A Cool Girls Guide
From a Self-Proclaimed “Cool Girl”
Journal Entries
Entry Number One:
How to Find your Cool
I was inspired to start journaling after moving to New York and struggling with the transition. I have been questioning my self of sense and realized that others may be feeling the same way.
So let’s start out
What is a “Cool Girl”?
The honest answer varies. Cool is different for each person. On social media, we feel constantly
pressured to fit certain aesthetics, clean girl, mob wife, whatever the trend of the moment may be. After Sophia Richie Grainge’s wedding, I almost threw out my entire closet.
But why?
Her style would not suit me. I am nothing like her but yet I felt this immense pressure to conform to what other people believe is cool. Let’s not get it twisted though, inspiration is a beautiful thing. Every day I am inspired by different walks of life. I believe it becomes an issue when you are blindly following a trend for the benefit of others. I wanted to exchange my entire wardrobe based on an internet stranger’s opinions. Now that I am in New York City there are so many people I can aspire to be, it is almost overwhelming.
Quickly after moving here, I was to attend my first day of work as an intern for a very high-profile stylist. I struggled with what to wear, how to act, what makeup to put on, and the typical first-day jitters. When I finally showed up at the stylist’s studio, my heart beating out of my chest, I realized I was the least “cool” person there. Everyone was dressed so differently than me and had knowledge I could only dream about having. I felt like a complete idiot. I went from a big fish in a small pond to a small fish in a VERY large pond but I had no choice except to jump right in and swim. The first few hours I endured many well-deserved insults and quite a few paper cuts. Then about five hours into my very stressful work day my boss gets a call from a publicist. The publicist tells her how much she loves her work and how interested she is in representing her. My boss abruptly cuts her off and says “I’ll think about it but I don’t need someone to make me look cool I am cool.” I sat back and thought to myself that is what cool truly is, knowing your worth and owning it. She could have told me rainbow glitter jumpsuits were in and I would have believed her. She didn’t care what a single other person thought, she would’ve worn that rainbow jumpsuit and others would have followed suit because she owned it. She said what she meant and she meant what she said. She was her absolute own aesthetic and I respected the hell out of it. While I decided it was in everybody’s best interest not to come back the next day, I will take that phone call with me wherever I go. Could that have been an amazing business opportunity? I have no idea. Did she end up using the publicist? I couldn’t tell you. What I do know is that her words resonated with me and now I am passing them along to you.
Sometimes it can be hard to recognize other people’s “cool”. When my brother Jonah and I were younger we were very different. I had a big group of friends, loved going out, and was on the tennis team. Jonah on the other hand had a small circle who loved video games. They rarely saw the light of day due to their dedication to Fortnite. Jonah also wore the same two Adidas tracksuits every day for about 3 years. In a moment of frustration when I was 14 and he was 11 I asked my Dad,
“Why doesn’t Jonah play sports? Did you not dress him in jerseys as a baby?”
To which he replied,
“Don’t you think I tried?”
My dad is an active, healthy living, basketball-playing, Green Bay Packer-loving man. I didn’t understand why my brother couldn’t be the same. While my parents have always taught me to “love everybody” and that “kindness costs you nothing”. I could not accept that Jonah was not the “cool” that was recognizable to me. I would envy my friends who would bump into their siblings at a basement party on a Friday night. I was jealous that they could get the older gossip we all wanted to know at their family dinner. I wanted that so selfishly that it caused me to blatantly ignore the “cool” I had living under the same roof. Throughout the years Jonah and I’s relationship, and fashion sense, grew immensely. I was out in Chicago this summer and ran into someone I hadn’t seen in a while. We began small talk and the conversation ended with
“I know I’ve never met your brother but he seems so cool.”
My life felt altered. She had never met him and didn’t know how amazing of a person he was. She only thought he seemed cool. Seemed. Cool. This is what I wanted so bad? Someone to say my brother “seemed cool?” I realized right then and there that he is more than just “cool”. He is the most gentle, kind-hearted, caring person I will ever know. I heard what I always wanted to hear but it only made me realize I was ignoring how cool it was that he was unapologetically himself. Why did that adjective have such a hold on me? On everyone? He wore his Adidas tracksuit every day with pride. He never concerned himself with ins or outs. He woke up every day and lived for himself, not for anyone else’s validation. Just because I couldn’t understand his “cool” didn’t mean it wasn’t there. Every person already has their cool inside of them. If some don’t recognize it then others will. Own your worth, ideas, hopes, and dreams, and scream them from the rooftops because that is what’s “cool”.