The Masterclass

Saturday morning, I left the house with an enormous amount of guilt, to attend an in person Masterclass with Aletté Winckler. From Mom-guilt to Wife-guilt to Financial-guilt, you name it I felt it.

Mom-guilt is always there, so everything I do is weighed down by that, by the way. The other two not so much, but they were present on the day. Anyway, I was late leaving and driving to Johannesburg for the event and when I had JUST left the house I realised I never put my earrings in (or on? Which one is it?).

I decided that I CANNOT meet THE STYLE QUEEN herself and not have earrings on. So I sacrificed some travelling time to turn around and fetch the earrings. Anyway, I arrived 5 minutes before it all started, sighing a big sigh of relief.

Needless to say, it was measuring, looking at colours against the face, you name it we did it. I walked over to Aletté (typically of how I am) and introduced myself to her. She must get this all the time and in hindsight I just laugh at myself, but there is a bit more to this introduction and why she would know how I fit into her picture…

I must say, I LOVE listening to her and in person it is even better than on Facebook videos! She did not only speak about color and style, she instilled some word from God and the Holy Spirit spoke directly to my heart when she spoke. Like, we must enjoy the season that we are in. They do not last forever, which is so true. She also said that, at some time or another, we all offend our children and this places a rock between us, which in the end builds a wall.

Realising that I made wrong with both my children, offending them at some time and on some level with something, purely because I was busy with work or something that required my attention at the time….this had placed many rocks between us…

She further said that when you apologise, you remove the rocks and the wall or barrier that the enemy is trying so hard to build up – because he is out to make everyone miserable and ruin relationships! Thank God that I have apologised to my kids when I did wrong, sometimes not enough I think. But I felt there is hope and we are on the right track I hope (and think).

She also spoke about forgiveness, something God has been talking to me about a lot lately. Sometimes I get it right and other times not so much. But she physically demonstrated that, when you hold something against someone, you are bound to that person for as long as you hold onto the thing you hold against them. What do you call the repetition of the same word in a sentence? Some fancy language label… My word, how is that for holding on to holding something to hold on to….anyway, moving on!

They go on with their lives and you cannot understand why you just cannot move on and live the life you are supposed to live. So true and something God has showed me, yet I keep on forgetting that at times…

Aletté further said that God loves us all uniquely not the same. This was a very interesting fact and something I had not thought about in that manner before….and that is how it is with our children is it not? We love each one as God created them to be. What I realised, is that I need to know and understand myself, my husband and my children even better than what I already do.

If we do not address everyone’s love languages, then the time spent in the house, the place where we are supposed to feel safe and loved, will become torture and awful which will leave scars.

Back to the image stuff. Apparently it takes 1,5 seconds to make an impression (a few years ago it was 7,5 seconds). Wow. Why did this change? I suppose because everything seems to be going faster and faster these days….so naturally things like that will also speed up.

At some stage during the day, the enemy wanted me to feel like he always tries to make me feel. The odd one out. The one that is not pretty enough. The one that did not put her lipstick on (something I am not crazy about wearing but realised that it is a must if I want to leave an impression). I even felt intimidated by each and everyone there, especially the Image Queen herself, with her funky green jacket, white shoes, red lips and all.

As soon as those thoughts started, I then, almost, for a moment proceeded to believe the next lie – that I wore the wrong outfit. Let us face it. Going to something like this is intimidating, as you feel that you will be judged by others. I dressed for comfort more than style and that is purely because of the cold front that came in suddenly and early.

Not that there was something wrong with my outfit, the colour and everything was right I later learned. As all the lies started to march around in my mind, I even had a thought that I messed up the ONE CHANCE that I had to have a gorgeous photo of me and Aletté. She, of course, looked stunning and I looked, well, dull and everything that she is not.

The Holy Spirit immediately started to work with my thoughts, sifting and throwing out the negative seeds the enemy was trying to sow in my spirit. He told me, that, it is OK to have this photo that I perceive to be dull and not so great, about me. Because, the next time that I will meet Aletté, I will know my everything relating to style better and be even better presented. Was this not the purpose of today?

Around about this paragraph, I realised that this entry is going to be longer than the average entry. This is purely because I cannot break this up into chapters, we will loose the essence of what happened on 9 April 2022. I am also writing only in English, not Afrikaans too like I normally do. That is because of a few reasons, one is this piece is very long to translate, two – the class was presented in English due to English people being in the audience, and, three – there are more English people, I believe, who will be reading this entry.

Back to the day. Somewhere during the morning she gave some facts. Like, we as woman dress to impress other woman rather than our husbands. What a shocker, but as soon as she said it, I realised it is so true! My husband’s comment on this statistic is that us women, are always in competition with each other….something to think about too. She then also said that we wear 20% of our clothes 80% of the time. Jip, you read right! She did a calculation and what a shocker about the amount of money we have wasted on garments that are not worn often. Thank goodness I do not shop every season cupboards full of clothes, but, this statistic made me think….I have some sorting out to do in my cupboard….to throw out things I no longer wear…

She talked about a lot of other things too. I am not going to write about everything for two reasons. Number 1 – my husband also reads this blog, and she said some things (many of them I had figured out over time) but want to keep it a surprise for our special time together. Number two – those who are reading this who have not attended the Masterclass yet, must do so, I do not want to spoil the fun.

Back to the girly stuff. I was very much surprised to learn that my bonestructure is medium rather than small like I thought my whole life. She continued to bombard us with information, which I tried to make notes of as we went along. Things that I did not know, yet did without knowing why.

The long and short of it all is – the human eye searches for balance the whole time. If you are off balance it looks wrong and you do not feel confident. She also said that, when working from home, you must dress like you are at the office. If you look the part you will act the part. Something which I also always did, because I have worked from home since I was 23 years old (right out of articles starting my own Accounting and Auditing Firm).

We were then divided into two groups – cool and warm. I suspected that I was cool (not the cool as in the OutSurance advertisement where the officer takes his own temperature at the end saying I am still cool). This (being cool) means something, which I cannot put into words because of a lack of sufficient knowledge. Let me say this – I now know what colors to wear, and thank goodness my instincts over time were right! I do not have to replace my entire cupboard – something I am sure my husband will be elated and ecstatic to know.

Then they placed colour boards beneath our faces to determine the next thing Cool and clear or Cool and muted as well as another option which I cannot remember. At some stage Aletté was looking at the ladies, then she would say, “Show number one again, show me number three, no back to number two.” It felt like an eye test to me. You know, where you tell the optometrist you want to see lens number one again because…. mmmmm…. number two was very close to number one.

When it was my turn to watch this intriguing process being done on other ladies, I followed Aletté and her team like I don’t know WHAT. I wanted to UNDERSTAND what she was doing. Many times during the process she said it is Higher Grade stuff this. I commented to say it is more like doing a Masters Degree (I suppose that is why she calls it a Master Class is it not?). At one stage I thought my CA exams were easier to grasp and understand than this.

But anyway. Back to the process of determining the next level or step if I may call it that. I looked and looked. There were about two or three ladies where I thought I could see what they were going on about, but I was not sure. It was almost like those 3D pictures that were in the center-fold of the Huisgenoot magazine growing up. I just could not see it! And when you think your eye is trained to see something, it looses it again and then you just think it was your mind playing tricks on you.

Somewhere during the morning Aletté also said that your style that you like to dress in, says a lot about your personality. I did not know this and did not think about it in this way….I did not even know I had a style (with a name nogal)! But, after attending the Masterclass, I know a lot more and I also received access to the SA Image Application, I now have Aletté’s knowledge in the palm of my hand, specially designed for me…I now know my style, colors and a whole lot more…

On my way home, I thought about the whole day. I realised that we know so little about that which God wants us to know. It was as if the Holy Spirit prompted me to think a bit more about what had just happened and what is busy happening in my life. So many things on so many levels. I feel overwhelmed, but I know this is HOW God works with me. I need to do things on different levels to get the desired outcome…to get ready and prepared for that which He showed me 14 years ago.

I am busy with Ethics training (as you may or may not know) where I am learning about my personality based on the Tall Trees analysis from Hettie Brittz. Somewhere within that process we are working on Emotional Intelligence. I do not know enough to comment on that yet. And now, two days before I have been 40 for a year, I learned about my physical appearance. I also reallised, that with the Tall Trees personalities I must figure out my family’s Tall Trees profiles AND love languages too…

It is as if God is working on me at three different levels at the same time. Body, spirit and soul. Wow is all I can say. It is crazy busy with a husband, two kids, two businesses AND all this going on. Somehow I realised that we HAVE TO MAKE TIME for these things. We cannot just work all the time. All the glory to God for sending all these things to me. Even at times when it seems impossible to fit something like that in too.

I always say – when is a good time to start? (something that Aletté also talked about). I cannot wait until my kids are finished with school. In the process I would have made more damage and left more scars because I did not know them like I should know them! Now is a good a time as any. I mean I normally start crazy things and make hectic changes in my life in February (my busiest time work wise), so then April is not that bad…

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