Do I need to wear "armor" at work? I used to rely on luxury designer handbags and suits to show my status, until...

A travel journalist friend once told me that when he arrived at the hotel for a media interview group, other journalists from the same group would arrive at almost the same time. Once, while waiting to check in and enter the room, he noticed another reporter picking up his luggage from the storage area. It was then that he discovered that other fellow reporters had beautiful silver hard-shell handbags and various high-end brands and exquisitely crafted luggage. Suddenly he felt out of place in his large suitcase of red fabric, clunky wheels, and frayed seams (shabby but reliable department store merchandise).

My friend immediately bought a new suitcase after returning home. It was not an expensive item, but a stylish black hard-shell suitcase. It let others know that he also lived a cosmopolitan, active and busy life. Just as a bird uses its feathers to show off, he wanted the suitcase to reveal how he saw himself and how he wanted other reporters to see him.

I used an expensive leather bag to prove my identity

His story reminded me of the bags I owned when I was working in high-net-worth finance. My "four-figure" handbags (that's what I called any bag that dared to ask for more than a thousand dollars) were the way I represented myself to my client base. value way.

When I was twenty-eight years old, I bought my first four-digit leather bag—a classic Chanel shoulder bag, made of beige leather with black stitching, with a folding flap and an unexpectedly heavy gold chain shoulder strap. When I walk into a conference room to visit a prospective client, I stride in with a deliberately dangling Chanel bag under one arm and briefing materials in the other.

Of course, in these meetings, you have to show that you are the best person to be taken seriously, and as a committed workaholic, I am always very well prepared, but my leather bag makes me shine even more. Just as my friend noticed that the hotel waiter became more respectful after he started picking up nicer suitcases, I also noticed that when I placed my iconic four-digit bag on the conference table, the entire conference room Everyone inside will sit up straight. If the receptionist sees me walking in with it, they'll put the coffee cup on my table a little differently than they would if I walked in with that good-quality, albeit worn, department store tote.

Ironically, although I loved buying status bags at that stage of my life, luxury spending in general made me very uncomfortable. My usual style is to hang around on the edge and not stand out. While my contemporaries in finance, law, and management consulting were buying homes in upscale neighborhoods in Houston, I moved to a former factory complex on the other side of the tracks, far away from status symbols. ; When everyone began to collect high-quality paintings to hang on the wall, I found interesting black and white photos on the Internet, paid the photographer's royalties to print them into larger sizes, and put them into exquisite photo frames to form eye-catching works. The cost was only that of my colleagues. One-tenth of the purchase price; while my peers meticulously planned extravagant weddings at the age of 28 or 9, and soon began to look for nannies, it was not until I was 35 that I put on a beautiful J.Crew satin dress, and in just In the presence of eight people, I married a man who was twenty years older than me - he didn't want more children, and he didn't mind, at least at first, and I kept working.

That's why I'm ashamed to admit that I instantly get a sparkling boost from those expensive handbags. At home, I wear blue jeans and a T-shirt; but at work, I wear combat attire: power suits, designer heels, luxury bags. My travel journalist friend stopped after buying one suitcase, but I bought more and more combat clothing to increase my defenses. My wardrobe is full of leather armies and golden warriors: the Lady Dior bag designed for Princess Diana, a classic Ferragamo handbag, a Gucci evening bag, a bag so big it can fit inside Prada for my laptop and work documents, and of course Chanel handbags of all sizes, shapes and styles. At the height of my military power, I owned up to twelve status-symbolizing women's handbags at the same time.

But after I left the corporate world, a funny thing happened. When I was thirty-nine and about to enter the entrepreneurial chapter of my career, my then-husband and I decided to move from Houston to a sun-drenched, minimalist desert home in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The master bedroom of our new home has two closets, so the first thing I did in mine was to nail hooks into the wall and hang my bags like armor, so that I can make selections for each day's battlefield. Which one to carry with you.

Common Mistakes People Make: Using External Things to Measure Intrinsic Value

However, I'm not actually fighting anymore. In my new life, I write books, teach personal finance seminars, and make media appearances. Carrying an expensive handbag on stage and giving a keynote address won't wow your audience. They want real-world financial advice not a reminder that I can waste how much money I can on a bag.

What about the people I met in Santa Fe? They don't carry bags like senior female executives in New York or Los Angeles. How ridiculous it would be to walk into a town of cowboy boots, turquoise jewelry and Bolero tops, wearing my Manolo Blahnik heels and a Balenciaga handbag. So, my combat attire sat in the closet gathering dust.

As each year passes, it becomes clearer and clearer to me how much of a wasted investment opportunity they represent for me. Occasionally, I'll look in the closet, the financial gears turning in my mind, and I'll think: There are nearly $20,000 worth of handbags gathering dust in here. How much money would I make now if I had invested that money in the S&P 500 instead of these stupid leather goods hanging in my closet? I started calling it my "wall of shame."

Finally, I donated most of my suits and heels to Dress for Success, an organization that provides low-income women with formal clothing to help them find jobs. I keep a few bags for use during my periodic consulting visits to corporate executives, and distribute others to female friends who still need soft armor in their careers.

I really want to tell you that those handbags no longer have dazzling power over me, but the truth is that when I carry them, I still feel a little bit elated, because when I see other people's reactions, at that moment, I feel so special. The difference is that I know now that those feelings are fleeting and the flashes don't last. Now I can see these bags for what they really are: objects that are external to me, even if I use them to measure their intrinsic value. Imbuing identity items with this kind of meaning is a mistake many of us make every day.