A President’s Closet
Did you know that Barack Obama wears only gray or blue suits? According to Business Insider, a simplified wardrobe is a common thread (Hah. Get it?) among the most financially successful in our country.
You might be thinking, “maybe they just don’t have varied clothing options.” While that may be true, a restricted closet isn’t the outcome but rather the intention. Scientifically, wearing the same outfit every day lessens what is known as “decision fatigue”. Researchers estimate that we make about 35,000 decisions every single day, most of them without really paying attention. Yet, all these decisions add up and by the end of the day, our ability and willpower to make good decisions can be seriously impaired. Many entrepreneurs and businessmen/women have found minimizing their daily choices to improve their decision-making quality. Busy schedules mean less time to focus on the little things. When there are bigger goals to accomplish and long to-do lists to complete, there is no time to fuss over relatively frivolous matters. When getting ready in the morning becomes predictable and habitual, we start allowing our brains to save that mental energy for other, more important decisions. Plus, as Business Insider points out, you’ll be physically comfortable knowing that the outfit you’ve chosen fits you well and can last you through the day. Nothing is worse than sitting through a work meeting uncomfortably because your pants are too tight or because your feet are killing you.
Don’t get me wrong, I am a big believer in the power of first impressions and strongly advocate dressing for the job you want, not the one you have. Finding joy in getting dressed in the morning and deriving confidence from a great outfit is an important part of my daily routine. But, I also believe that elegance and style can still be achieved with fewer possessions. So, unless your career depends on what’s in your closet, I would encourage finding ways to simplify your wardrobe and thus shorten the decision-making process involved in getting dressed. If fashion isn’t your main selling point, I think decluttering your closet or even creating a capsule wardrobe would greatly benefit your daily workflow and your ability to focus from when you wake up to when you go to sleep.
So, if you have the opportunity to do some fall deep cleaning, start with your closet and focus on the clothing items that are the most versatile. Ideally, you want your closet pieces to be interchangeable so that you can create many outfits from just one item. If you don’t have time to tackle that kind of sorting right now, I would instead recommend finding your most versatile tops, bottoms, and jackets, and placing them front and center in your closet. This way you have a variety of outfits you can put together, but you’re still limiting the duration of the decision-making process—and you don’t have to spend a lot of time looking for certain items either, which is a good bonus. In retail, stylists will create outfits and hang the top, the bottom, and the jacket together on a rack to give shoppers an easy grab-and-go outfit. You could try that too.
Either way, I hope you learned something new about the fashion choices of some of the wealthiest men and women in our country. The link to Business Insiders’ blog post is below!
Bloem, Craig. “Successful People like Barack Obama and Mark Zuckerberg Wear the Same Thing Every Day - and It's Not a Coincidence.” Business Insider, Business Insider, 28 Feb. 2018, https://www.businessinsider.com/successful-people-like-barack-obama-wear-the-same-thing-every-day-2018-2#:~:text=Uniforms%20for%20success&text=Barack%20Obama%20wears%20only%20gray,gray%20Brunello%20Cucinelli%20t%2Dshirt.
Le Cunff, Anne-Laure. “Decision Fatigue: How a Burden of Choices Leads to Irrational Trade-Offs.” Ness Labs, 20 May 2021, https://nesslabs.com/decision-fatigue.
