The "Raw-Drobe"

From Successfully Raw eZine published today:

It's no secret that eating raw changes more than your blood chemistry, but have you yet had any weird goings ons with your clothes choices since being raw?

If you've been into raw food to a high degree for six months or more chances are the answer is a resounding "yes" - although you may or may not have any clue as to why.

Sure, you may be leaner than you were six months ago and that invariably means buying a size or two smaller, but I'm not talking size here, I'm talking everything but size, in fact.

Before I get into my own stuff around clothes I want to share with you a real life case study of how this first showed up for a client a year or two ago. This is what she had to say:

"I've got something to share but it feels really odd to say it and I don't know how it can be connected to going raw, but deep down I feel that it probably is..."

"Go on..."

"Well, usually when I go to get ready for work in the morning I just go to my closet, pull out a sweater, blouse and trousers and get dressed. I don't think anything about it, I just pick whatever's there and put it on. But this past week I have found myself standing in front of my clothes feeling really particular about what I choose. Certain colours feel very wrong or very right. I can't just pull anything anymore, it's like suddenly my clothes mean more but I don't know why. It has to feel right or I can't put it on. Am I going crazy?!"

Now, while there's a whole lot going on here I'm going to keep it really simple. When we eat live food we eat higher vibrational food, and generally more colourful food. We come alive from the cellular level out, we become more conscious, more aware, more sensitive. Knowing that everything in the Universe is comprised of energy, by making different energy choices in the food we bring into our body, we become more sensitive to other things we bring into our world, but especially in or around our body. This is where clothes come in. Clothes also have their own energy. There's the colours for starters, and then there's associations and memories, or the feelings they evoke in us. We get to play out who we are through our choice of clothing, but when we're "asleep" they just don't seem to matter so much, we don't know who or what we are playing out as we are typically unconscious of it.

For my own part I have found that over the years my clothes have become increasingly important to me. As a child I was disinterested in clothes until I was about 15 - a late starter! When I went raw I started getting more experimental with clothes and I got into slimmer silhouettes, brighter colours and generally became increasingly intrigued with how certain clothes made me feel. When I went through my 100% long-term raw phase I wore black almost all the time. Surprising? Yes, you would think I would have gone for brighter colours, right? This didn't happen as I spent much of my life force energy during that time trying to hide my light rather than show it. Black clothes served as the means to do that, they kept me anonymous, although I didn't fully understand that at the time. Fast forward to today and I find that my taste in clothes doesn't now just change radically from year to year but season to season. I can love something one minute and be totally off it the next! This time I realise it's because I'm changing so fast that so is my sense of identity, and our clothes very much mirror to us and show to the world who we think we are or who we wish to be.

Tomorrow I am going clothes shopping. While I have some ideas of what I'd like to find, I do suspect that the only thing I am guaranteed to discover among the clothes rails this weekend is the Karen that's been revealed thus far. I look forward to seeing how far I've come since my last shop of three weeks ago : )

NB: I'm posting this here so we can have a conversation and sharing here if you'd like to. This really can get pretty fascinating!!

Comments

[juliana]

Hi Karen,
I found it so funny to read this entry that i had to coment on it. I've been feeling exactly like that! Need to change the clothes since i've been changing a lot... but where to go? where would i find what i am looking for? This is also such a fun part of this adventure :)
I am glad you are talking about it.
Best wishes,see you in december!
juliana.

[María José]

Hi

Though I´m not 100% raw foodist, I am gradually experiencing a change in lifestyle and attitude and I find myself no longer feeling atracted to wearing lots of synthetics; as everything is interrelated, nature in food, in clothes... I would like to share these three links with you:

http://www.peopletree.co.uk/category/hers

http://www.naturalcollection.com

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/page/2008/jul/10/7

xx

[Elspeth]

November 17 will be 6 months of largely raw for me. My favourite colours have always been on the blue/green end of the spectrum, but increasingly I find myself drawn to reds and oranges - brighter colours - and also white (lighter) - and earthy tones like shades of brown. The new clothes I have bought after my former ones got too baggy were therefore not the colours I would usually go for. Within the past month I find myself magnetically and intensely drawn to all shades of the colour pink, which is odd because I've always disliked pink! Now it jumps out at me wherever I look (even this web page) - so much so that it seems like it's everywhere. I feel like I need to get some pink clothing and paint my room in a deepish pink shade ... although I wonder if I can live with that, in the event that this is just 'a pink phase'. Although I don't think it is a phase. It's an addition to my palette of appreciation. I think of famous pink phrases, like 'in the pink of health' ... which fits with eating raw. Also pink being symbolic of love (self, other and Divine).

[Pamala]

Karen,
First I want to say my daughter and I adore you. We attended your talk in Sedona and your interview with Kevin G. was so pure of heart.
What I have experienced with clothes is that I choose to wear what feels most authentic...less about "fashion" and more about what makes me feel true to myself... no concerns to what "image" I am projecting. A friend once told me that my closet was different shades of dirt and now you will find splashes of orange, red and greens.
Blessings and Gratitude,
Pamala :o)

[Cindi]

I find it always very interesting that the thing I am thinking about is what you write about on Fridays. That is why I list you as my favorite guru. I think we are in sync or something...

Anyway, since I have been doing raw foods for a little over a year, I have released 75 pounds of toxic waste and have more to go. The 'down side' is that of course, my old clothes do not fit. In fact, I change sizes every month or so. Previously when I was so much fatter, I absolutely hated buying clothing and only bought by sight, never trying anything on. Only the basic necessities. I bought what was my size, never thinking about liking what I bought.

Now that I am 'forced' to buy clothes, I can't believe how much I am enjoying it and how much I am really picky about what I wear as well. There is definately an energy in our clothing that matches what we are feeling for any given day.

As for buying clothes, I have learned to shop at thrift stores. I depend on the universe to help me find the outfits that will be good for me, and I love using this approach. It has worked perfectly for me. There are always things there that are my size that resonate with me. It is a wonderful side blessing to the great energy and personal wealth I have received by doing living foods.

Thanks for letting me know I wasn't totally wacko! I love knowing others are having similar experiences.

[Vicky]

Karen, I so relate to this post. I've been mostly raw for over a year now - shed 35lb and of course many of my clothes no longer fit. I'm right into decluttering as a way of making space for more of what I want so I've been regularly decluttering my wardrobe. Plus I moved into my dream home on the water and decluttered more clothes.

I've always had a dream of having just a few pieces of clothing that I really love - that can be mix and matched - but the way I bought clothes made that really hard - whenever I saw something I liked I got it - with no big picture in mind. And I thought I was a winter - which is a very cool season.

Well, it turns out I'm a warm autumn - and with the help of a color consultant I had a makeover - and went shopping.

When I returned home, I took everything out of my wardrobe - clothes, shoes, bags, belts, coats, jewellery etc and took it all to a charity shop - and I mean everything - apart from 3 pieces of clothing. I was surprised the over riding feeling I had doing that was one of relief - I no longer have to try to fit everything together.

And I started wondering what charity shops must think when they get an entire wardrobe donated - what came to me was that they probably think someone has died. And the reality is that someone did die - my old self - and it took some grieving for me to integrate all the changes.

I'm wearing browns for the first time ever and this does feel much more like me - or the me I am now. I feel that my essence is shining though - and this is being reflected in the comments I get everywhere I go - I feel things are in alignment for the first time ever.

And my wardrobe is only one quarter full - it feels great. When I look at everything all lined up I can see that I could wear any combo - they all fit together. This will make packing to travel so much easier - that's always been the only part of travelling I don't like.

In Feng Shui closets represent secrets - I now feel I've come out of the closet. Raw food has been part of so many changes in my life - and now this one - and I'm stepping out of my little introverted box and dropping my assumptions about what being an introvert means. I notice I'm being way more sociable - I just led my very first in person retreat on my houseboat - something I've been determined I'd never do - too introverted! I loved it. I'm sold!

Clothes are our closest environment - underwear too - they mirror who we are and they determine who we are - just as the energy in your other environments does - the world of raw certainly shows us all the places we are out of alignment.

Very exciting!