The Best Thing You Own Was Not Chosen By You

Have a think about your favourite piece of clothing. The one you reach for without deciding to.

There is a reasonable chance you did not pick it. Somebody gave it to you, or you found it somewhere unlikely, or it arrived by accident. That happens far more often than it should, and it is worth asking why.

Why We Are Bad At Choosing For Ourselves

When you choose, you choose safely. That is not a character flaw, it is arithmetic.

You know what you already own. You know what suits you, or you believe you do. So you select something adjacent to what you have, in a colour you have worn before, in a style that will not surprise anybody who knows you.

The result is a wardrobe that is entirely coherent and slightly narrow. Nothing in it is wrong, and nothing in it is a discovery.

What A Surprise Does That A Choice Cannot

Something arriving unchosen skips your entire filter. It has not been assessed against what you usually wear, because you were not consulted.

Sometimes that is a miss, and that is genuinely fine. But sometimes it is the thing you wear for the next five years, and you would never have selected it in a shop, because in a shop you would have walked past it.

That is the whole case for surprise, and it is a stronger case than most people expect.

The Small Ritual Of Not Knowing

There is a second thing going on, and it is not really about the item at all.

The moment before you know is genuinely pleasurable. Anticipation is a distinct feeling from satisfaction, and it is available in a form that costs almost nothing and takes almost no time.

Most adult life is entirely predictable by design ~ we build routines precisely so we do not have to think. A small unknown, deliberately introduced, is a remarkably cheap way of interrupting that.

How To Be Good At It

Surprise is a skill on the receiving end, and some people are much better at it than others.

• Do not decide in advance what you are hoping for. A specific hope guarantees disappointment; openness cannot be disappointed.
• Wear it once properly before judging. Almost everything reads differently on a person than in a hand.
• Notice when you are surprised by liking it. That is useful information about yourself.

Try It On Something Small

Nobody is suggesting you hand over the big decisions in your life to chance.

But something small, occasionally, chosen by somebody or something other than you? That is where most people's favourite things came from anyway.

Written by MYSTERY TEES. Thanks for reading.