I think I’ve been lying to the world.
Not with my words.
With my clothes.
I’ve been lying about who I am.
My clothes are still from my pilgrimage era. And they show hints of the previous monastic era.
I have my multicolored wizard coat. And my red faux-dashiki shirts. And brown pants, and brown sweatshirts, and brown muscle shirts.
I still love brown. And I love red, and the whole multicolored thing. But I don’t think it’s who I am right now. I don’t think it’s who I’m trying to be. Who I’m trying to show the world that I am.
My monastic era was a training period. Meditating and chanting and doing retreats. Developing leadership skills and learning how nonprofits work.
Brown and earth tones made sense for that era. Humility, simplicity.
My pilgrim era was about discovering my vow. I traveled all over the world, making friends and building community. I learned about Love, Curiosity, and Empowerment, and tattooed symbols of them to my body. I started The Service Guild, and put several years of work into it.
A wizard robe and dashiki make sense for that, for a pilgrim.
But I worry they’re giving the wrong message.
They’re signalling: love and light, hippie, playful, disheveled, incompetent. Unreliable. Untrustworthy, perhaps, at least in ways that matter.
Yes, I’m a kind person, and nice, too. But I don’t see myself as incompetent or unreliable.
This is going to be a new era of my life. I want to live in Brooklyn. I want to build out The Service Guild, to help it to flourish. I want to make more money, and eventually marry someone.
I want my clothes to signal less pilgrim or hippie, and more… Godfather. Vito Corleone.
I see myself as powerful, capable. Strategic. Loyal. Virtuous, even. (I wrote more about The Godfather here.)
Guildfather. Tasshin.