A Simple Life or A Scared Life?

I remember deciding at a young age that I wanted a simple life. Not that I didn’t want a life filled with excitement and adventure. Not that I wasn’t ambitious or have high aspirations. I just never felt I needed much to be happy. Enough money. A nice home. A happy family. A supportive community. That seemed like plenty to me.

I’m not quite sure when it happened - perhaps during the latter years of college when the high flying adult lifestyles I saw in the movies were closer to a reality than a dream, or perhaps during my first few years living in New York City when all around me I saw people living big lives - but at some point, I realized that I could realistically do - and have - a lot more. And if I could do more, how come I didn’t want more? 

Or maybe I actually did want more. Maybe I’ve always wanted more. Maybe, as my high school basketball coach might say, I’ve just been playing scared - wanting more but too afraid of failure that I aim for less.

For the 7 of you who don’t know me outside of this blog, I have 2 other big interests beyond writing: fashion and cooking.

Both started from a young age.

In middle school, I was famously voted best dressed for my humble collection of cardigans. It may not sound like much, but considering most teenagers then were still in the Hollister polo and khaki shorts combination chokehold, cardigans were ~high fashion~. 

Cooking started even earlier, when I shamelessly stole the Baked Ziti recipe my aunt made every Thanksgiving. With that as my start, I slowly made my way through the Americana cooking classics - chicken, pork chops, poor imitations of Chinese - all the way through to the penultimate expression of home cooking snobbery - homemade bread. 

If we move past my personal love for clothing and cooking though and take a look at the larger stage of high fashion and fine dining, there’s a common thread between the two that makes me think perhaps I’ve been making a false dichotomy all these years.

SIMPLICITY AS HIGH FASHION

SIMPLICITY AS FINE DINING

Opened in 1887, Peter Luger has been rated among the best steakhouses in NY since 1984. Having been visited by some of the world's biggest celebrities, it has easily entered legendary status. Peter Luger’s steak has two ingredients: steak and salt.  No A1 sauce. No Sazón or Lawry’s, respectfully. Just steak and salt.

Travel to Japan and somehow land a table at Sukiyabashi Jiro, a 3 Michelin Star sushi restaurant headed by the renowned chef Jiro Ono, and you’ll find yourself enjoying an Omakase dining experience consisting primarily of sushi with 3 ingredients: rice, fish, and soy sauce. No spicy mayo. No tempura crunch. No “crab” toppings. Just rice, fish, and soy sauce.

A simple life or a scared life?

The flaw in my scared life hypothesis lies in the false belief that more is better. That in consciously striving for less I’ve somehow forfeited the best that life has to offer.

Reserving to a simple life initially seemed to me a commitment to underutilized potential. To know all that I could do - to recognize all that I was capable of achieving - but to make a conscious decision not to pursue it in the name of peace or rest or contentment or whatever it may be.

It may sound like a bad thing, but in some ways it’s still true. By definition, simplicity requires the elimination of excess. I don’t need more than I need simply because I can have it. I don’t need to achieve everything that I can achieve simply because I can achieve it. I only need to have and do and achieve what makes for the life that I want. 

Then, choosing not to pursue some things - choosing not to do all that I can simply because I can - is simplicity. A life of simplicity will require underutilization. But not underutilization of potential. Rather, I see simplicity as a conscious decision to maximize the potential of the few instead of pursuing the incomplete potential of the many. I’m not limiting my potential. I’m simply limiting what I choose to potential. To potent? To potentiate? Whatever - I’m choosing to limit what I invest in. 

The high fashion pieces we revere shine not because they have a million different colors or a million different fabrics. The true luxury that we prize is made from the highest quality of a handful of fabrics, cut into simple yet pronounced silhouettes, and constructed with the time and care needed to make it last. They shine because they are of the highest quality of the few things that truly matter without concerning themselves with the things that don’t.

Don’t get me wrong, you’ll always find the ostentatious and the extraordinary on the runway. 

But, call me old fashioned, few of them will ever match the elegance and beauty of a simple silk dress or a fitted black suit.

There’ll always be room for crazy, experimental food. In fine dining you’ll still see the 36 hour braised beef served with 7 different types of mushrooms, 13 different herbs, cut into perfect bite sized squares. Even in everyday eats, you’ll find the chicken alfredo stuffed in a turkey leg. The oxtail and plantains on pizza.

But, I’ve yet to find a meal I’ve enjoyed quite as much as a high quality steak, seasoned to simplicity with salt, and maybe a handful of french fries if I’m feeling fun.

A simple life or a scared life?

The most interesting feature found in the paradoxical luxury of simplicity is an inability to hide.

If your shirt is made from 100% cotton and you choose bad quality cotton, it shows. If your sushi consists of just tuna and soy sauce, and you cheap out on the tuna, it shows. 

On the flip side, a “C” quality cotton doesn’t feel quite as bad if you mix it with some polyester and nylon. And a mid grade tuna doesn’t taste bad if you drown it in spicy mayo and tempura crunch.

It’s only when the underlying ingredients - whether they be articles of clothing, pieces of food, or the features of our lives - are of poor quality, that we seek to cover the inadequacy with excess.

For my scared life hypothesis to be true, it would mean that I want the best that life has to offer but have somehow convinced myself to swing short of the fences out of fear I can’t hit a home run, therefore settling for a life of simplicity. But while a life of simplicity is a conscious decision for less, it’s far from selling myself short. Simplicity is the highest form of luxury. Simplicity can be the best that life has to offer. 

A simple life - my simple life - is one where I make a commitment to strive for the absolute highest quality of the few things that are important to me and let the non-essential fall to the wayside. It’s a life where I strive for excellence at my craft, with wealth and success a lucky byproduct I would welcome but don’t require. It’s a life where I strive for a happy and whole family. It’s a life where I strive for a supportive and authentic community. Everything else is non-essential. Everything else is synthetic fabrics and spicy mayo and tempura crunch.

And if I don’t get the essentials right - if I strip away all the excess money and fame and attention and recognition and materialism and social media following, and I still fall short - well there’s no place for me to hide. I have no choice but to face the quality of the life I’ve chosen to invest in.

In that sense, perhaps a life of excess - a life where I can hide behind the money and fame and attention and recognition and materialism and social media following - is the lesser life. Maybe, that’s the scared life after all.