Can you give me 80%?
There are two distinct types of buyers in the world: those who find beauty and comfort in simplicity, and those who find taste in chaos, color, and texture. In other words, you are either a minimalist or a maximalist (or, well, still figuring it out). While shopping is typically either a necessity or a pleasure, the way you shop, or more specifically, the items you gravitate toward, will tell you what category you fall into. I’ve found that while I can appreciate the art of maximalism, I will always be drawn to modern takes on the classic. If not the color, then the silhouette; and if not that, then the fabric. I don’t like things often, but when I do, I’ll love it completely. Shopping appeals to the masses, but doing it properly requires truly knowing yourself and your taste, otherwise, you can’t trust that it’s you who wants it and not some external influence convincing you that you absolutely and utterly need it. And sometimes, I even fail at that.
Every fall, I go on about needing the perfect pair of boots, a mission that, truth be told, has lasted me two fall seasons now. Back in 2023, when I first started my search, I casually browsed the available collections in the mall near my house. Bloomingdale’s was the first store I went into, and where I fell in love with these Ba&sh brown suede low-heel stiletto boots (I have no idea what they were called). I had never seen anything quite like them, and they caught my eye rather quickly. Although they weren’t black or leather like I initially wanted, they were far more than 80 percent perfect and I never even tried them on. Considering that I still had so much of the mall to cover, and that I was flying to Prague and Austria in a few weeks, I told myself that I’d only seen one store, which meant I’d find something better elsewhere. I never did. From Europe to the U.S., I’ve found everything that filled in the 20 percent gap of those boots from black to leather and yet I only want those Ba&sh boots. They’re sold out now, with no plans to return, (I’ve checked). When you really know your taste, you know when to stop searching. In a world overflowing with options, we forget how to trust our gut. We stop choosing what feels right and start chasing the gaps, the missing 20 percent, the illusion of perfection. We convince ourselves there’s always something better, a shinier version waiting just out of reach. But in doing so, we overlook what’s already whole. This shows up everywhere: the house we want, the school we pick, the people we love, the choices we make on the days that matter most. The truth is, there’s never better. There’s only different. Every gain costs something, but if you choose right, you won’t spend your life thinking about what you lost.
- With so much love, Fiza Usman
