But what if I like new?

Sustainability says “shop your closet.” But what if my closet can’t keep up with me?

constructivelydissatisfied.substack.com
That is what this substack was gonna be called, but they rejected it because it is apparently too long. So I went with the current name. Sidenote: Y’all better not steal that idea if they ever expand the character limit on subdomains. But I digress!

That name wasn’t just a clever URL. It’s how I live my life—always growing, always refining, never stagnant. Being constructively dissatisfied doesn’t mean I’m unhappy with where I am. It means I believe in the next version of me before I even meet her.

‘Learning’ is my top value. Back on a random day in 2003, working at Ford Motors, I remember looking at a robotic hand, just flipping a combination lever switch (those turn signal and wiper switches in your car) on, off, on, off, on, off….thousands of times to test the durability when I decided industrial design was not for me. I could not bear the thought of designing something like a car where for obvious reasons, the whole point is sameness and building things that last forever.

I have stayed at my job for 13 years, but I have also switched roles within the company every 2-3 years. I lease my cars instead of buying them, I change up my hair every so often, and I go back and forth between ornate and simple, short nails. SO THEN HOW am I supposed to make peace with the notion that my wardrobe must be a fixed, a constant?

Environmental impact, I get it. Financially not a smart choice, I understand. But what about the joy, the freshness, the simple DELIGHT that newness brings some of us?

Most recent closet addition. My first and only pair of brancusis. So much texture. Do not care that this might be passe. For me, this is growth.

I refuse to believe this is all a capitalist conspiracy! I mean, yeah. I understand what marketing is and what it does to the psyche. But also, this is who I have always been. I was not the kid who was an expert in dance. I was the kid who did dance, singing, debate, played basketball, theater, and whatever the new activity was.

MASTERY. AUTONOMY. PURPOSE. Daniel Pink says these are the 3 values that motivate people. Mastery was never a motivator for me. Autonomy is more important, which is why I am at peace with my relationship with trends, social media, and influencers, but what gets me going is purpose. And for me, constantly evolving, being constantly constructively dissatisfied with where I am in all aspects of my life is my purpose more than fighting capitalism with my shopping choices.

Here is what is not often acknowledged in the sustainability conversation—what do you do when stagnation feels like a bigger personal cost than change?
(sidenote dos: I use em dashes and I am still human, not AI).

And no it is not enough to ‘shop your closet’. It is also not about ‘just seeing your older pieces with new eyes’. This isn’t about boredom. This isn’t about not liking older pieces anymore. It is simply that I am constantly striving to be better than I was yesterday and with clothes, at some point you exhaust the limitations of how much the envelope can be pushed with existing pieces.

If you’re a believer in slow fashion and how it has been traditionally represented, you don’t believe me at this point. Maybe you are right. Maybe there is some level of enlightenment that I have not achieved yet. But in that ignorance, I will for now present my POV that it’s not that you are right and I am wrong (or the other way around). It is simply that you are a believer in MASTERY. OR, your purpose is preserving the planet/defeating capitalism over everything else. Mine—constant evolution so I am better than yesterday.

Rihanna didn’t build an empire by staying the same. Bowie didn’t become a legend by wearing one look. Zendaya isn’t called a style icon because she found a signature outfit and stuck to it. I don’t aspire to be either of those people. I am not a makeup mogul, a rockstar, or the best model-actor to have ever existed. I DO however aspire to squeeze everything that life has to offer, to be a legend in my own eyes.

My mom grew up with two brothers. They wanted to be engineers, so did she. They became engineers. She did not. Her parents did not want to spend the money on educating a daughter in science. She made a great career for herself anyway(nevertheless she persisted!) but that is what made her decide her daughters will never lack opportunity. My part? Never take an opportunity for granted. Never let a door close untested. So when I look back, I want to see this: Every door opened. Every opportunity taken. No stagnation. Ever.

So you see, reinvention is not a preference for me. It is a principle. Now this whole thing is not an excuse for why I buy things. Because honestly, haters will hate no matter what. This isn’t about justifying my shopping habits. It’s about making sure MY choices align with MY values and principles. So, if reinvention is the principle, how do I do it without being reckless?

• I like aesthetics. That is the simple truth. I am a designer by training and trade. And I like things to be beautiful and look beautiful. I want my closet to be aesthetic. This means it cannot be cluttered. Which means my closet capacity puts an automatic limit on the amount of stuff I can own. I enforce this by having a fixed number of hangers. At any point in time, I like to have at least a few empty hangers. Negative space is good.

• Change for the sake of growth, not for the sake of change. So, anything I add to my closet MUST be a bar raiser. This means, it is BETTER than anything similar I might have in my closet already.

• I don’t buy duplicates in more than one color in the same fabrication. For someone who likes novelty and growth, the idea of duplication doesn’t make any sense. It is LITERALLY the same item. There are some exceptions to this. For some reason, I believe a Liam vest in navy is not the literal same as a Liam vest in this warm ring 3 toffee. BUT, a Liam blazer in a navy would be the exact same as a Liam blazer in the toffee. For me, a vest is a styling piece—layered, modular, worn different ways. A blazer makes a statement. And I don’t need to make the same statement twice. Doesn’t make sense? Good news, it doesn’t have to! Your closet rules only need to make sense to you.

  

  You cannot convince me these are the same vest

• I sell clothes I don’t want anymore. I buy quality, and that usually can be sold easily. I price items to sell. The money is gone anyway, and the difference in cost is my investment in my growth. Pricing it to sell means it is not sitting in my closet gnawing at me and making me feel guilty. Also, stagnation is literally the anti goal here. Doesn’t make sense to hold on.

• I don’t buy dupes or placeholders. I don’t have any problem with the concept, but for me buying a dupe means knowing it is inherently not a bar raiser and there is something better I could be buying instead. If I can’t afford something or don’t want to spend money on it, I simply don’t buy it. For example, I have wanted the Lancaster trench forever, but I don’t want to spend $900 on a trench. So I wait for a sale or to find it second hand. If I don’t, all good. I will wait longer. I might find another trench that I like better before this goes on sale. In that case I will buy that other piece. And if this sells out without ever going on sale, fine. There will be other trench coats in the world.

• I play with my clothes. I follow style challenges, I try little prompts here and there. I make it fun. This way it’s not a passive dressing mindlessly for days at end and then one day realizing you hate all your clothes, potentially leading to a purge and then backfilling all the empty slots immediately

  

  Look at that beautiful closet utilization

• I like myself! I like my clothes. I know the kind of clothes that look good on me and that make me feel good. When I try new silhouettes, it’s from a place of play. It is all experimentation and learning. So when I add something to my closet, it is coming from a place of abundance, not lack.

• When I am buying something I ask myself, will I wear this tomorrow? If the answer is no, I am probably not buying it. I follow #ProjectNoZeroWears as an Indyx user. If you’ve never heard about that hashtag it’s because I made it up. Nothing makes me sadder than if I were to ever list something for sale as NWT. Once I buy things, tags come off, clothes go on so I can start playing. They are not helping me grow if they are sitting in my closet.

• No backwards slide. I don’t let go of clothes that are not working for me unless I understand the lesson of the ‘why’ so deeply that I am confident I will not make that purchase again. If I don’t know the why yet, it stays in my closet and I keep working with it till I learn the lesson. Like this black cardigan with fringe. It should work in theory, but I don’t love it. It stays till I learn WHY I don’t love it and what is the lesson to take from this. Till I don’t, I keep styling it.

  

  I do not understand why I don’t love it. On paper, it checks all my boxes and I loved it when I bought it. So I keep wearing it till I find out.

• I trust my instincts. I trust my curiosity. And if you want to see how that plays out in real time, I’ve written about my thought process behind two of my recent purchases—a leather jacket and a sequined blazer.

At the end of the day, this isn’t just about clothes. It’s about how I choose to move through life. The way I dress, the way I experiment, the way I refine—it’s all part of a bigger commitment to evolution. To never being fully content, but always constructively dissatisfied. To not being the same person I was yesterday. To never letting myself get stuck, whether in my closet, my career, or my mindset.

So no, I won’t apologize for liking new. I won’t pretend reinvention isn’t a part of me. What I will do is stay intentional—because growth isn’t wasteful. Stagnation is. And if sustainability has to mean standing still, then maybe we need a different conversation.

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