How I Found My Shadow‑Soft Aesthetic (and Built My Author Brand)
The Shape of My Soul in Ink
Having gathered a steady stream of peering eyes, I believe it is time to explain who I am and the moment I realized my aesthetic was never random – it was a build up of every significant moment in my life and the pivotal climax in my upcoming debut novel.
It was my true identity pushing through.
Legacy of the Fire: War Waged in Shadows is who I am.
Every word inked into the printed pages of my novel is me piece by piece.
Aren’t everyone’s?
Authors write stories and some of them have stitched their souls in between every line.
The genre they choose -romance, horror, gothic, nonfiction.
They choose these for a reason.
Something in their hearts has called out to them.
Just as something in my heart called out to me.
And for years, all I wanted to do was fit in.
So, I concealed myself between florals and pleasant smiles while I wrung out my ear from the truth I kept telling myself.
“You aren’t really this kind of a girl, Angela. But I’ll let you gander on for your sake.”
So, I did. And I tried as best as I could as shown here in this little collage of my adventure.
But as you can see, I still somehow returned to certain parts of me I truly wanted to be.
That is when I began to understand that I wasn’t doing this to enjoy myself, I was doing this to blend in and feel maybe… accepted.
By whom?
Me? No.
Everybody.
Where Freedom Felt Like Freefall
I discovered that after high school, you have this new profound freedom, and nobody really knows what to do with it.
I mean, unless you have a plan, then I’m super happy for you.
But as for the rest of us, I can’t say it’s exactly easy.
You see, two weeks before I graduated and five days before my birthday, my father passed away.
So, things kind of started off morbid to say the least.
I was finally able to stop hiding from my feelings and be with my husband (which is an entirely different story on its own), but things went as they did.
Things Ended… and not kindly.
Relationships. Friendships.
Chapters closed, doors opened, and doors slammed shut.
There’s always an emotional root being ripped out somewhere.
I only wish I had a heads up that it was going to be ripped straight from my heart, leaving me aimless and devastated for a couple of years.
Because grieving is rarely linear.
Grieving is reckless and desperate decisions made one after the other without forgiveness for the future poured with regrets and misery.
Grief is wild, man.
When so many endings happen when you’re expecting the beginning to start – it hurts.
It ruins and messes with a person’s mentality.
And I was never the confident one – so that was just the cherry on top.
This is why it took me a while to find out who I was.
Heck, I went through all my twenties in a self-induced coma of numbing alcohol, tears and poor decisions.
But I’m okay now.
About to be thirty-one and I can say confidently I know exactly who I am now and it only took one life-shattering panic attack, multiple months of non-stop anxiety and a mountain of debt.
Yep. I know who I am now.
But that doesn’t mean I didn’t know I was then.
It just means if you keep ignoring who you truly are its gonna cost you.
Trust me.
The Gift and the Diagnosis
Ever since I was eight, I was curious about who I was and what I was meant to be.
So, I decided to look up my name.
Angels means heavenly messenger.
It was at this very moment I decided that is exactly who I am going to be.
I kneeled at the edge of my bed and clasped my hands together as I bowed my head saying,
“God, if I am meant for something greater, if I am meant to be your heavenly messenger, allow me to help those who need healing. Hear those who want to be heard and be the one that shares your light with the world.”
Yes. I did indeed say this.
I was very, uhrm, straightforward.
I mean who doesn’t want to be that person in this world.
You know, the one who wants to be the change.
I used to think it was for the world, but then as I grew up and as I am now, I have realized it is just someone’s world.
There have been so many people I have talked to and sometimes I think, “Why do they all say that?”
Say what?
Say this, “Yes! That’s exactly what I’m trying to say! It’s like you know me better than I do!”
When so many people say this, the narrative begins to shift in your head and you question,
“Why and how did I know that?”
Maybe it’s a six sense, but after so many years it’s finally got a word.
Hypervigilance.
But I dismiss that because some of these things are too creepy.
But the common occurrence in my life has always been divine.
Good versus Evil.
It’s always been darkness and light at war in my head and heart.
But my soul was always trying to tell me we are in the grey.
And after the panic attack in March 2024 and the pills, hospital stay, crisis hotline, everyone telling me who I am and who I should be – I quit.
And I accepted it.
I live in the grey.
Between good and evil.
I will be in the middle of darkness and light.
And finally, I admitted.
I think I have more of a shadow-soft aesthetic.
Then things started shifting.
Things, moments, words, and clothes started to align.
Creating My Own Home
Once I admitted I wasn’t too gothic and wasn’t much of a church girl, I accepted things as they came to be.
But believe me, I love black.
Distrubia clothing is my whole vibe.
But, like, also think of Blogilates.
I’m so in between these two as my aesthetic but with particular colors such as:
· Oatmeal
· Plum
· Marron / wine
· Hunter Green
· Celestial Blue
· Bone White
· Candle-Gold
· Ash Grey
· Frosted Taupe
· Charcoal / Matte Black
· And well… just like two or three more
I started seeing what colors felt right instead of what everyone thought was “in.”
Then my confidence boosted and it became more easy to pick clothes that inspired me rather than made me feel like I was just retreating to being that people pleasing person once again.
Plus, it helps with my brand.
It truly does define me.
Everything feels more cohesive and less chaotic.
I don’t regret a piece I buy because I know exactly what I love and what aligns with who I am.
And I honestly feel like that is super important to a writer – person in general.
We don’t like being apart of the “trend” we just like belonging to a place.
But I never felt like I fully belonged anywhere.
So, I created my very own home, here.
Shadow & Scripture is for the girl who became a woman and has suffered through trials that shaped her.
Depression, trauma, anxiety, and feeling alone and unloved are me.
I was never somebody’s first friend, which is why I was always there to be everyone’s because no one should ever feel that way.
But certain moments in my life have forced me to pull back.
Not everyone deserves your everything.
And not everything deserves your time.
Time is sacred.
Once I realized that, after years of regret, I started to understand that my time is best spent where it matters with who matters most to me.
With whom I actually care for and uplifts me as a result.
And I spent years running from blogging, but honestly, with the rise of AI, I feel like we need more honesty online.
Because heed my words AI will eventually become obsolete.
Generic, even though it learns.
Saturated with the same words over and over because people will be using the same information instead of adding to it.
I’m not saying it won’t have its perks, I’m just saying humans have something AI doesn’t.
A past. A present. A future.
I know I digress but that’s what lovely isn’t it?
A genuine conversation from one writer to another, talking about aesthetic as identity and then how time is genuine currency.
But hear me out.
This is just me, trying to tell you… Stop hiding.
Be different already.
Be You.
Stop following the trend and start being it.
Authenticity is your greatest weapon in a word of conformity.
Use it.
Then come and tell me – spill to me every detail of how alignment and self-fulfillment came shortly after.
You will be gob smacked.
I know I was.
Who Will You Be?
It’s so important to just be honest with who you are.
It’s also so important to just stop running from what is chasing you: the past.
You won’t escape it.
The best you do is wear a blindfold and wander through life as if you cannot see anything.
Occasionally boozing it down or sleeping it off.
Can’t feel something if you feel nothing.
But, coming from a woman who never wanted to hurt anyone and still did anyway, I’m going to tell you that you will do at lot worse avoiding it then facing it head on.
Hence the mountain of debt, regrets and breathless nightmares that bring on the morning misery.
Choose you, my friend.
Choose healing. Choose pain. Choose love.
For you.
Aesthetic in its prime form means: concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty.
But at its true form it means something greater: it is a set of principles underlying and guiding the work of a particular artist or artistic movement.
Your movement.
I hope that you are aware that the story you are writing is your whole aesthetic.
Angels, demons, God and lucifer are my aesthetic.
Always has and always will be.
What you have written – stitched quietly in between the binding of that book of yours is the underlying principles that guide you.
So, next time you think you don’t have an aesthetic, I encourage you to ask yourself these three questions because when debut day comes and you’ll have to wear something for photoshoots with your fans I want you to know who you are and what you represent.
It’s the best way to sell your book.
Because what is social media anyways but people who wish they were following people who realized who they wanted to be.
That’s us. That’s you and me.
Be you and I’ll be me.
Now those three questions.
Are you Ready?
Are you sure?
And Who will you be?
