Guest Post: Cognitive Dissonance, Confusion, and the New Garments

Guest Post by Calleen Petersen

When the new garments were announced, I was thrilled! I live in The South where it is so hot and muggy in the summer, peeling off your soaked, sweaty garments should be an Olympic sport! Sign me up for breathable fabric, sleeveless tops, and slips. Why are we releasing them in the 4th quarter when it finally starts to cool down???!!! We need them stat! There was also a part of this “reformed Molly Mormon” who also couldn’t wait to feel she was breaking some rules without breaking them with sleeveless clothes. I was going along riding this beautiful wave of anticipation for the new garments.

Then enters my daughter.

She’s been mildly pushing boundaries lately, as most 17-year-olds do as they prepare to leave home. It’s a rite of passage and a developmental milestone. In our house, we have never allowed tank tops. Years ago, I had a friend who chose not to get married in the temple because she would have to buy a whole new wardrobe. I had determined then and there that any daughters I had would dress in a manner that they would be prepared to wear garments. But a few years ago, my daughter joined the high school dance team and brought tank tops into our house as they were part of her uniform. I had grudgingly allowed it only for that reason. Now she wants to wear them all the time.

I should let her right? They’re approved now?

But the cognitive dissonance I feel after being told for the last 47 years that we had to wear the darn sleeves, slams its big fist down and makes me unreasonable. I’m all for wearing sleeveless for myself. Can’t wait. I’m not wearing them yet because I don’t have those garments. But to see my daughter in sleeveless tops and dresses makes me grip tighter. No, you can’t wear those! You aren’t allowed! Even though I mentally know it isn’t true, my brain screams, “She’ll never go through the temple if she wears those!” All of those reasons we were told we had to wear sleeves come tumbling out, and I’m left to wonder in confusion, did any of it matter? Or what does matter now?

To the younger generations- Please be patient with us who have been around a while as we try to recalibrate years of teachings and figure out how they fit into our lives. It’s a work in progress.

Calleen Petersen is a follower of Jesus, a therapist, a writer, a mom, and a wife who is just trying to find her nuanced way in the blazing hot South.