A Book's Cover

“Are those randomly multi-colored nails?”

“Why would you get four piercings on one ear?”

“Do you have to wear such long earrings?”

“Do your accessories always match your clothes?”

“Are your nails really painted fluorescent?”

“Is that lipstick?”

“How long do you take to dress up everyday?”

These are questions I’ve encountered through my life. Superficial and limited to how I look and dress. Everyone judges a book by its cover. The first thing anyone notices about you is how you look. If you are blonde, you are dumb. Apparently, it doesn’t matter if you are actually a Harvard Graduate. If you are blonde, you are dumb. If you have a tattoo and piercings, you are a rebel. It doesn’t matter if you are an accomplished surgeon. If you have a tattoo and piercings, you are a rebel. All of us, no matter who we are, have been in situations were our looks were given primary importance. We have all either been rejected or wholly accepted into something because of the way we look.

“Her clothes are too loud. I don’t like her.”

“Her nose ring is weird. What is wrong with her?”

“He is wearing a pink shirt, he has to be gay.”

“If she spends so much time dressing up, when does she ever study?”

“She is so shabbily dressed. Her mind is probably as disorganized as her dressing sense.”

A counselor once told me that everything I wear and do to myself reflects something about me to the people around me. That had me wondering – when I choose what I’m going to wear every morning, am I aware of the image that I want to portray? Do I realize what kind of vibes I’m going to be giving off and still choose to dress a certain way? A small part of my brain responded, “Yes, I actually do.”

Even though I often feel that people over-analyze my clothes or that they unnecessarily attach importance to things that barely matter to me, it hit me that there is actually a reason for this kind of attribution. I wear bright clothes because it makes me happy – I am a person who attaches importance to the small things that make me happy. I have outlandish piercings – I actually want to stand out and be different.

The clothes we wear and our selection of accessories are actually another part of your personality. It is what distinguishes us from those around us. It helps us identify with those similar to us. Essentially, it represents our individuality. What we are on the outside represents what we are on the inside. Maybe not an entirely accurate depiction, but it is closest depiction of what you think you are.
Just the cover of that book is not going to tell you everything about the book. The cover is just giving you a glimpse of what lies inside. If you really don’t like it, maybe it is not your kind of book, but you’ll never know for sure, because you never took the time to actually read it.