by Leann Zotis

Created on: June 16, 2009   Last Updated: June 29, 2009

In order to achieve a sense of harmony within yourself and with your surroundings, it is essential to reveal your own personal style. Reveal it, not create it. Personal style is something that is within us all along. It is not forced, it is released.

Personal style is, well, personal. Each of us are made up of an assortment of qualities, of likes and dislikes, of preferences and opinions. To discover the key to your own personal style in decorating, you need look no further than your own personal style in the clothes you wear and in the way you live your life. Even if you can't immediately see your own style, those around you probably recognized it long ago.

Are you a button-down collar, Brooks Brothers kind of guy or does casual Friday suit you just fine? Do you dress up for the symphony or dress down for the softball field? Sports coat or sweat suit? Leather or canvas? Formal or grungy? Are you classic literature or comic books? Classical music or rap? Summer or winter?

Your home should be a reflection of the inner you, the one that feels comfortable in your own skin and your own choices and who wants those around you to feel that way as well.

Is dinner at your house a home-cooked, sit down affair most nights? If so, the choice of a classic oak dining room table and chairs will work well in your decorating scheme. If most meals come from a take-out carton, a pizza box or are consumed from a plate in front of the television, a formal dining room area will be wasted on you. Investing your money and creative juices in the family room or game room will bring out the real you.

Do you follow the latest trends, always wearing up to the minute fashion and knowing the top names in designers at any given time? Your personal style may be ultra-modern and you may be most comfortable in an environment that reflects that mood.

What happens when you share your living environment with another? What if he's a little bit country and you're a little bit rock-and-roll? Personal style, much like everything else involved in the lives of two people in a relationship, must reach a level of compromise. Does his taste rule one room, while yours reigns supreme in another? Do you turn a bit eclectic and mix and match throughout your home? Do you both abandon it all and just live in the moment with whatever comes your way?

This decision, too, will be dictated by your personal style. If you're a control freak, you may feel the need to force the issue in favor or your own tastes. If you're easy-going, you may be willing to relinquish control in favor of harmony. The point is, to discover your own personal style, all you really need to do is open yourself up, let it all in and let it all out. As long as you're not trying to force something that isn't really you, the real you that was there all along will have a chance to emerge.

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