Minimalist Athleisure Clothing

As we continue to work from home for more than a year now, casual clothing in client meetings has now become acceptable (sort of) in my industry. I guess the tropical climate of Singapore has a part to play, as well as the fact that these days most customers also seem to be wearing t-shirts for most meetings that I video dial into.

Over the last year, I ended up converting my entire work wardrobe to athleisure clothes only. So almost all days now I wear a t-shirt and shorts for work. I am loving this comfort and as Singapore gets hotter in the next few months, I cant be more blissful.

Long term readers of my blog know that I have been generally a big fan of Uniqlo. However, recently I discovered these amazing t-shirts from H&M and I love them. So, I guess, I need to introduce them to you.

So before you judge me, I have to explain. Since I became a minimalist, I don't like to wear t-shirts with designs or witty slogans or messages. I love my t-shirts to be super plain and if possible in solid colors. The second thing about t-shirts is that - they should be able to absorb sweat (yeah tropical country - remember?). So the Sports top Muscle fit H&M t-shirts fit my description perfectly. Same fit, 7 colors, fast-drying! What else would a pseudo-minimalist ask for?

And if you are also interested in my recommendation for bottoms, then I swear by the Decathlon Trek 500 shorts. Again, they are fast-drying, very comfortable and have pockets! Most exercise shorts seem to miss pockets and I can't live without them (keys, phone, wallet)! Unfortunately, the shorts are available in only 2 colors.

So there it is - my definition of a perfect wardrobe from working to workout and everything in between. So next time if you see me in these, don't judge me, I already told you why.

Mindfulness

So I managed to read the Miracle of Mindfulness a third time. It is a super simple book and can easily be read in a day. It is the only book I have read more than 2 times in my life, because I felt I was too shallow in understanding it.

I realize that every time I read it, I understand a little bit more about mindfulness. While it sounds very mystic and spiritual, it indeed is a very simple concept. The problem really lies in how difficult it is to be mindful every breath of your day!

If I have to summarize my understanding of mindfulness it would be - Your mind has a continuous stream of thoughts (Monkey Mind). How you "react" to those thoughts decides how you "feel" (Fear, anxiety, stress, love, hate, anger, jealousy are all feelings - outcomes of thoughts that came in your mind). When you are practicing mindfulness - all you are really doing is completely focusing on whatever task you are currently doing (eating, sleeping, reading, walking, etc.). From a mind's perspective you are neither engaging in thinking about your past or your future (consciously or subconsciously). Also, even when thoughts indeed come in your mind (which they always will!), you are acknowledging the presence of "those" thoughts, but choosing not to "engage" in them (By not "engaging" I mean you do not "feel" or "drift" with the emotion that your mind generates with regards to those thoughts). 

If you are a practitioner of mindfulness, you might as well correct me. This is my current understanding and it may definitely change as I try to implement it more in my life and potentially understand and experience it more. And if you are not yet a student of mindfulness then I recommend you give it a shot for a few days/ weeks/ months to really "experience" it.

The quest for a red shirt

Christmas is coming. While nothing has really changed with the COVID and WFH situation, my organization has decided to celebrate Christmas virtually. One of the "asks" is to wear something red to suit the occasion. Christmas's and Santa's association with the red color is the work of art of the Coca-cola marketing department. Brilliant indeed. However, we talk about it some other time.

After browsing through my big wardrobe (or even before browsing through it), I realized that I only carry shades of black (Black, Blacker and Blackest) for informal t-shirts and shades of blue for my formals. Thinking hard now, it has dawned on me that if you are a man living in Singapore, you need to have at least 1 red t-shirt in your closet. Hold your horses to read why.

The 3 biggest occasions that are celebrated en-masse in Singapore are - Christmas, Lunar New Year and the Singapore National Day. Tradition demands that you wear red on all these occasions (Coca-cola is not responsible for the association of red with the Lunar New Year by the way - they just got lucky there!).

So after years of refraining from buying bright colors, I have succumbed to the idea that I need a red. So you shall see me in red hopefully at least 3 times in the year going forward.

Reduce. Reuse. Recycle

After we are done (whenever that is) with COVID-19 and the US Elections, we still have to come back to the looming problem of Climate Change. It may be on the back burner now, but it is just a matter of time before it raises its ugly head again. While I am no scientist, I do believe that we all can contribute to reducing our (human race's) impact on the fragile ecology (or whatever is left of it now).

 

I think the age-old saying of Reduce - Reuse - Recycle needs to be somehow changed to emphasize on the fact that we need to reduce a lot more than we have to reuse and we have to reduce and reuse a hell-lot-more than we have to recycle. Only then, we have any hope of saving the planet. My not-so-clever brain came up with this inverted pyramid to depict that:

 

 

Rather than simply engaging in green washing, think about your environmental impact in everything you do. For e.g. by now, I hope you have read that plastic bags are environmentally more friendly (if you reuse them) than cotton bags (reuse 45 times than reuse 7100 times to have the same life-cycle effect). Anyway, let's revisit the terms Reduce - Reuse - Recycle again:

 Reduce

Buy less. Use less paper, plastic, food. Use less electricity. Use less water. Walk where you can drive your car. Take public transport wherever you can. Don't waste stuff. Every action you do, think of your environmental impact. Remember, the world has to last even after you are gone. So reduce the irreversible change that you are inadvertently causing.

Reuse

Reuse plastics, reuse paper, reuse clothes, reuse utensils. Reuse whatever you can. Be stingy for the environment. It is not about how much you can afford anymore (most of us are rich enough to afford quite a bit of luxury and be wasteful). It is all about the environment now.

Recycle

If you can't reuse, then remember that most countries now have recycling programs. If you try you can find out how you can recycle your stuff. Make sure you segregate at source so that items put for recycling are really recycled.

Time

Sorry for disappearing for almost a month. Life changed suddenly (like it always does) and I am in the midst of that change. I will probably write about what I have "been through" in a subsequent blog post once I am through this.

If there is one thing that I feel we all have equal access to (regardless of race, wealth, color) is - time. Every human being on the planet gets 24 hours a day. Irrespective of how rich you are, you can't trade time and everyone is equally wealthy in terms of the number of minutes you have in a day.

We are obsessed with money, but if you are a middle-aged salaried man like me - you need to guard the finite resource - time - by trading away money to do things that take too much of your time. To value your time, you need to have an index cost to each hour of your time so that you can do a cost-benefit analysis of your "time" much more easily.

I know it sounds simple but this "cost-benefit" analysis can get really complex. There are some things we do with our time that are genuinely required. For e.g. spending time with family is priceless. Working out, eating, sleeping, daily ablutions are a required (mandatory) use of time. So then, this analysis is something we need to seriously do about the discretionary time (browsing, socializing, entertaining) that we spend. Or the chores (cooking, cleaning, paying bills) that seem to occupy all of your weekends. I know I have written about time-boxing before, so I am sort of repeating myself.

Anyway, this brings me to my last argument on this topic. As much as possible try to do the following two things with your chores:

• Automate
• Outsource

 If repetitive things can be automated (auto-investment, auto-bill-payment for e.g.) then do it! Save time on non-value added activities. If you can outsource boring, non-value added chores (filing taxes, washing, cleaning (to maids/ robots/ consultants)) then do it. Only DIY if you enjoy (entertainment) or have a health benefit (cleaning 1 hour is your workout of the week!) or it is really worth it (for you).

Auto Switch-off Internet

If you are having broadband internet at home, there is a high chance that you never ever switch off your router. Which means your Wi-Fi signal is always available. Besides reducing the life of your equipment and wasting electricity, I am not sure whether it is an ideal condition to leave your internet running all the while 24x7. So if you are someone who is worried about it like me, here is a simple solution:

There are these cheap mechanical power timer outlets that are available that can be programmed to switch off for specific hours everyday (they are simple 24 hour timers and you can program them to switch off power to any appliance that is connected to them for designated hours). I have mine set to switch off my TV and Router every night from 11 PM to 7 AM. The advantage? Not only do I save electricity, but it forces me to go off to sleep at a fixed hour every night (TV and Internet are the biggest time wasters anyway), even if I am in the middle of a Netflix drama or surfing aimlessly some random YouTube videos.

I would highly recommend you buy these. Or if you have the budget, you can buy the electronic ones that can be programmed to follow a weekly schedule (Mon-Sun, 24 hours - so you could set it to switch off on weekday afternoons when you are not at home and change the hours for weekends - if you wanna binge watch Friday nights). Eco-friendly and help you to be disciplined!

The Distraction (curtailment) box

While I have stayed off social media for a long while now, my smartphone addiction is still an intriguing bit that I am unable to comprehend. Since the beginning of this year, I have been on a quest to understand this compulsory need to involuntarily check my mobile phone several times a day. It started with the download of an innocuous looking wallpaper from the Google Store called the "Unlock clock". All it really does is - show a count of how many times I "unlocked" my phone since the start of the day. It was scary at first to see that I checked my smartphone 60-80 times a day on a typical workday and it went down to 30-50 times a day on most weekends.

Subsequently I chanced upon a book titled "The Distracted Mind: Ancient Brains in a High-tech World" and it jolted me back to reality. I realized that I am addicted to "information seeking" and subconsciously seeking out new information every few minutes from the easily accessible Internet and WhatsApp on my phone. Besides wasting my time on unnecessary information, I was also losing out on getting bored. So I came up with this rather simple idea. I went to Muji, bought a random plastic box with holes for handles on both sides. Now, I keep my phone in the box when I am at home. I call it my "Distraction Box" and I keep it far away from my living room and my Work from Home room. The advantage? I don't subconsciously check my phone anymore. Every time I am tempted to casually check my phone, I have to go through the special effort of going to the room where the box is kept, opening it and taking the phone out. This entire act, actually motivates me not to check my phone unnecessarily.

Now, I just go occasionally (8-10 times a day) and read all the WhatsApp messages I have received, reply to them, put the phone back in the box and get on with my life. If I do get a phone call, the phone is always connected to my Bluetooth and I can still take the call.

Sit/stand desks

I love sit/stand desks. So much so that we have 2 at home. When we furnished our home first, I bought the mechanical variety that needs me to physically bring it up. Later after a few months in an IT show we saw an electronic one with 4 programmable pre-sets that can store (Up + Down) heights for 2 people. I went against my minimalism principles and ended up doing an impulse purchase. We have had this desk for 2+ years and I love it. I don't regret my decision to buy, and now in this global work from home experiment, I am so glad that I bought it. With my cheapskate ergonomics, its a nice setup for me.

The advantage of having a desk like this is - I can occasionally stand-up and continue working and then when I feel tired, I can bring it down and sit. I have a daily 15 minute stand-up meeting with my team everyday morning (and I love to take it literally "standing" with my coffee!). If you have been sitting on the fence about having a sit/stand desk, I will implore you to seriously consider buying it!

We have been working from home for more than a month now, and as of today, it looks like we will work for at least a month more. So, it's better we get used to this new way of working and not yearn for going back to office any time soon!

The 8 shoe pair minimalist

After I fell in love with the concept of minimalism, I went crazy and minimized my life aggressively. I threw away/ donated a lot of stuff I had, and I reduced my impulsive consumption to unprecedented levels. I felt good, fulfilled and happy!

Over the years, my spontaneous consumption, however seems to have crept up again. While I have had a very strict policy for my clothes and my accessories (e.g. 1 belt, 1 watch, 1 wallet, 1 phone etc.) I realized that I haven't been mindful of my shoe purchases. Slowly and steadily that number has been rising. Last week, I did a count and now I am at a crazy number of - 8 pairs!

This is how the list goes:

• Clarks - Formal shoes for office
• Timberland - Cold weather shoes
• ASICS - Running shoes
• Reebok - Cross-training shoes
• Merrell - Trekking shoes
• Speedo - Kayaking/ Water shoes
• Chappal - Casual Indian footwear for walking around
• Crocs - Hmm the casual pair that I wear everywhere else

I have been trying hard to rationalize and decide on throwing a few of them. The problem really is - shoe marketers have imbibed in my silly brain that I need a different shoe for every activity. Growing up we just had a pair of canvas shoes that could do everything - from climbing, hiking, walking to running and playing all kinds of sports. As a kid I loved playing badminton and table tennis barefoot. I remember in one inter-school tournament I was specifically asked to wear shoes else they would not let me participate. And I distinctly remember how awful I felt playing and losing that match. Not only did shoes make me feel uncomfortable, but also they made me realize that I had no "feel" of the ground! Gone are the days!

With a heavy heart, I have decided to stick to all my pair of shoes, cause well, as of now I can't find a solution to my shoe conundrum.

Seersucker

Welcome to another fashion advice post from reverent uncle Girish. I have a very limited wardrobe. So limited that I can easily fit all my clothes (I mean absolutely every thing that I own now) in a carry-on suitcase.

I also seem to have a sort of an amnesia when I go buy new clothes. Which means, I forget what I already own and end up buying more clothes of the same color/ type and repeat my wardrobe. And then, I only shop from a very few places. Which means, I look the same most of the times.

Anyway, I recently realized that I have taken liking for this specific type of fabric called a seersucker. I realized this is when I washed 4 shirts all of the same fabric and type last week. Now, mind you, 4 is a big % of my total clothes, and if all of them happen to be of the same type, I believe I have fallen in love with that material. So this post now is hereby dedicated to the seersucker fabric.

For those of you who have forgotten, Singapore is an extremely humid and warm country. The national costume of most people (regardless of race, gender, age or class) is shorts and t-shirt. As I grow old, I moved from t-shirts to shirts, and that is where I came across seersucker! A quick Wikipedia search indicates that Seersucker is an all-cotton fabric of Indian origin that the British "found" and popularized to the western world. It is amazingly perfect for a humid weather and I can wear all day and sweat comfortably in it. Besides, you know what is the best part? It already has a "crumpled" look so you do not have to iron the shirts at all. All you have to do is - wash, dry, wear and repeat! Life can't get any simpler. So for the next few years if you see me wearing the same types of shirts - blame the British.

My Movie Choices

Long term readers of my blog know that I am heavily inclined towards minimalism. The philosophical me thinks that this endeavor to constantly reduce things in my life is what has kept me sane (so far). Reducing things also boils down to constantly downsizing options. I like my life where I don't have to choose much. This however is much difficult than what it seems.

Everyday (for me) is a constant struggle amongst numerous choices. Whether it is choosing what to eat, which movie to see, which series to start watching, which clothes to wear, where to go, the average consumer has a plethora of choices. Anyway, over a period of time, I have learnt how to restrict my choices, and limit the decision making process that I have to go through.

This blog however is specifically about - how I chose which movies to watch. Well, before I start, I need to give you some context. The only place I watch movies these days is either on a long haul flight or on Netflix. We don't have channel-subscribed television at home anymore. After struggling several years on making movie choices, I boiled down to choosing my entertainment based on the actors I like. As of this writing, here are my favorite Hollywood actors (in no particular order):

• Tom Hanks
• Jake Gyllenhall
• Christian Bale
• Keanu Reeves

This is besides the fact that I watch all Quentin Tarantino movies. But he doesn't make that many movies for me to go choose to watch them on a flight (I guess, I have already watched most of them, and the ones I haven't, aren't available on Netflix or on flights!). So if I have to see a movie, I just go through the list and search for the ones in which one of these actors are present. This has led to me seeing a bunch of weird, dark and psychological thrillers. I won't say I particularly liked them, but I feel like I have already had my fair share of demented movies. I think other than Tom Hanks, all the other actors listed above, have made some serious "art" films. The list of weird movies that I saw in the last few months because of these actors (again in no particular order):

• Siberia (Keanu) - Can't believe I saw it - if not for Keanu!
• John Wick (Keanu) - The only senseless action movie I ever liked - I am waiting for part 3
• Night Crawler (Jake) - Creepy, Jake is awesome!
• Demolition (Jake) - Weird, emotional - Jake is awesome!
• Nocturnal Animals (Jake) - Dark, emotional - Jake is awesome!
• American Psycho (Christian) - Weird, Psycho - Can't believe I saw it!
• Vice (Christian) - Awesome, loved it!
• American Hustle (Christian) - Awesome, loved it!

I have thus concluded that either my choice of actors are artsy or they just happen to be the choice for artsy films! Anyway for the superhero lovers out there, Jake is entering the Marvel Cinematic Universe as "Mysterio". So now you gonna get a taste of him too :) !!

Get Bored

Have you guys noticed lately that we (as a human race) hardly get a chance to get bored? With our smartphones, tablets, internet, TV and always-on entertainment availability, there is hardly a moment when we get to sit and just do nothing.

I was wondering whether such complete occupation of the brain has any side effects. Well, based on the limited amount of Google articles I could read on this topic, it looks like it does. Most of my "Aha moments" and my creative ideas (however limited they are) have always appeared when I am doing nothing. I don't seem to get any ideas when I am seeing YouTube videos, playing games, surfing social media or engaging in any other kind of entertainment.

So, before you lose all your creativity, and become a drone, I think it has become increasingly important now to actually make time in your busy schedule to - "do nothing". I mean, I am thinking of chalking out specific time periods in my day/ week where I switch off internet, keep away my smart devices and sit and be a man. Pondering into the void, actually doing nothing!

Say no to straws and single use stirrers!

I am amazed that it is 2018, we all are so conscious about our use of plastics and the impact it has on the planet earth, and we still insist on having straws in our sugary drinks and single use stirrers!

Plastic straws are one of the major pollutants in our oceans. I believed everyone knew about it by now. If this is the first time you are reading this, my friend, please Google the impact of straws. If you are (un)lucky enough you might get to see a video of a turtle choking on a straw in the ocean!

Last week I was told off by a colleague for not taking a straw and directly drinking off the glass as "unhygienic". I was a bit saddened but then didn't say anything about it other than defend myself on why I avoid straws.

I am happy to say that, some governments are now actively planning to ban the use of straws altogether. While you wait for your own country to ban it, I highly recommend to stop using straws "as much as it is possible". Let's reduce our footprint on this planet for the generations to come!

Simple Wardrobe

Talking of minimalism reminds me that I have reached the zen state in one aspect of my life - clothes and shoes. The rule I have adopted is very simple.

You can only have "X" number of items of clothing. The x is what you are comfortable with (it can be any number, smaller the better). And the x splits into a, b, c for types of clothing and so on. So a simple wardrobe could be:

10 Formal Shirts
5 Formal Trousers
5 T-shirts
3 Shorts
etc. etc

While the concept is deceptively simple, it's harder to implement than what you think. The key is to maintain the X constant. So if you plan to purchase something new, an old piece of clothing has to give way. And it has to be of the same type. So a trouser can only replace a trouser and so on.

I have been using this system for last 2+ years. I look boring cause I keep repeating my clothes, but at least, I have reduced my clutter, and I am happier with my wardrobe more than ever before. And the best part is - every piece of clothing is something I love and comfortable in. And I no longer do random purchases because I see things on sale!

Fake Minimalist

So we moved again. Again??!! Yes again. And I went through the notions of packing, throwing, repenting buying and cursing myself for all the stuff we own. And while I thought I had become a minimalist since the last time I moved, I figured that was just a notion.

The good part is - there was no significant increase in stuff since the last time we moved (28 boxes). The bad part is - I still have a lot of stuff (28 freaking boxes of what??!!). Minimalism is harder than you think it is. While I have severely cut down on my purchasing habits, it's next to impossible to reduce what I already own. And trust me - I have already minimized my clothes and shoes. So the boxes I am talking about are everything else but clothes and shoes.

I think true minimalism comes when you actually manage to throw away 80% of the stuff you own and live in the 20%. So here we go again. Back to square one. Minimalism is a journey and I have just begun.