops but don’t anymore as I found that I would just buy it because it was cheap but not because it was what I really wanted or what I felt great in. Yes, once in a blue moon I would find a piece that was made for me, but most of the time, I was just settling and I don’t want to settle for second hand or second best anymore. I would rather wait.
I can remeber a time when nothing I owned was good enough – no matter what I wore and the different clothes i got in different styles, it never matched what I wanted to look like in my head based on the pictures I had created from the media and those around me that I wanted to be like.
Now I dress far more for me and my obsession with new clothes and looking a certain way is much better – i feel beautiful and myself in what I wear.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” we always think we buy things or eat food to “fill up” something we are missing yet you raise a great point, by doing that we feed the emptiness further in a never ending cycle.
When we use anything to help us fill a space within us, we may get short-term relief, but in reality the void does not get filled at all. And not only that, the lack we experience within us actually gets magnified! This understanding in itself is absolutely huge.
That’s true – seeking to fill the space within is a constant chasing of our own tail.
Not needing anything because we are full of love is an amazing feeling which we miss out when we go the other direction.
Yes it is a great feeling to be so full up that you don’t need to seek anything from outside.
“I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt.” The core condition of the addiction and one that we can never satisfy all the time we search for fulfillment in the external world. Material objects, substances and activities can never fill the void, making the effort to connect with our bodies, to feel our selves and seek our inner tender stillness does.
When I really feel into buying clothes, I love the process and I really enjoy the clothes themselves.
‘I got to a point where I could feel a change in my body as I would buy something.’ I still often marvel at the wisdom that is communicated from the body as I am still caught out from coming from my head, and that it can be so simple. Just by staying connected to the body and understanding its communications mean we have an entirely different relationship with life and with everyone around us.
I remember having a similar behaviour in my later 20’s
“I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them. Then when I eventually got rid of clothes, they always looked as if they had never been worn and that was because I hardly wore them!”
I would buy really beautiful expensive clothes in the sales and then never really wear them because I felt they were too good to be worn for anything other than special occasions. This reflected my childhood where we had play clothes and clothes for special occasions and I disliked wearing a dress because when I was a child they were starched and uncomfortable to wear and you cannot really wear a dress to climb trees or have fun. Reflecting on my current wardrobe I have clothes I wear for visiting customers and clothes I have for everyday so may be nothing has changed in this respect?
It is interesting this thing about having special clothes for special occasions that we don’t end up wearing much. I have done this, but these days I am buying clothes more because they fit well and feel great to wear and am wearing my ‘good clothes’ more every day rather than waiting for some special occasion. It feels like I am worth it to wear clothes that look great but are also smart on a daily basis, rather than wearing baggy clothes every day and only leaving my smart clothes when there was some special reason to wear them.
Its funny how when I really want something I find it quite hard to find or spend hours looking online yet so often things that I have found the most supportive I find instantly. It goes to show that what will support us is always given to us.
That is a great point James, because if it is really hard or complicated, it really is a sign, like seriously how hard is this… do I really need this?
I also find that if things seem hard or a struggle then I am not in a flow with life. And so I have 2 options: 1. stop and come back to the flow or 2. override what I am feeling and force myself to continue what I am doing.
Some of us, me especially find it hard to be in the flow because making it complicating and staying in struggle has been a life long habit. I am now aware of this and slowly chipping away at my pattern to make everything a struggle.
Slowly but surely Rosie – I have always wanted things immediately and never wanted to put in the yards and work. Now I am learning the benefit of what putting in the work brings because it means I get to solidify my foundation and so can never return to the ill ways I used to run with. Whereas when I try to skip ahead effectively I am building my house on sand so it will eventually collapse.
whoa! I love how you have worded this James and it makes so much sense. No quick fix, just building with a solid foundation. Thank you.
Thanks Rosie. The more solid we build our foundation the more we have to fall back on. Knowing that we are not perfect and will make mistakes is key. I have found that any short cut I have taken eventually gets exposed not as a punishment but as a way of bringing more love. So I can choose it now or wait until I am forced to see it!
So so true, any shortcut, or half done job eventually surfaces and is felt and seen. It comes around again, and that can be beautiful if what you left behind comes back to support you or quite uncomfortable when your choices come back around and bite you on the bum!
Yes they can be uncomfortable when you choices come back around and as you say bite you in the bum, but the beauty is we are living in cycles and so we get another opportunity to reimprint our lives with absolute love. Or we can continue to stay in the cycle of abuse and disregard – the choice is always ours.
It is a beautiful opportunity that we have to re-imprint and do things again and again until it feels right and then we can move on because we don’t have to keep repeating the same lesson. For me, it is something that I haven not really stopped to appreciate until recently. Its wonderful to look back on life and go yeah, I messed up there for sure but I can re imprint it, change my ways and not keep in an old pattern.
Awesome Rosie and yes it is great when we see what is presented before us as an opportunity to be more of the love we are and so live it rather than beat oursleves up for past choices and then end up further away. We are here to learn after all so any notion of perfection is a trap to take us away from ourselves.
I realised the other evening that we can just give it a go, anything for that matter… it doesn’t matter if we get it wrong because in giving it a go… we may find that its amazing, better than we could imagine… but if we hold back in case we get it wrong we don’t even know.
Very true Rosie, it is far better to make a mistake by giving it a go than to have never even tried. After all we are here to learn and not meant to be perfect so mistakes will happen- the question is do we choose to embrace them and learn from them and so move on or do we want to stay in the cycle of blame and regret which only takes us further away from the love that we are.
Always learning, even re learning the stuff we have already learnt! There is no end to it.
The joy of being a forever student, we do not need to perfect and get to constantly deepen our love by learning from what is before us in each and every moment.
Yes I think that if we think we are perfect, then we are in fact really lost!
We are soo very lost the moment we think we are perfect or need to be perfect.
” noticed how I would start to feel racy, disconnected, unsettled and guilty all at the same time”- I can relate to this level of anxiety which is present when you know you are doing something that is not actually supportive of you but you have to do it anyway. I realised that my addiction to buying clothes was no different to any drug and there would always be a terrible after taste left when I realised that my new purchase did not help my reconnection back to me. Some addictions are more socially acceptable than others but the reasons behind them are still the same, and our society is full of them.
You lost 25 kilos Denise? Although it is at the beginning of the blog, there is a matter of factness about that sentence because you go on to mainly describe about your clothes and your shopping addiction. If there was a survey done, I wonder how many people in the western world want to lose 25 kilos? I would surmise quite a few. In the throwaway lines how you say you did it by understanding how much you had been eating for comfort using food to fill an emptiness in you, and controlling your eating and weight but never really dealt with your issues underneath, herein lies a pot of gold.
Recently worked with someone who reflected that clothes we love shouldn’t be kept for ”special’ occasions. And then met someone that said she had clothes in her wardrobe she hardly wore, kept for special occasions few and far between, if at all. Each day is special and if we feel to wear something, go with how we feel, not what our mind tells us.
The money, time and effort that is spent feeding the emptiness, what could we do if it was applied to supporting the fullness that has always resided within us all?
Probably nearly everyone has some sort of behaviour or addiction as the result of in inner emptiness, loneliness, sadness, tension, insecurity, etc. Some of those behaviours are considered normal, others as extreme or are recognised as disorder or illness. The underlying root cause is in any way the same and needs to be addressed and healed as the harm being done may vary on the surface but not on the inside, it is the same for everyone. What differs is only the coping mechanism and how much that is in line with the socially accepted norm or not. It may even be better to not fit the norm, then at least we are aware that something is not right instead of believing one is okay but wondering why they are unhappy anyway.
You would be an awesome wardrobe makeovers professional because what you speak of and share with others what comes from your own life experience.
It’s such a great point you bring up how we can think we have stopped one thing that we know is not good for us but it simply gets tranferred to another problem or issue because we haven’t dealt with or healed the root cause of the first one. Thanks to Serge Benhayon and the teachings of Universal Medicine hundreds and hundreds of people are healing their core issues.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” A profound understanding underlying addiction.
It’s interesting to observe here, and thinking about my own and others’ addictions, how precisely tailored they are to seemingly ‘answer’ the dilemmas that take hold in our foundational years.
When we claim how divine we truly are, any clothes that we buy are bought with this knowing in our livingness – they will be honouring of who we are and feel gorgeous when we wear them.
Any addiction is is a great reflector of not choosing us and so then arent able to feel our own amazingness as we have stepped away from our own loving support.
To replace a food addiction with a clothes one, it is great to share this Denise and allows us all to see clearly how we deal with issues, and where we swap them out for something new. Essentially it is burying what we don’t feel ready or able to face. Most of us have mini traumas in our lives and it can feel uncomfortable to face them, or perhaps also easy to indulge in them. Being willing to feel vulnerable, raw and fragile are all experiences that can only help in being honest about things we do that are not supporting us in our lives.
Our expression is everything – and clothes are a very direct channel in how we express ourselves. If we are unsure, have body image issues, insecure and/or lacking self worth it is all reflected in the clothes we choose to wear. Same goes for the other side of the coin; if we are feeling sexy, sassy, vivacious and confident, our choice of clothes can represent these qualities gorgeously.
And how good does it feel when a woman walks into the room, full of herself and not afraid to show it, walking her walk, she can look sexy in anything.
‘I now see how I had learnt to control my eating and weight but never really dealt with the issue underneath, so it popped up again in a different form – this time through buying clothes.’ – thank you for sharing so openly and clearly how our ‘un-dealt’ with issues WILL keep occurring in different guises, with the same patterns repeating, until we address the root cause once and for all. It’s so empowering for us to acknowledge this truth.
‘The clothes we choose to wear can support us far more then we realise.’ I am starting to really appreciate this. I have felt this in the negative: wearing clothes I wasn’t 100% sure of that day I am wearing that energy of self-doubt. Sometimes when this happens I have to stop and have a moment of appreciation, feel the delicateness of me and often the clothes I have chosen are actually quite lovely, it’s my discount of myself and them that has tainted them which is easily changed.
Yes it feels like clothes are a great confirmation of how we are feeling – either confirming that we don’t feel great about ourselves, or confirming that we do.
A great sharing Denise. I often fill up on things to make myself feel better or reward myself but in fact where have I gone to have gotten to that point? I love what you say about emptiness ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness’ and that’s the thing we feed it and of course it’s insatiable so we don’t stop until we step back and understand we are not the emptiness and we can choose to build and support us or we can indulge an emptiness. It’s our choice.
I can so relate to not wearing clothes because they were deemed ‘too good. When I was younger I didn’t wear some clothes because I felt I looked too good in them so needed to save those for an occasion only to find that when an occasion came up they were not suitable . . and when I did allow myself to wear them I longer felt they looked good anymore!
Being addicted to buying cloths is no different to being addicted to drugs or any other addiction. We cannot judge any- one who has an addiction, given many of us have been or still are addicted to something.
So true Mary-Louise – addiction is addiction and what ever the flavour, it still serves one purpose… To avoid feeling the fact that we have walked away from our connection within.
We limit addiction to mean drink, smoking, sex and drugs when there are so many more addictive behaviours which we do not want to expose as this would mean far more honesty will the the way we are choosing to live.
I completely understand the addiction you describe and although for me it played out slightly differently, I felt the same emptiness and it’s funny how clothes now find me without any effort or trying and unbelievably (as I never found anything in sales before) they often 50% off.
I have been having lovely experiences buying lately, as in.. I am not going ‘looking’ for clothes – they find me. There is a definite feeling to it …. as if that pair of shoes have been waiting for me all along.
I can relate to finding myself buying clothes that I really like the look of, but they just don’t feel right on me…it feels like I’m forcing an image of sorts, and so I always feel a bit weird. these are massive signs for me that I am becoming more and more aware of. It’s pretty intense when you realise just how imposing the retail market is, how it just wants you to consume and conform to a certain image to make you feel like you’ve got a certain edge. But..if anything, it’s the edge we need to let go of cause we don’t need it…
Quite simply – when we live the fullness of who we truly are, we do not have to be a slave to who we are not and thus parade this false self to the world in an effort to be ‘accepted’. We need only accept who we are and the grandness of the Universe is revealed as being one and the same majesty that lives within us.
That is beautiful Liane.
Buying clothes can be such a celebration of ourselves or it can be the complete opposite. Dressing for me, in celebration of me and the way I dress being an expression of me is a glorious thing to feel.
“… I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.”
I know this phenomena, Denise. When you live connected to yourself and in flow with the universe, life becomes very easy because everything is there when you need it, but you also have to allow yourself to go with that flow and not bring in the mind, going, yes, that is great but maybe there is something greater around the corner, allowing doubt to come in if this is it.
It is quite a revelation that the method, etc. we use to make ourselves feel better is actually the one making us feel “sick’ in some way. This can be applied to many things like: food, excessive exercise, any distracting behaviour we think we like or need. Whatever it is it can keep us hooked into the cycle to give us a temporary ‘lift’ only for us to drop back to the starting point or even lower, because sometimes we can start to be harsh on ourselves for feeling flat again.
It is amazing how clothes support me being me. There are specific clothes for specific days. My favourite clothes are on certain days not my favorurite clothes. I love the science of wearing clothes. There’s magic in clothes. Wearing clothes that are able to hold me, confirm me or even evolve me is a beautiful way to support myself.
Love the detailed description of an addiction here in this blog – that it comes from seeking relief from an emptiness we feel inside but because it is love we are missing and the act of seeking the relief is in fact loveless then the act actually just adds more to the emptiness, which of course results in us seeking even more relief. The only way to break this is to look at why we are seeking the relief and what are we wanting to relieve ourselves of? And also understanding how we can choose another action or movement instead which moves towards more love, rather than away from it.
Believing that what is ‘fashionable’, expensive or worn by celebrities/other ‘trend setters’ fits all is a huge misconception, and trying to fit this image can be one of the reasons we buy and buy and buy clothes without actually liking them… For some, their whole self-image and identity is based on a style that isn’t truly ‘them’ but a look to fit in.
That’s a good point Susie, I’ve never thought about that before. We see an image and like it and then try to emulate it which never works as the style simply does not fit us or confirm who we are. Feeling what to wear on any given day and wearing something that we feel great in, whether that is expensive or cheap, fashionable or not is what I find supports me to feel good about myself regardless of what is going on in my day.
Clothes are sold to us on glamorous models dripping in things we want. To be able to say ‘but I am enough already’ is massive. As a woman who loves clothes – I can still feel I am going through this shift of dressing for others vs dressing for myself – so this blog has been a very supportive read.
“… All that I needed to do was STOP and FEEL. I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness; I couldn’t bear to know what it was. I know this seems crazy now to even think that about myself, but when I was hooked I was not thinking clearly…” This is such an important reflection as it reminds us that any issue, no matter how huge of a deal or burden we think it is, it is actually nothing that we can’t handle and is in fact a tiny speck in the grand scheme of things.
Today I put on smart an outfit that was cool enough for the heat but warm enough for the cool morning. It floats as I walk and I feel great in it. I wore my heals and took my daughter to school. I had no make up on today which is unusual for me because I didn’t feel to but I did feel to claim how beautiful I am on the inside, I chose not to hide and to bring all of me to the school gates. What was amazing was how many compliments I got, not because I had spent ages getting ready (although I had taken great love and care of me doing so), nor because I had more makeup on or my hair was different but simply because I had chosen to honour what I felt as I got ready and to let myself shine.
When disconnected and go shopping I buy from a need and inevitably I take the item back.
This is but one of many examples of how we choose to medicate ourselves rather than to connect and to feel what has arisen for us to deal with and move on from.
A great observation of the importance of deeply connecting to our inner-most truth – in our connection there is no opening for indulgence, distraction and burying of our hurts.
I noticed that when I stopped eating as much sugar I turned to watching more movies and social media surfing – anything that helped to keep me racy the way sugar once did.
‘Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.’ Living with this understanding makes anything less than feeling beautiful more a case of, what did I allow in? opposed to thinking that we did something wrong or are lesser in some way to another.
It is so true that when life is flowing and you are connected within yourself, the perfect clothes come to you. There is no trying or deciding, considering price or if they make your bum look big. You just know that is what will support the real you to be seen and celebrated.
Beautifully said Ariana and isn’t this pattern exacerbated by our current celebrity culture who in the most part are enslaved to the emptiness and constantly reinventing themselves, not role models just puppets.
“I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness; I couldn’t bear to know what it was. I know this seems crazy now to even think that about myself, but when I was hooked I was not thinking clearly.” What i find amazing is how well we can read ourselves, how underneath we know that a pattern or behaviour is not serving us, yet as you say Denise we avoid feeling the emptiness, the vulnerability that in truth leads us so close to the truth of the sensitive beings we all are.
Clothes are an interesting subject. We need them in order to function in the world, but we can also use them as an expression of how we are feeling inside. I know I have used them in the past to express my anger or my depression. But I have also used them to express my joy and my inner beauty. Either way they are an expression of what is going on within, therefore our focus needs to be on that rather than first on the clothes.
What this blog proves to me is how even something that appears to be a benign act (like buying clothes) can be manipulated into an addiction to fill an emptiness or to avoid feeling an emotional issue that needs to be addressed at its core in order to be healed. Personally, I have used exercise and sports in this way, as well as diving into books and the internet to learn as much about as many topics as possible, thinking that acquiring intellectual knowledge will make me feel good enough. But these tactics always fall flat on their face, as they all begin with the false emotion of not feeling good enough as we are, but instead trying to constantly prove our worth to others.
A revealing sharing Denise! I too have periods of time in my life when I have worn only a handful of comfortable clothes and haven’t been really interested in buying anything new . When I was much younger I loved making clothes for myself and buying a few nice stylish clothes that suited me that I wore a lot. It is only since connecting to Universal Medicine and the teachings of the Ageless Wisdom that I have truly leant to value and appreciate myself enough to buy some clothes that I love wearing because I am worth nurturing!
Going shopping, trying on clothes, making the purchase – all of these are movements and our body does know whether they are filling a need or not.
This is one of the addictions that fly under the radar and yet once again, we are trying to find something on the outside to mask the empty feeling on the inside.
It tales a lot to reflect and admit what is actually not true in your life, to register that all is not right. But in doing so you open yourself up to so much more.
“… I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness…” What a revelation that has the potential to bring any addiction to a halt!
Any addiction is highlighting a ‘need’, if we are needing something surely this is showing us that we are not fully appreciating the fullness of who we truly are, if we were, we would know that we are already enough just being our selves and we would live with this knowingness flowing through our every particle.
Exactly Alison any need for something on the outside is a give away that there is something missing on the inside.
‘I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt’ – what you are sharing here is offering such a blessing for anyone who reads your blog, Denise. This feeling of wanting to fill the emptiness within with something outside our selves is something many, many, people experience on a daily basis. As we try to fill the void, the feeling of emptiness intensifies as we are misreading the truth of what is needed, which is simply to re-connect to our glorious selves and start appreciating the gorgeous magnificence of who we truly are.
I noticed a while back that when a work contract finished – which would have been a long period of intense working – I would often find myself buying a new camera or some other piece of technology. I felt it was some kind of reward. But I now see that it was an attempt to fill the emptiness of what I hadn’t been living during that work period; the dropped relationships with myself and family, the dropped levels of self-care…all contributing to a hole that I was then attempting to fill with a retail fix. But that pattern has been halted by a much deeper and consistent commitment to my livingness, so that I don’t get these drops that I then attempt to fix my way out of.
This sharing rings true as the reward would often take the edge off the intense experience I was in and the need to reward myself for a job well done. The retail fix is often the choice of drug to stop us appreciating and asking what is next and the possibility to endlessly offer more and be showered in the joy of responsibility and true service.
Amazing to hear the terminology “showered in the joy of responsibility”. So true yet such a rare understanding and appreciation of what responsibility can bring us.
I don’t think there’s much awareness about the addiction to buying clothes, it’s more like “just what people do”. You bring an amazing awareness to this through sharing your story. I can relate to buying clothes because they were cheap, not because I felt in my body that this was a loving act to and with me. I have spent lots of time clearing out of my wardrobe and THAT I love to do! Just keeping my favorites, making space in the shelves, – makes space in my life.
Denise as a wardrobe makeover consultant you’re now no doubt bringing a whole new level of understanding to your clients. Nothing is ever truly for nothing.
No, that’s right and what I love is her willingness to keep looking and allowing whatever is there to be seen for the truth that it is with no resistance or feeling her ability as a makeover consultant to be less. What a great blessing for her clients.
Addictions seem to have the same characteristics no matter what form they take. And yes, unless we heal their root cause, we’re doomed to an endless cycle of either cracking under the pressure and reactivating them, or moving to a fresh field of obsession.
Thank you for exposing what is going on Denise when we continually repeat behaviour despite an awareness that it is not working for us. I have had the beautiful experience of buying clothes in connection but have also frequently bought things that I knew very quickly were not right but somehow despite various clearouts they remain in my wardrobe. Feeling now how this impacts on me and my view of myself – letting go of purchases that are not supportive feels crucial to deepening my connection with my body and embracing my beauty.
What I have noticed in the last few years is that when I buy something I have been wanting for a while and finally purchase it, it has none of the ‘buzz’ that it used to have to finally get the coveted object of my desire. Instead there is an appreciation for buying something that I love and want to express myself with but I know I can express with or without that piece of clothing etc. I also are so much happier to wear clothes I like where as previously I would feel shy or awkward wearing something because I was going for a ‘look’ that was me trying to be someone rather than the clothing being an extension of my expression.
‘..I would save my good clothes for good and I didn’t really wear them.’ Interesting how we have this consciousness that ‘good’ clothes are too good to wear everyday. It is suggestive of a lack of self worth and that the occasions we are saving them for are more important than we are. How about wearing clothes we love simply as a celebration of ourselves without holding back? Wouldn’t then every day become a ‘good’ clothes day and we could enjoy our purchases without having to throw them away unworn? There are ways to dress up or down our ‘good’ clothes so that they can feel more causal or formal depending on the circumstances of the day. During the last week we have had unseasonably hot weather in the UK and yesterday I chose to wear this lovely grey and blue flowing long silk skirt, with an off the shoulder orange top -but to make it feel casual and more appropriate for the school run I wore some very casual flat wedgy sandals. I felt great in it all day and didn’t really think about how other people might react!
It’s amazing how we can use childhood stories, other people or our families to not take responsibility for ourselves.
There is any manner and number of excuses or stories to draw from when irresponsibility is the chosen way rather than truth and learning.
‘All that I needed to do was STOP and FEEL. I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness; I couldn’t bear to know what it was.’ and this is also the case with many other addictions, they become self-perpetuating to avoid the knowing of what is was we have been trying so hard to cover up, forget or no longer feel.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.” Until we appreciate this and address the cause of our emptiness we will never experience being full.
I’ve had many addictions in my life, shopping not being one of them but it’s so amazing to find the underlying cause and when we start to understand the underlying cause the cure has already happened.
Yes. Accept the underlying cause and there is no need for a ‘cure’
“I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them” – this is really true, I find when I go searching for something I want to buy I never find it, but when it comes to something I love and know will support me moving forward then Boom it’s there without all the struggle and exhaustion of searching for it – a bit like all the great things in life!!
I love buying clothes, I love the feeling of something new to wear, but I am not addicted to clothes, for me each item serves a purpose and is part of my overall wardrobe. I may not wear them regularly but when I wear them I enjoy putting them on and being in them. I have old faithfuls that are 10 or more years old and they still feel as new as when I first bought them.
That’s gorgeous Alison.
My almost my whole life I have had my clothes picked for me. Going to school we did not have uniforms but the start of the new school year and Christmas were new clothes times. Then work has always had uniforms. So, like the California gold miners in the 1800s, Levi Strauss has covered the bottom half of me the rest of the time.
Time has moved on and I have changed over time with what I wear. I buy things by how they feel and then how they look. Now, even going to work I chose what feels best for the day.
I realised at some point that there were always some favourite pieces I would wear in a season. The rest was basically ‘back up’ or things I did not like as much. So these days I am looking more and more at having a couple of really lovely pieces that I can wear out during a season instead of trying to build a later ‘basics’ wardrobe. I am changing all the time, both in my body and in the relationship with myself and this way I have space to adjust my clothing more and more to this.
I can relate to this Denise, I found I buy clothes online often as they are then a great bargain. When I realised how much I would actually buy, some of it hardly ever worn, it showed there was a lack of self-apreciation being covered by ‘rewarding’ myself with nice clothes.
There aren’t enough clothes in the world to compensate for an absence of self-love or self-worth. We will never find love in shop or online store – unless we are first connected to it within.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” This applies to all our addictions. Our emptiness exists because we have relinquished our connection to our inner love. When we make inroads into re-forging this most essential relationship, the desire to feed the emptiness begins to pale dramatically.
Thank you Denise, this will be a blog I can come back to continually to work through what you have shared. This in particular was a stop-in-your-tracks line “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Wow, that sums it up and why it continues to perpetuate itself. The realisation of our own amazingness and how we are or are not claimed in and connected to this in relation to addictions is wonderful Denise – lots for me to ponder on, thank you.
Addiction is always a symptom of a feeling of less inside. If we focussed on this rather than the activity of buying we may find answers that would support us for lifetimes.
Denise, this is very gorgeous to read, ‘Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.’ I realised this recently, I have a party to go to and didn’t have the time or the money to buy a new dress and I was feeling a bit stressed about this, I then had a day where I felt great; very connected and joyful and felt that actually I feel so amazing that I do not need to buy a new dress to be beautiful, I am already beautiful and if I feel connected to me then I can shine in a dress that I already have, this felt really lovely and settling in my body.
As with all the things that we use as a substitute they never give us anything but short term relief only to leave us with a deeper need and desperation – filling emptiness with emptiness creates more of the same. What we actually miss is already on the inside but we have disconnected from it hence the illusion of seeking it outside. That is the hard nut to crack, turning towards ourselves again and facing the choice we once made to step away from the preciousness and love that we are.
This is such an honest personal account at the truth behind addictions Denise. Isn’t it odd how we categorise addictions into ‘socially acceptable’ and ‘not socially acceptable’ and then turn a blind eye to those we deem socially acceptable simply because the vast majority are doing it and it looks the part, when all the while the whole gamut of addictions – anything we use to fill/feed ourselves as a result of not living true to the love that we are – are fed by one and the same energy, which is simply all that opposes love (otherwise known in-truth as ‘evil’).
When we are addicted to something, irrespective of what it is we are in fact craving connection with ourselves and others. Disconnected is like an assault on the body as it goes again our divine nature.
Whatever our addiction is, and lots of us have them, whether its buying clothes or something else, there is always something that is driving it. So until we are willing to stop and look at what that is, we will not change the pattern of behaviour and it will end up simply being redirected and become another addiction.
And our addictions can be acceptable or not acceptable in society or they can seemingly quite small and insidious or large and obvious. The more we explore them then we are able to see how many more are possibly there.
This is a simple exercise: if we want to find out if we bought a piece of clothing out of need or not, observe our reactions when we lose this garment or it does not fit anymore, or it has been shrunk in the dryer or damaged in any way. Trust me, if you want to find out, you will be given this opportunity. Observe what our reactions are. Can we simply let it go, or do we fall apart? The question then is: Do we allow what is outside of ourselves to define how we feel? Or do we take authority of what we know and live it? A need is always disempowering, no matter how confident we think fulfilling it makes us feel, because by taking it away, what we think we have, disappears.
Great questions Adele and a wonderful exercise.
An exposure of attachment and then also an exposure of why we are attached.
How deeply empowering it is, to recognise and acknowledge in full that we have been wilfully fuelling a part of us that will never, ever be satiated… and open our eyes and hearts to the part of us that has always been ever-awaiting, poised and full of the grandest love possible.
Dare we go there, and let go of all of that which has held us back from living in the known connection of such grand love? I say Yes.
And when we open our selves and our heart to this grand part of us then things like clothes etc are an expression from our light and never can be used to fill an emptiness
Absolutely johanna08smith. And interestingly enough… the more I embrace this, the more compliments I receive on something I’m wearing – even if it be something very, very ‘simple’ fashion-stakes wise…
We can most definitely sense when something naturally expresses from the love that we are, and the love we have for ourselves and all.
It is such a trap women can fall into in using clothes to mask an underlying lack of self worth. Thanks for exposing the details here Denise, I often apply similar questions myself when I see something I like these days, particularly if it is a ‘bargain’ and double check my motive for buying… a/ that I love it, b/ that it’s needed (this one’s negotiable depending what it is!) and c/ that I can afford it. Those usually weed out any motive that l’m later going to regret.
Me too Jenny. First question is ‘do I love it?’ and that often is the end of it because I know, if I don’t love it, then it’s life with me will be a short one. If it is a yes, then it’s ‘do I need it’ and that often also ends it if it isn’t truly needed (or in some cases just wanted).
Yes exactly… and sometime wanting it feels perfectly fine, and other times it is the defining question that exposes it as excessive or indulgent.
Interesting and i’ve found myself how one addiction (e.g. over-eating) morphs into another (buying clothes) and that underneath any addiction lays the issue of lack of self-worth and (not) feeling good enough.
I would buy things for the home, always something practical, for the kitchen, perhaps, or occasionally something decorative on a theme, such as beach huts, which I love. I hadn’t thought of this as an unnecessary addiction until I was clearing my things to move countries and realised how much money I had put into ‘stuff’ to make my life more convenient/comfortable/complete. I realised then that it is people and not things that bring love into a home and that help us to feel complete.
I have always had a thing for shoes; I may have been a centipede in my last life.
Hahaha me too! Perhaps we were related.
Great blog and very insightful Denise. We can learn much about ourselves and our behaviours when we are willing to be honest. A pleasurable experience such as shopping.. or any other for that matter can lose its joy when approached from lack.
It is very different, very easy and simple, when we buy clothes that feel true for our bodies and for us. I have bought 2 pairs of boots – one pair a style I wouldn’t have ‘normally’ picked – but as soon as I put them on, my feet and ankles felt completely snuggled up and supported, so buying them was a no-brainer. One pair was more than I would normally pay but I couldn’t deny how my feet and ankles felt, and bought them anyway and I havent felt guilty for one minute. I’ve had them 3 winters now, had one pair resoled I’ve worn them so much, and they still feel as snuggley as when I first put them on.
This is a brilliant expose on clothes Denise… there is so much to become aware of around clothes – colours, shapes, styles, why we buy what we do. As you share here… whatever we wear is a reflection of how we feel about ourselves and how we are choosing to live our everyday.
Your awareness in this paragraph is amazing Denise. There are actually layers to your awareness here which I think is fabulous. And if everyone in the world looked at everything in their lives with such awareness then the false emptiness would have not place to be as it would all be exposed. It would then make all the room for our grand love, divine glory and magnificence to be in full.
‘I knew my needing to buy clothes was about something else. I felt something was missing. I was missing something and I was using clothes to fill up this something. I felt that I needed something ‘out there’ to fill an emptiness that was in me. The more I bought, the worse I felt.
I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness’
An addiction is anything we do to fill a sense of emptiness, and it can take many subtle forms which aren’t as obvious as the drug or alcohol type of addiction. Once we nominate something as an addiction we start to get at the root cause and if we can address why we are not appreciating our worth and valuing who we are and recognize that we are enough without a drink, a new outfit or a good job, then we are well on the way to freeing ourselves from any addiction.
Such a great blog Denise – so insightful with a loving invitation to reflect on how some of my choices feel in reality.
In contrast to the addiction buying clothes Denise, I can go into a struggle with buying clothes for myself, when I look underneath this behaviour it always has to do with a self worth issue. When I am connected, I feel me and the beauty that I am I have no problems with spending money on clothes I feel suit my body.
For me when I buy in connection it has a beautiful flow to it and there is no hesitation at all. I don’t question the colours or feel or look or style as I simply know in that moment what is and is not for me. Also I tend to buy a few great items that I cherish rather than a lot of unneeded stuff that I’ve bought for other reasons.
I’m sure we are all guilty of using shopping therapy in some form to make ourselves feel better and distract our attention away from what is truly going on… buying things we don’t actually need and that are not a true reflection of who we are and where we are at but are rather a reflection of the space we are in when we shop in this way. I love that you have exposed that once you stopped and brought awareness to your pattern you were able to address what lay beneath and embrace that you are already enough and need nothing other than to buy things that support that reflection..
It is interesting that when you went to your wardrobe you noticed you didn’t really like the clothes that you had bought and that you felt sick. If we choose to be as honest as this about our relationship with all our possessions and behaviour we would be far more aware of the areas that need attention.
Your comment Golnaz reminds me of the massive throw out I do everytime I move house. I can easily let things go but what and am great at de cluttering and having a clear living space however what I am questioning now is – how did I end up buying so much that I don’t need ?
Addicted to shopping is a common addiction we don’t often talk about and recognise or open to seeing how destructive it can be. This is the case with many addictions, our society seems to be more willing to accept certain addictions as normal compared to other more horrific addictions because it isn’t seemingly harming others on a physical level. But energetically if any choices we make that hurts only just one person (mainly ourselves) this means it affects us all because we are all very much interconnected.
This is a fabulous point you make here Chan Ly. These unspoken of and acceptable addiction are harming and maybe more so than the obvious ones because they are hidden from even being looked at at being addictions therefore the support to acknowledge and do something about them is also lacking.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ This is something that we don’t tend to feel at the time because we have the buzz that comes with feeding the addiction to distract us and make us think, what we are doing is actually fine. It is only when the buzz wears off that we are left in the emptiness and have to do it again and again. This is in total contrast to coming from a place of truly appreciating and honouring ourselves and feeling that we are more than enough as we are.
Before we are truly ready to face an addiction, we may feel or think we have overcome it when we stop whatever we have been doing, but if we replace it with another activity that is just as addictive, then we have not overcome the addiction, we have simply shifted the focus elsewhere, which shows how fickle we can be! A part of us registers that we need to deal with the addiction and then it is like a sabotage comes in to thwart our efforts to do so. For example it is very common for people who want to stop smoking to suddenly shift their focus from cigarettes to foods and then put on 20kg. They may have quit smoking but all they did was replace it with something else. This is not necessarily a bad thing, for once again it allows us time to see that this is not working either. And sometimes the quitting of something requires a few steps or bridging and you can work towards addictions that are less damaging to the body. For example to have decaf coffee is a way to wean off coffee, or to have fruit as opposed to chocolate can support in reducing the sugar addictions. But the key thing to realise is that in the end no addiction goes away until we are willing to look at what drives it and willing to feel all that is required to let it go and embrace a more loving way of being with ourselves.
I absolutely love what you have shared here Denise – it shows that we are all prone to addictions of different kinds if we do not deal with the underlying feelings of agitation, anxiousness or unsettlement within. Typical addictions in our society are seen as those with alcohol or drugs, but you have flipped the coin here and shown addictions can be with anything! How beautiful that you allowed yourself the awareness of what was happening and were willing to explore it!
It is actually quite amazing to see how creative human beings can be with their addiction to not deal with the same underlying hurts or issues. I also imagine that this creativity would be quite astounding if it was out to true purpose and evolving society.
This is gorgeous, we can use so many things to district ourselves from everything we dont like to feel. When it usually it is so supportive to just live in apreciation of ourselves.
A beautiful realization to come to, and something that could inspire so many people… Here it was clothes, for others shoes, for others watches… Whatever we used to fill the hole… It’s great to not need this any more
We expect a new item of clothing to bring us something – some form of feeling better about ourselves – yet are already looking for the next item before we have even had a moment to realise that it can’t, won’t and will not ever fill the void are desperately trying to fill.
We could replace the ‘clothes’ word in your sentence Denise with anything that is used to not feel the emptiness of having left the beauty-fullness of our own essence “I was using something to make me feel better about myself. I was trying to fill something up with clothes, an empty feeling.”
“When we buy clothes in the energy of ‘I’m not enough,’ we are setting ourselves up each day to feel less”, this makes so much sense, and a vast amount of women have this belief of not being enough running in the background, the clothes then become the energetic confirmation of ‘I am not enough’ that we walk around in all day.
So awesome to read this as I am looking at clothes in a big way at the moment. But what jumped out at me was, ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness:’ how I think that what I think is distracting me from the emptiness is actually taking myself further away from my essence so of course the abyss feels greater when I check back in. Choosing behaviours or movements that do not confirm who we are piles in energy that hides who we are further.
An important topic to bring such wisdom too. This line was a stand out – “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” Very honest and great awareness to get to that point. I remember once a friend saying to me that there are never enough corn chips to fill that hole, and I remember that when I am eating to ‘fill the emptiness’ and realise that if goes unchecked, I would be like a labrador and eat myself to death…or at least a food coma.
It is only when we choose to get super honest that we can realise that we can never fill the empty feeling (no matter what your filling – clothes, food, work, family etc….), and when we try we are only feeding it.
It is our responsibility to realise that we are already enough, and look at these ‘holes’ are and why we are trying to fill them.
What stood out for me was this line ‘you can’t fill an emptiness only feed an emptiness’. This made me stop and ponder as there is a belief that something outside of you can give you something and this just makes it clear that when you leave yourself in search of this it just perpetuates the need more.
This is beautiful Denise and I love your honesty. I’m sure many people will be able to relate to this as buying clothes is a fairly common addiction yet not one that often gets looked at.
Thank you Denise – I recognize myself in what you share about not feeling enough. Recently I started to clock this and feel what was suppressed deeper : that is ; not letting myself out in full! There is nothing wrong with me , the only thing that is seemingly not right has been the choice to not be the full precious woman I am. Now I feel this I know what to do. So just allow yourself to feel whatever is there to feel or coming up.
When I read this article I get the sense we get to hard on ourselves. I mean yes if you feel something and it doesn’t suit then absolutely bring awareness to it and support the change but if we get to a point where something is playing out then the same thing has been in every step before hand. So for instance like this article, I don’t see the buying or then the not buying of the clothes are being the issue but more the way of living outside of this moment. We don’t just arrive at any given point and have an issue. There is a way to see life not carefree but as simply points to feel and not carry or beat yourself up about. If you become aware of something, great then just truly settle with that no matter what the heading and then simply make your next step with that awareness and feel the next point. It would seem at times we over think things or make things bigger then they actually are, this results in us continuing to carry them and making sure we will run into them again.
It’s like we have removed the most absolute, perfect, beholding piece to our puzzle, then try to fill it with all sorts of shapes and sizes of pieces, ones that not only don’t fit but destroy the rest of the puzzle! When will we learn that through humility and acceptance of our original choice to remove that piece, we can put it back in place and enjoy the grandness that is then there to be.
There are so many things in life that we do to feel content, but our contentment needs to come from inside, a feeling good in and with our bodies, because anything we apply from the outside is only a short lived experience of contentment and needs to be repeated.
I have bought so many clothes out of thinking I just need something, even if I didn’t truly like the look or feel of it on my body. Or bought clothes that are someone else’s fashion or expression not mine… and that feels awful when I wear them too. Now, I’m constantly removing pieces that are just not me or they are uncomfortable to wear or I’ve outgrown what I needed them for.
There is nothing greater, well there probably is but as the saying goes, than buying something you feel will truly support you. I’ve bought lots of things just because they are cheap and sure they might look good but they don’t feel as good and these things I never have the want to use or wear. The things that feels right I often use until it’s falling apart.
‘When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience.” Sentence was the highlight for me in this article. When we wear these clothes that we bought with connection becomes our second skin or the extension of the body. I love buying clothes and quite picky about what I like. It was refreshing to read the article. Thanks for sharing.
‘Buying with an addiction is like continually selling out on myself.’ very true Denise
Isnt it amazing how we can seemingly deal with one issue or bad habit, but if we dont address the underlying reasons behind why we did it in the first place, it just resurfaces in another guise
Yes inspiration indeed to address what’s underlying so we can be with ourselves in full.
Well observed Rebecca. Connecting to the heart of the habit or cycle is always the way. Rather than allow ourselves to feel deeply our absolute gloriousness, instead run away from it or dampen with food or distraction.
What a great expose of yet another way we can chose to stay separate from our divine beauty. And a great reminder that a deepening is on offer if we are moving in a way that is making us feel racy, guilty or disconnected.
‘When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.’ I find this too.. it’s more like ‘oh that is the jacket I have been feeling to get’ and not looking for a reason to purchase something.
Every addiction tells us something about ourselves and it takes courage and a lot of honesty to front up and let it inform us of what is truly going on.
This blog is such an accurate description of how we can feed the emptiness with all sorts of things and yet the impetus is always the same to relieve the tension we feel.
There is so much wisdom offered to us from our body if we are willing to hear it. The body never gives up trying to get our attention. Anything in the extreme offers an opportunity to ponder and to choose a stop moment rather than ‘be’ stopped.
Denise, I’m sure this is the case for so many women. If we all were to stop and feel why we were buying clothes I’m sure there would be a different reason to needing them. Buying from an emptiness and an addiction is one thing, but buying from a place of wanting to celebrte ourselves is totally different. It is worth stopping to consider which one we are doing.
Thank you for sharing your story, Denise, it highlights that addictions can apply to anything that we think will fill the void, make us feel good. Some people buy cars, racehorses, in your case it was clothes, and indeed clothes can be great reflections of how we feel inside.
By the amount of stores and online shops selling clothes I would say you are not alone with your past addiction for shopping for clothes. You only have to look at shopping centres on a bank holiday to see that shopping fills a void in peoples lives. Without love being the focus and knowing that we are already complete we will continue to search of for things to fill the emptiness and as you say Denise “Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.”
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ A really utterly profound realisation to have got to – thank you for sharing this. There is such a large distinction between the two that anyone in a similar situation can’t but be inspired by your willingness to go there (and go there you did).. awesome.
Thank you Denise for this powerful blog. You’ve highlighted to me how trying to cure an addiction from a physical and mental level simply don’t work because if we are not willing to healing our addictions energetically on a deeper level, then it will simply come back as a different disguise.
Spot on Chan, we can become masters of dressing the same issue in many outfits.
Absolutely brilliant Kim, I love your comment. Very playful and packed full of truth.
I agree it’s easy to get caught into the sales and buy things because they are ‘on sale’ but not really assessing and getting what we need and want. Same could go for food shopping, it’s easy to get distracted in supermarkets and get things we didn’t plan on which leads me to ask the question, what makes us do this? From experience it is from trying to quell the feelings of anxiousness.
Spot on Harry. For me, especially with food or other things that are on sale, a feeling of ‘don’t miss out on that’ comes up. It’s almost like there is a belief of being thrifty or smart in some way by making sure you get the deal… and definitely a quelling of feeling anxious. It’s amazing though how different I feel when I know I don’t need it and see the energy of hooking that is there and walk away. I know in truth I am not truly missing out on anything.
How about if we didn’t think so much about buying clothes – and focussed more on other things in life such as people – then we wouldn’t have issues about what to buy or wear.
Why do we live in such disregard of ourselves? It’s interesting how we pick up or all the things we’d say to someone else to do or not do, for example if you saw your friend wearing maternity clothes 9 months after giving birth you’d be like ‘what are you doing? Why are you wearing those? Come on you need to stop wearing them, get some new clothes’ – yet we happily choose to not do this for ourselves, going around hiding in our clothes, holding onto old clothes etc – just as one example of many many different things we do to totally disregard, play small, make ourselves less and hide ourselves. You often see this with mums and dads, they’ll take more care of their kids than themselves.
A woman who is full of her own beauty can look smokin’ hot in a potato sack and a woman who has not yet come to feel her own beauty can reduce a stylish outfit to a pile of rags.
Such an interesting topic clothes, and there is a lot to reflect on here Denise, whether it is buying or not buying clothes, spending a little or a lot, it is worth clocking what the feelings are that surround the decisions we make in this regard. I know when I have bought quality items that I have loved how it has felt, and there is definitely something brilliant in doing this to confirm myself and enjoy the clothes and my body in them.
I can relate to this Denise. I’ve bought clothes at different times to ‘feel better’ but of course, that feeling is only temporary, just like a fix of sugar – a quick pick me up, but later you’re left feeling the same or worse than you did prior to having it.
A great topic Denise, and one I am sure every woman will relate to. Personally I do not spend a fortune on clothes but do have a few items which I look at and wonder why on earth did I purchase that, and usually it’s because I had a picture in mind how I should look, and then I find the item just sits there in the cupboard until I have a clear out.
I am appreciating myself after reading this as I can relate it to so many parts of life. I am choosing to feel a heavy fullness when I eat when it’s not needed, or full and heavy with emotions. I can also choose to feel myself full of light, full of presence and full of my own tender love.
It is amazing how we shift from one addiction to another, never really dealing with what is going on. And how awesome is it that what is really going on is underneath all that empty feeling that is being feed, as you so aptly described is the divine being that we are! All this effort going into avoid what we are! Utter madness.
So, is this why we are can be easily addicted to various addictions because they gives us a false sense of being full for a nano second and then feelings of emptiness from our disconnection creeps back in and the cycle of trying to fill our emptiness repeats again and again. I realise we only feel this emptiness when we choose to live and move disconnected to our essence.
I can definitely relate to the feeling clothes have when they are bought at a time when deep down I am buying them for the wrong reasons – there have been a couple of instances recently where I have made it to the desk to pay for items and I can feel that something is not sitting right with me so have honoured that and chosen not to carry on buying them. We always have a purpose or intention in everything we do – we just have to ask whether it’s a true purpose or not.
Great to observe our relationship with clothes and how they can be such a support if we allow them to be. Was recently discussing this with friends and sharing how I now choose clothes to celebrate myself as a woman which is a big shift from my old attitude of making do and hiding behind clothes.
Beautiful Denise. Love your sharing and your turning around of your relationship with clothing. Your mention of addiction and shopping stood out to me because I am sure on some level we have all felt the emptiness of needing to buy something so it can fulfil us. I had the same with buying technology. It is similar to gambling as it is emptiness feeling emptiness.
“All that I needed to do was to stop and feel.” This sums up so many aspects of my life. The senses can trick the body into thinking it wants something – the sight of a clothing sale, the smell of food. It’s always worth asking the body first before making a decision.
That is such a significant point Denise, about feeding the emptiness inside not just feeling it, as if somehow we actually enjoy doing that and so keep on doing it because we think we do, and so are caught in this round of recycling the old pattern. Recognising that is what we are doing can be the first step to moving out of the cycle and starting to feel what we truly enjoy that is of true value to us.
There is so much here to discuss and I can really relate with what you have shared on many levels’ Firstly in asking myself ‘Do I really want or need this item?’ I do not ask myself this question enough and I know I buy many things from a place that is not truly loving me. I was going to say I want to buy clothes that reflect how I feel but can never find any!!! But this just confirms to me the place where I am with myself in not truly claiming all that I am and my inner beauty, grace and love. Definitely something for me to feel and I can also really relate with this ‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ How many of us by not only trying to fill and emptiness but our action actually feeds and perpeptuates it!
Denise what a great blog that can be applied to so much in life, so many areas where we seek to get something to fill us and to feed us rather than feel the amazingness and buy something that supports us in our amazingness, i’ve found that when I get things that are not “truly loved’ by me in the first place that I don’t end up wearing them. It’s about my relationship with me at the time of buying clothes that is so important, any bit of “but I need to buy something” ends up with me getting things that are not supportive or that I wear and I end up wasting money that is hard earned.
It’s amazing what we can expose if we’re truly honest with ourselves.
I often pay a visit to my favourite shop and look out for good bargains, I don’t necessarily buy something, however, this is something I could do everyday without buying anything. It feels like I am trying to fill something inside me, that void you were talking about. If I was to ad up all the time spent in that shop, I think it would be a substantial part of my life…
In my local town where I go shopping I would say that people have an addiction to Coffee as there has been a huge increase in Coffee shops at least another four have opened in the last six months and they all seem to be busy. In my experience Coffee races our bodies so much that it is unable to feel any connection to it self, so drinking Coffee is a way to numb the body but you need more and more coffee to do this hence I guess the increase in the new coffee shops.
This is a great topic of conversation to be having as addictions come in many disguises and most people are not aware they have one. So to admit that you have an addiction to buying clothes then then be prepared to look underneath the need to buy clothes and heal the emptiness you are feeling is a huge step forward.
Great that you have brought attention to this Denise, as I am sure there are many that can relate to it, including myself. Buying clothes can be such an addiction, so to be able to stop and ask yourself what is really going on when you pick something off the rail to try on is a great place to start. I know myself that even though I have a wardrobe full of clothes, there are some things that I wear all the time because of how they feel and how I feel when I wear them, and others that rarely get worn for the same reasons.
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ This is true. It is more obvious perhaps with alcohol, drugs and food but when we buy clothes as an addictive habit or get hooked into sport or a hobby of some kind we tend to ignore what is really going on and as a society we keep on endorsing such behaviour. Doing things to pass time or fill ourselves up is crazy when we are already full in the first place, we are just not bothering to connect with this fullness and live from that.
‘I was so afraid to feel what was under the emptiness…’ I know this feeling well. There is a sense that there is something to fear deeply in that place and that we must do whatever it takes to not go there. Having dared to look though, what I find is that the fear is apparently a form of protection from what seems to be ‘nothingness’ – but is, when seen more clearly, a deeper and wiser connection to self, the true Divine self.
Buying clothes to feed an emptiness, fill time or give us a ‘lift’ is just the same as overeating or indulging on treats…. The momentary ‘high’ of purchasing another item gets shorter and shorter though, so in order to still get a kick out of shopping as you’ve shared we sometimes just keep going with it!
A profound and truly healing realisation from the addictive quality of shopping. Thank you Denise for this honest sharing.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness”.
Such wisdom Denise, thank you for sharing it here. It is apparent to me that if we do not feel good about ourselves or believe that we are not enough, everything we do to try to remedy this issue simply ends up confirming the original feeling or belief itself. As you share here, we have to go deeper and see what is really going on. Connecting to the truth of who we are on a fundamental energetic level brings forth healing upon which we can build real wellbeing and make choices which confirm ourselves rather than continually negate. How amazing it is when our every day lives offer us such truth.
It’s true that when we buy clothes out of a need/ lack of worth/ trying to fit a certain look to impress others we end up wearing that energy when we wear the clothes we’ve bought! And similarly if we’ve bought something from true connection with ourselves then we get that confirmation when we wear those clothes and it’s a beautiful reflection and confirmation for others too.
Could it be that we are irresponsible whenever we are making movements that is lesser than being in divine connection with our Soul? If this is true then as we move about our house before we even leave for shopping or work we can be in an energy that is from this divine connection, that is from the Soul then we only do what is serving humanity and us? As you have shared Denise,’ when I’m connected there is no need’, only a true wisdom of that, which is going to be evolutionary for all involved. Then could it be our Soul is not so much about shopping but sharing the light of God in the retail industry?
A big can of worms to open Denise and one that many women (and men) can relate to. I know I used ‘retail therapy’ as a way to fill a huge sadness that I felt within me, a sadness that arose from my own self loathing and a lack of connection to my glorious love inside. Since focusing on restoring this connection, my whole relationship with purchasing clothes has been transformed and it has become much easier to feel what it truly right for my body with beautiful results.
Yes buying clothes is an big topic. I often noticed how I would totally love something in the shop to then come home and notice that I could almost not walk as the jeans were very tight over the knee yet in the store I hadn’t noticed this. In the store there many mirrors and I always get enticed by the look, also I find in the store I always feel like I have to buy something and can’t walk out with nothing. A lot of ideals and believes instead of shopping in connection with myself and also not being aware of the energy of the store that wants you to buy things.
It is interesting to feel Denise, how you realised you were not filling an emptiness, you were feeding it. When we get underneath what is really going on and heal the underlying energy of feeding the emotion of emptiness, everything changes. It feels gorgeous how you filled your place inside you with your beauty, how incredible is that!
A great conversation to start Denise, how many of us buy clothes of feed an emptiness…in other words we use the clothes to make us feel better about ourselves, which was my old pattern, and back then I was pretty much checked out. Like yourself I am also finding that when I am connected and I am not having to buy anything, I also find that the things I love naturally come to me, and shopping is effortless!
‘I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.’ What a great observation Denise. And it seems our emptiness is insatiable until we are willing to look at its root cause.
“Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.” What if we could all have this realisation? Amazing Denise. The world would be a very different place.
“I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness.” This is true for all addictions and distractions in life.
We can quite easily convince ourselves that we have dealt with our issue when the obvious symptom/pattern ceases to manifest. It is with our deepest honesty and humility we can peel through the veneer and accept true healing.
Densie, this is really interesting, I too have found this to be true; ‘When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them.’ I had an amazing shopping experience where I had made the space to go shopping, there was no rush and I was feeling great and very joyful about going shopping, as I went into each store certain items stood out, I knew these were for me, I tried them on and they were perfect, they confirmed by loveliness and playfulness, this happened in all of the shops I went into this day, I have also had the opposite experience where I have had little time and have rushed around searching through rails trying to find something and have never found anything that I like, the difference is the connection with myself.
‘Nothing can ever fill a place inside me. Only I can do that. I am already full of my own beauty.’ so very true and well said. It is amazing how we can save things for a special occasion but never wear them often the things we feel most supportive and expansive in. I know too how clothes/shopping can be used to fill a lack within myself.
The lengths that we all go to, to stop feeling the amazingness that we all are is simply crazy, so thanks for sharing Denise. It also made me look at the cloths I buy as well, not that it has been an addiction but the other day I went into a shop to buy some T-shirts, the first one I saw had a penguin painting a large anti-clockwise circle and I loved it immediately, the second one had a great design and I liked it a lot and then I saw two on sale so bought them because they were cheap. Being home I realised I didn’t really like the cheap ones so although on sale they weren’t the bargain I was after.
Colleen, I too have been a clothes-aholic and also had a wardrobe stuffed with outfits I rarely wore and bought to feed an emptiness I felt inside. Once we know who we are, our beauty shines through whatever we’re wearing. It is not the dress that makes us, but being connected to and claiming our innate and sacred essence as women.
it is a beautiful thing to buy clothes to confirm who we are.
Thank you for sharing Denise, this is so open and honest. Whether our addictions are shopping for clothes, overeating, TV watching, computer gaming or alcohol consumption we are all fighting the disconnection we are feeling to ourselves and wanting to numb the emptiness we feel as a result. The simple remedy you share is to stop and feel what is there…and then deal with it.
What has been shared so openly and honestly in this article shines a light and a huge dollop of understanding on what is going on behind people’s seeming love of following fashion and buying clothes -especially in the words, ‘When you buy clothes with a connection to you it is a totally different experience. There is no thinking from your head, “Do I love this or not?” There is no part of you that has to get a second opinion: your body is there to tell you. The way you hold yourself, the way you walk, the way the clothes feel on your skin, these are all the signs that you need and they are a true confirmation’ . . . ‘body wisdom’ available to us all.
Thank you Denise, I really enjoyed reading your blog. Doing anything for the wrong reasons, irrespective of how “good” it might feel at the time will always negatively affect us. I love the focus you have brought to addiction and that we can be addicted to absolutely anything if we want to fuel the emptinesss we feel inside.
Thank you for sharing your story Denise, one that many would be able to relate to. My vice or go to, apart from food, was buying supplements and vitamins. Always with the intent of making me better. I spend a ridiculous amount on tablets and hardly ever took them and then eventually threw them out because they were past the use by date. It was also something that once I realised what was going on I was shocked at how long I had been doing it for. Now I know when ever I start looking at myself through the view of needing to be ‘better’ that I am many steps away from my connection.
Addictions are a momentum of movements and it is as you say Denise like a roller coaster that not only plays on our anxieties and hurts but wreaks havoc with our bodies too. What I find truly amazing about addictions is how we can really see how consumed by the movements we can be and how one different movement and or choice to stop and feel what is really going on, can reveal a great deal of honesty to what may be underlying these movements and bring a greater understanding to why the momentum began in the first place. A great blog thank you Denise.
Beautifully said kellyzarb… And with the honesty, we are offered the chance of deepening our relationship with ourselves – to see how we have negated ourselves as women and men alike, and make the choice to embark upon a path of discovering just how much of us there actually is to cherish and treasure.
We so readily seek to fill this lack of love for ourselves with behaviours (and rolling momentums of them) that have us seeking to fill a void, needing to be ‘more’, etc. – when the true way is to go within and re-discover the richness that is innately and already there…
I love buying clothes these day and only buy things that I feel amazing in. This was not always the case as I remember in the past having clothes that were not so great. Mind you at that time I did not feel so great about me and my body and now I do, so it seems my clothes and way of shopping are a reflection of where I am at.
This seems to apply to everything and is not something static. For example what I eat and my way of eating reflects how I have been that day and how I am in the moment as well as how I have been over the last days and months. Every aspect of life offers us constant reflections and that is a wonderful thing!
This is so true Nicola and reminds us that although we may feel the need to ‘dress to impress’ or hide ourselves or perhaps that a particular ‘diet’ is good for us when in actual fact it is not, the truth is that there is no hiding in the world of energy and absolutely everything is a continual reflection of where we are at. Be that perceived as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ it does not matter, what matters is be able to receive the truth of what is being reflected and this we can only do by being open and transparent and willing to expand. Therein lays the key to our evolution…
I just noticed reading your comment that if you add the letter R to evolution you get revolution as in revolve (not revolt or maybe revolt our past revolting ways ha ha) – life goes round and round constantly offering us reflections, choices and opportunities to evolve – isn’t that cool!
There can be so much behind buying clothes. I have certainly bought many clothes that I find myself not liking, that I do not wear or I wear consciously knowing that something does not feel right. Only this morning I put on an outfit to go to work in and it didn’t feel right. I walked around in it for a bit trying to convince myself that it would work for me today however I had to stop and change completely. Once I changed I felt a difference in the way I was carrying myself, I felt taller and how I was thinking about myself, my thoughts were not negative but rather confirming how gorgeous I was feeling not just on the outside but on the inside as well. The awareness I am developing around what I wear is all thanks to Natalie Benhayon.
I love your honesty Denise, it is so refreshing. You have created a loving space for me to examine my own buying behaviour.
Reading your words Denise: “I wasn’t filling an emptiness, I was feeding the emptiness” suddenly made sense of the fact that an addiction is first and foremost an emptiness with this feeling of emptiness often so overwhelming and uncomfortable that we try everything and anything to fill it. And then when we ‘cure’ one addiction without the understanding of why it was there in the first place, as you experienced, along comes another to take its place. I have found that the only way to fill this emptiness is to be in connection to me and to know that I am enough; that I am full from my own love.
This is brilliant Denise – the hook on women to purchase clothes is a huge one and I’m certainly not free of it myself. The industry feeds on our own lack of appreciation and worth and just as you point out Denise, it offers us another form of addiction to satiate.
It’s not about not buying clothes, and not enjoying them – it’s about coming from the fullness of who we are first and foremost and being solid within ourselves that no garment however gorgeous, equals the gorgeousness within. It’s a completely different relationship and ironically when we do approach clothes and shopping from that fullness, it becomes so much more enjoyable.
Well said Katerina, and your words here clearly come from a palpable, claimed quality within yourself – a fullness of you that is not negated.
If we buy into the ‘set up’ that’s out there for women, we will never, ever be or ‘look’ enough, will we… It is essential that we rebuild our relationship with ourselves first and foremost. It takes dedication and time, but the differences you describe can surely be our experience if we choose to go there.
We are so worth it!
What a popular and relatable topic Denise, shopping and its addictiveness that fuels the vacancy inside. Love this line here of yours: “When I’m connected there is no need, I find that things that I love naturally come to me, I don’t have to go looking for them” – how very true.
Ah Denise, you show so well how there are a million outfits we can put on, a thousand shoes to accumulate and so many flavours of filling this empty space. We like to make it a conversation about ‘to have’ or ‘to have not’ when the real dress that suits us best is Love. Nothing can ever replace this in our wardrobe.
This article of one woman’s experience with buying clothes is but a speck on the scale of just how much of the worlds purchases are made in very similar energies. The fact that we have so much available to buy, much of it produced with little to no care for the purchases is clear proof is our buying habits as a humanity. If each of us understands and applies what Denise has shared, maybe the products produced would also come to us with a quality of support instead of simply supply.
Can totally relate to what you share here Denise. i have lots of things that I brought that take up space in my wardrobe and my home that don’t bring value to my life and they stand out alongside the things that I love to see, touch, wear and use.