When I started this website, I was thinking about how I would ‘frame’ or ‘brand’ my message. I knew I wanted to teach women on self-realization, but I couldn’t choose which vibe, colours and style I wanted to use. As a woman, I am very much a mix of spiritual habits, mixed with classy belongings. In real life, that is never a hard combination. However, when I look at other content creators, influencers or online teachers, I see they usually choose to show only ONE side of their personality and style: the one that matches with whatever it is they are selling.

Rolemodels

I have two big online role models in my life. I don’t want to name & shame (although I’m really never trying to shame anyone), so I’ll call them ‘classy woman’ and ‘hippie woman’. The classy woman is all about levelling up, and how to live a luxurious lifestyle, while the hippie woman is all about meditation, transformation and living a peaceful life.

While I know that they actually have a lot in common (which is probably why I love them both), their branding is very one-sided: the classy woman shows a lot of luxury, champagne, expensive bags and shoes. But she never tells about how she stays sane or what she does for quiet time, while I know that this is part of her life too (as she casually slips it in her video’s now and then).

On the other side, the hippie woman is all about light and green colors, zen and nature vibes, while I know that she is also a girly-girl who buys herself expensive accessoires from the money she makes, and rightly so. However, she never really shows the rest of her life that is less calm & quiet, since it just doesn’t fit her brand.

The illusion of a binary world

And trust me, I don’t blame these women. They have a very good insight into how social media works and what their audience wants to see. People find it very easy and comforting to see ‘black and white branding’, as I would call it. They like the illusion of the world as a binary one. It is very nice – even if it is just for the hours spent online – to be able to think that the hippie woman meditates all day and is never materialistic. And to think that the classy woman always dresses fancy while drinking champagne, and never breaks down or needs nice meditation and a chai latte to pick her up again.

But is that really how we want the world to work? It sounds nice and simple, but doesn’t it make life that much harder in the long run? I’m sure that if the hippie woman would tell the world that she bought a Chanel-bag from the money she makes off of her meditations, some people would call her fake or a hypocrite. But don’t we all consist of more than one color?

Let’s be colorful

This is why I decided to build my website on the premise that you can be whoever you want. This not only means that I believe you can choose and build the life you are dreaming of, but also that you can have as many hobbies, qualities, messages and styles as you want. There really is no limit. You don’t have to be just healthy, just a minimalist or just classy. You really can have it all!

Human beings are very interesting and complex creatures. Let’s not compromise but celebrate that. Don’t show the world just one color because otherwise people will get confused. Let that be the problem of small-minded people. Don’t deprive the world of all your beautiful colors. If you can combine sobriety AND luxury in your life; so do I – good for us! Congratulations on being a full, complete, complex, interesting and self-realized human. Now let’s show the world what we’re truly made of.

xx Coco