On Outgrowing My Own Symbols
It felt like I was wearing someone else's hands for the last three weeks.
But let me start from the beginning:
I get my nails done every 3 weeks like clockwork.
I stopped for about 9 months, last year, to give myself the space and the grace to evaluate if it truly mattered to my self expression or if I’d just gotten used to doing it (I think it’s good to question our habits from time to time - even the “good” ones!).
Turns out, I don’t even feel like ME without them done. I can do it. But I don’t like it. Having pretty nails is a big piece of how this former-tomboy expresses her femininity AND they just make me feel pulled together.
Lately, I’ve been preferring simple nails. One tone, pink or red or neutral. Boring, right? Who is she? I mean not that long ago I was the girl who had some design or gemstone or at least something edgy like matte black, on her nails. Now, it’s all in the same colour family, on repeat.
So 3 weeks ago, I got my nails done and I opted for a sparkly purple. I like whimsy! I like joy! I like colour! It’s like my WHOLE BRAND ;-)
Plus, I've been really into purple lately. I saw someone else have sparkles. I liked it. So I tried it.
And it felt like I was wearing someone else's hands for the last three weeks. Sorry for the dramatics, but the feeling literally kept mounting. Every few days I’d be more…disgusted almost? Not like they were ugly. They weren’t! Purple sparkles are adorable.
They just aren’t me? And that feels weird too. Because I used to express myself, my joy, my individuality through these visible markers. Literally through my nails.
And I guess I thought I could return to that language of joy, simply because it had worked in the past when I needed a boost.
So when that didn’t exactly work, I found myself wondering “What the hell? Am I just boring now?”
And then…”so what if I am?”. But neither of those is the takeaway. The place I finally landed, just this morning while sitting in the nail salon, is that I no longer need to SHOW those qualities. Because I’m quite literally living them.
Because they live in me and are expressed in my every moment - in how I show up, in how I speak, in how I move.
So the simple, or boring, expression isn’t even a loss. It’s just integration. It says you don’t have to look at me and see whimsy, because I move through the world with it holding me. You can opt into my world long enough to find out. Or see my basic bitch nails and opt out sooner than you should ;) But either way, I’m me. And I’m good.
It made me wonder where else I’ve been trying to return to old expressions of myself, just because they once felt right.
And where the truer version now might be quietly expressed… but more lived. I’m starting to trust that version more, even when it looks simpler on the outside.