Your Fashion Journey: Embracing Change and Overcoming Challenges

“If you don’t know where you want to go, how will you ever get there?” – Gina Renee

I am all about setting goals, and I want to share with you the reasons why. Goals are something that can motivate us and get us farther in life. Why might we want to go farther in life? Because oftentimes, it can lead to a more fulfilling life. 

Many times, people don’t set goals because they think it’s not realistic or they don’t know how they will ever achieve them. Don’t let other people tell you to “be realistic” when setting goals. If you take that bad advice, you’ll be lowering your goals when you could be shooting for the stars. Think of your big goal as your big dream in life.

How do we attain our goals? We break them down into baby steps, much like we did at the beginning of The Fashion Design Book on page 9. Figuring out where we want to go is the main goal. At this point, you don’t need to know all the steps to get there. Just a couple of baby steps and you’ll figure out the other baby steps when you complete the others. 

I’ve had big goals so many times and have pivoted several times when I realized there might be a better path for me. Sometimes on our journeys, we don’t always know what opportunities exist until we set out to make things happen. Along the way, we might find out that there are other options that sound more appealing. At those points, it’s great to pivot so we allow those new opportunities to flourish. 

In the video, I mentioned that I always wanted to be my own designer. I also always wanted to have my own business. I never knew how my business would end up, but I knew I wanted to go in that direction. In my younger years, I imagined my business to be to design snowboarding clothes and swimwear. 

What I didn’t mention in the video is that there was a pretty pivotal moment that occurred when I was at the X-games in Colorado. Before these X-games, I had switched from working for Oakley to then working for Vans. Because I worked for these two different companies and their development calendars overlapped, I ended up working on both of their snowboarding collections as the developer and technical designer. 

When I got to the X-games, I saw so many of the outfits I developed on professional athletes and on spectators! It was double the amount I would normally see since I had worked for two brands for that season. It was such a fun experience watching the athletes win gold & silver medals while wearing clothes I created. The next morning, athletes with outfits I created were on the front of the newspapers in all of Colorado. 

This pivotal time for me made me realize that my dream of working on snowboarding clothing had been fulfilled. I was able to realize that dream in a slightly different way than I had originally anticipated, but I felt such a huge accomplishment. This allowed me to keep searching for what was going to be my next steps.

Fast forward years later, and my goals have been evolving. From leading a team of patternmakers and developers to now running my own business full-time, selling sewing patterns that I design and teaching others how to create their own sewing patterns.

At the end, you never know what opportunities may come your way. Other times, you may need to create opportunities for yourself to make your goals a reality. Take it step by step and pivot if you see a better path that is calling you.

I’m proof that dreams do come true, and goals can become a reality. Dream big!