#7 - Bringing Your Sexy Back

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

sexy, green m&m, Minnie, thoughts, costume, feel, noise, women, wardrobe, twin girls, life, sneakers, change, Minnie mouse, conversation, pantsuit, define, wear, episode, designing

SPEAKERS

Trisha Barita

00:02

Hey there, I'm Trisha Barita. I'm a mother of twin girls, a wife, an entrepreneur, a psychology major, a lawyer, and a coach. With all these different roles in my life, in the past, I truly struggled with limiting beliefs in my ability to adequately juggle all these roles successfully. I often would be frustrated that time and again, I let my goals and dreams always take a backseat to everything else I was trying to do. And those dreams always seem to be on the horizon, just out of reach. Until I discovered tools and thought-work to help me tackle and learn to balance all of it. Now, I don't let these titles define my limits. I define my balance in life by how I choose to show up for myself every day. Am I perfect? Hell, no. Far from it. But I do work every day to believe in myself, and to be present with whatever I experience in this life. The Good, the Bad, and The Really Fucking Ugly. To own my truth and own my thoughts.

01:15

I created this podcast to talk about how that noise gets in the way of our goals as women. And now I help women and teach them tools to cut the overwhelm of noise in their life, preventing them from getting the balance they want. If you like this podcast and want to take my free course to get started on designing your balance, and saying 'fuck that noise,' go to TrishaBarita.com/freecourse. Now let's get after it.

02:06

Hello, fabulous friends. So this isn't the episode where I talk all things Justin Timberlake and break down his 'I'm bringing sexy back' song from 2006. But please don't let me stop you. Seriously. Feel free to vibe to JT after this episode, if that's your jam. Okay, so back to the topic at hand--bringing your sexy back. First off, well, where the hell did it go? Or where the hell does it go? Maybe the truth is that sexy has always been there. The noise of at all. But well, it gets lost sometimes for us as women, especially in our head and how we feel about ourselves. And often what's going on in our lives and outside stuff dictates when it comes and goes.

03:05

I mean just off the top of my head, when my twin girls were three months old. I had not slept more than two hours in weeks. I mean, more than two hours in a row, right? I couldn't remember the last time I had taken a decent shower. And I had changed so many dirty diapers and cleaned so many baby bottles that I just thought,  "This will never end!" Yeah, pretty sure there wasn't much of an ounce of feeling sexy during that time.

03:42

But there's so many other reasons you may feel sexy has left the building. And it feels like she ain't never coming back. I bring this up because I find innately curious the recent conversations about sexy in the media. In particular, the discussions surrounding the change of wardrobe for the green M&M. And the change for Minnie Mouse. So in case you do not know, the green M&M is changing her white gogo boots for sneakers. And in Paris, France Disney, Stella McCartney designed a blue polka dot pantsuit for Minnie Mouse instead of her signature dress. There you have it, people. I know, I know, you're shocked. You're like, what the heck? Or maybe you're like yes, finally! Look, I don't care if the green M&M wants to put some sneakers on, or if Minnie wants to don a pantsuit. Whatever.

04:53

As a woman, connecting to my identity and what makes me feel sexy is not going to be wrapped up into a cartoon character. But you may be saying, "But it's about the kids, Trisha." Let's just hold up right there. Who here really thinks the green M&M in the gogo boots is for the kids? Yeah. Okay. Let me ask that again. Who REALLY thinks the green M&M in the gogo boots was made for women to feel sexy? Or really, for women at all? Yeah, okay. So, um, as far as Minnie, fine, it's, it all starts with the kids, I get it. I'm raising two kids. And I think about it constantly. The noise that will fill their heads about how they matter in this world, and how they should think about who they are in this world. And I'd say this: maybe we shouldn't let all of this noise pierce so deeply that it affects how you feel about you. And stop to think about who is defining what sexy is to you anyway.

06:04

Now maybe, behind closed doors, unbeknownst to me, there has been a decades-long struggle to put Minnie in a pantsuit and to get green M&M out of her gogo boots. And for all the fighters that went to bat to get that done, hey, more power to you. Great job. I'm actually more concerned that Minnie doesn't have more than one outfit. And how long has this been going on? For decades? She's a fucking cartoon working for Disney. Get some animation people in here and draw her up a boss woman's wardrobe and be done with this conversation. You know what I mean? I just feel like if Minnie wants to wear a pantsuit--cool. Or she wants to wear her go-to dress--whatever. I think the point is, it's okay for you to bring your sexy back.

07:07

I'm not sure where all this nonsense of cartoon wardrobes is going. But I think it's a pendulum swinging the other way. A while back, my sister-in-law pointed out something. And this was a number of years ago when we first noticed the trend, really,she noticed it and brought it to my attention. That around Halloween when you go to a costume store, online or in person, the majority of costumes for women will most likely dress up as a sexy-blank--fill in the blank. And it could be sexy fighter pilot. Sexy Carebear. Sexy bumblebee. Sexy skeleton. Sexy wolf. Sexy mummy. Sexy fairy, sexy pinata sexy monkey. Sexy box of chocolates, sexy referee, sexy, mad scientist, sexy clown, sexy, alien, etc, etc. I mean, even ridiculous stuff like sexy french fries, or sexy ketchup, or sexy popcorn.

08:18

So how much is the green M&M and Minnie's wardrobe change really changing the conversation? And what are we trying to change it to, anyway? I say, you want to be sexy fast food french fries for Halloween, have at it. And, well, if wearing one of these costumes is what gets your sexy back. Cool. But the point I think my sister-in-law was making was just generally, is there not any other costume choices for women that don't have some creativity to them versus just making the costume have a short skirt and adding sexy to the name? And what are we making that mean if sometimes we want to wear that type of costume or sometimes we don't?

09:02

If we're trying to move forward here, really, I don't think we what we need is a wardrobe change. I think because somebody is always going to be changing or trying to control the conversation about what is sexy. In particular, what is sexy for women. I think the only way to get the narrative in your head about how this makes sense for you is that you take your sexy back from all of this. If I could go back to myself when the girls were three months old, I would have told myself, 'Stop looking at the photos of whatever movie star or model who just gave birth two days ago and has a six-pack on Instagram or on the covers magazine.

09:48

Look, good for her. But that doesn't define your worth. And it shouldn't make you feel bad about how you do you in this phase of your life. You empower yourself with your own thoughts. If you have your thoughts being driven about what others define as sexy, you will always be trying to achieve something you never created or had control over anyway. What if the outfit doesn't wear you and you wear the look to make you feel as sexy as you want? And you embrace that the sexiness of you all comes from within your thoughts.  

10:29

Look also Aquino you may wear certain things like I don't know. Things that, you know, do make you feel sexy like a pair of stilettos. Or maybe it's combat boots, Chuck Taylors, or, you know, your go-to Nike sneakers. Red lipstick, a blown out hairdo, those jeans. Maybe it's your walk or your talk. How you love people, or your boss-self. I mean, you know, that just thinking about how badass you are as a woman can make you feel sexy. Hmm, like maybe green M&M has it right. Maybe she can still be sexy in her sneakers. And maybe, secretly at night, Minnie's going to try on green M&M's white gogo boots.

11:18

Look, people, you never know. This isn't some ridiculous Mary Poppins carpet bag, where you stick your hand in and reach around. And at some point, you're going to grab your 22-year-old sexy-self and all her thoughts and feelings. Pull it out and immediately feel like, 'Wham. Now there it is! I was wondering where it's been all this time?' No, no, my friend. This is more like you facing your true thoughts about yourself, your insecurities about how you look about what you think sexy is. And all I'm saying is, don't let others take that power from you. Own your part of the conversation in all of this. If you start with your thoughts, and start moving the noise out of the room so you can have a real conversation with yourself about who you are in the present, start becoming comfortable with who you are today, then you can connect with what you feel and think and start to change those thoughts and your perspective to your will not anybody else's to empower you about who you become and how sexy you truly are. And that my friend, is how you start bringing your sexy back. And I'll leave it at that. Now go get after it. You got this!

12:55

Hey, thanks for listening today. If you enjoyed this episode, and our woman ready to say fuck that noise so you can start designing the balance in your life. Go take my free course to get started at TrishaBarita.com/freecourse. Now have an awesome day and I'll see you next week.