What If Your Best Style Years Are Still Ahead of You?

Most of us are carrying around a set of invisible style rules.

"I'm too old for that."

"Women my age shouldn't wear white jeans."

"I don't have the body for that anymore."

The list goes on.

We treat these as facts. But they're not facts. They're rules. And most of them were written by someone else.

And the funny thing is, most of us can't remember where any of it came from. It just quietly became part of how we think.

So let me tell you where some of it came from, because I think you'll find it as annoying as I do.

The rules had authors

On the BBC show What Not to Wear, Susannah Constantine stated it as a flat rule. No woman over the age of thirty-five should wear a hemline above the knee. Not a suggestion. A rule, delivered on television to millions of women.

The designer Carolina Herrera has said jeans don't look right after thirty, that mini skirts and bikinis belong to younger women, and that long hair doesn't suit women over forty. Her own words are the ones that really get me. She describes seeing women in the street who look lovely from behind, with their long hair and their little skirts, and then they turn around.

Charming.

But here's the part that really got me.

Stacy London and Clinton Kelly, who fronted the American version of What Not to Wear, have since spoken publicly about how the show relied on a formula, and how many of those fashion "rules" were created for television rather than being universal truths.

They were made up.

The people who wrote the rulebook have moved on. The women who obeyed it are still obeying it, twenty years later, in a fitting room.

That, to me, is outrageous!

None of these people knew you. They'd never met you, seen your confidence, your lifestyle, your colouring, your personality or your body. Yet somehow their opinions became your rules.

Imagine applying this thinking anywhere else

Would we stop laughing because we were over fifty?

Would we refuse to travel because we were over sixty?

Would we give up learning, dancing, swimming, or trying something new simply because of a number?

Of course not.

So why on earth do we let age decide what we wear?

Style isn't about looking younger

It's about being fully yourself.

The most stylish women I know aren't chasing trends or trying to look twenty-five. They're the ones wearing what makes them feel confident, comfortable and like themselves. They understand that clothes aren't there to hide them. They're there to reflect who they are, not who someone else thinks they should be.

If a bright pink blazer makes you feel fabulous, wear it.

If white jeans make you smile, wear them.

If you love bold prints, statement jewellery, or a leather jacket at sixty-five, seventy-five, or eighty-five, wear them.

The only question that really matters is this:

Does this feel like me?

Because confidence will always be more stylish than somebody else's outdated rulebook.

Try this before you go

Go to your wardrobe and find the thing you've been putting off. The dress you keep not wearing. The colour you decided wasn't for you. The sleeveless top you bought and then quietly retired.

Put it on. Stand in front of the mirror on your own, with nobody to perform for.

Then ask yourself one honest question. Is this objection actually mine, or did I inherit it?

Most of the time, when you go looking for the source, there isn't one. Sometimes it's just a voice from a television show you watched twenty years ago.

Maybe your twenties were about fitting in.

Maybe your thirties were about raising children or building a career.

Maybe your forties and fifties were about putting everyone else first.

What if this is the decade where you finally get to dress for yourself?

What if your best style years aren't behind you at all?

What if they're still ahead of you?

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I'd love to know. What's one fashion rule you've followed for years that you're ready to break?

Tell me in the comments. You might just free another woman from the same one.

If you've realised you've been dressing around rules that were never yours to begin with, I'd love to help you untangle them. Get in touch, and together we'll build a wardrobe based on who you are -

not someone else's outdated rulebook.

Tracy xx