When I meet someone for the first time, they already know who I am.
I used to feel surprised when someone read me accurately upon a first meeting, but I shouldn't have. My outfit was speaking for me, communicating my confidence in my choices, my sensitive nature, my fizzing intellect. It murmured my appreciation for beauty and romance. Everything I do, everything I am, is expressed in my wardrobe.
Strangers don't know the particulars of my life. What my childhood was like, whether I'm in love with someone, what moves me to tears, or how I take my tea. But they glimpse enough of me to know, almost immediately, if I resonate with them. Or not. Not is okay, too. There are other luminous, lovely people to meet in the world.
And first I had to meet myself.
I had to introduce myself to myself on a soul level, as if I were a new friend I had just made. Someone I knew nothing about other than a list of what she liked: butterflies, poetry, embroidery, and..? What does that mean? What speaks to her heart? What does she need the world to know about her? How does she crave to be seen?
That was the profound connection I needed to make, and I'm still making it, all of the time. The pattern on a blouse, the length of a dress, the shape of a neckline, all of these dilemmas are best explored hand in hand with the question: who am I, and how can I harmonize my inner self with my physical design? You can't change either, not really. But you can make peace with them - I did so contentedly. I learned that there are no consolation prizes. There is only you.
The truth is that it's easy to believe you'll make these soul introductions later, at some vague point in the future when you're magically equipped to do so. Don't wait.