Living from the center of who you are always leads to the most rewarding life. Locating the center, finding what’s essential about your identity, about what makes you special is not always easy. Very few of us are raised to cherish these discoveries. We all have them growing up; those moments when we connect with something in the created world, a sound, a fragrance, a way of putting things together that resonates down to our core. We need help capturing these moments, identifying and naming them as central to our existence. There is something about them that speaks to our reason for being, our calling, our destiny.

The Style Core was created to help you gather these discoveries, reconnect with past moments of “Aha!”, learn how to identify what makes you special and never let go.

Here’s a surprising exercise to help you touch your center.

Create a Pinterest board or pull together 10 images that you absolutely love from favorite magazines. Next, describe in descriptive phrases or several short sentences why you love each place or beautiful thing.

Spoiler Alert: It’ll be more meaningful if you gather your favorites together first, before reading on

Surprise, you’ve just described yourself! That’s right. The same qualities that you love in your favorite places and things are qualities that you have as a person. Its easy to describe why we like our favorites, its harder to identify who we are, to describe our essential qualities and characteristics. We have so little practice. Identifying our favorites, we do this all the time.

Ready for another surprise? Your favorite places and things look like you. You are attracted to places and things that share the same design signatures as your body. The same line, shape, form, proportion, scale, color and texture. See VIDA Styling for a deeper explanation.

Erin’s favorites share the same inherent color palette as her hair, skin and eyes. She loves the cool blues and greens of her eyes, the sun-lit earth tones of her hair, the soft reds of her lips. Her descriptive phrases speak directly to who she is as a person.

As some one who has known Erin for a long time, I can attest to the accuracy. Even the phrase “mosaics” is so her. She is always pulling together colorful moments into a beautiful whole. This is who she is, what she does, how she lives. Erin’s Favorites Board is a reminder to her of the many ways she is special, to those of us who love her it helps us to see her more clearly.

Once you have your Favorites Board together, share it with your friends. Their affirmation will enrich your friendship and encourage you to share more of your self and your story.

Live from the center where you belong. It’s where your friends want you to be. It’s where life becomes more beautiful, more meaningful, more yours.

You can be guided through this entire process inside Your Million Dollar Look, an online style coaching program led by Erin and Carla Mathis. Start with the complimentary Free Masterclass right here. Trust me, it’s worth your time for this valuable resource.