Lessons From Fashion: The Benefits of Structure & Suffering

"Fashion is the armor to survive the reality of everyday life" Bill Cunningham

A disclaimer of Tone: This is meant to be pretty light-hearted despite the heavy implications.

Let's jump right in.

There's something you should know about me. I have seen ALL 20+ seasons of the famous, reality-based competition show "Project Runway". It's the premise of today's working metaphor so buckle in and hear me out.

Every episode is based on a 'design challenge'. A bunch of talented fashion designers have to compete against one another for the best wearable fashion design. Each challenge has its unique structure (ie design a dress based on the NY skyline) but, they also have to:

• complete everything within a short amount of time,
• with a limited budget and
• they have to keep their final creation within the tight structure of the design requirements.

'Design Challenge' example: create a luxury day-to-evening outfit for sporty girls with 50 dollars in 24 hours.

And thus, under high pressure, a designer presents this:

Each week the stakes get higher. They are expected to produce mind-blowing results, despite the constraints and difficulty of the 'design challenges'. They have to find creative solutions and then expertly execute them- or they're out. These conditions are stressful to watch; someone has a mental breakdown every week.

The 'design challenges' are judged by a famous panel, led by Hiedi Klum. "One day you're in, the next you're out," is her favorite saying on the show, a phrase that layers the pressure extra thick to remind them that one slip-up means they're out of the game.

There's a challenge every season called the 'unconventional challenge' where the contestants, who usually get to purchase materials at a fabric store for their designs, now have to use only unconventional materials; junk from a construction site, things from a party story, candy- you name it, it's been done. Food, tools, garbage, anything but material.

Here's the thing...

After all the years of watching this show I've noticed the astounding pattern that, time after time, the designers produced their best work under these crazy circumstances.

The pressure from structure and suffering pulls their talent out of them in incredible ways. This is the loudest in the 'unconventional challenge'; the challenge with the strictest structure and highest amounts of suffering produced the most amazing results of the show.

It became so popular with the fans that Project Runway started including multiple 'unconventional challenges' in each season.

The designers hate it. They hate the restrictions, they hate the time crunch, they hate having a limited budget and they usually can't stand half the people they are forced to work with or near.

And the designers unanimously hate the unconventional challenge most of all.

They dream of the day they make it to the end of the show where the three final contestants get a massive budget, all the time they could want, and no rules about what to create. Each designer hopes they get the chance to design their dream collection and debut it at the world-renowned New York Fashion Week.

There's a metaphor here and we're about to close in on it.

The three final designers who make it to the final challenge have successfully produced great results under tough circumstances. Now, at the end of the season, as a reward for making it that far, all the pressure is released. They finally get their dream circumstances:

• plenty of time
• more than enough money
• ideal circumstances (being around their ideal people, teammates, environments)
• and doing it 100% their way (no rules, no structure, they create whatever they want)

At the end of the show, the designers finally have all the things that they thought were the problem removed. They get everything they want.

And then something strange happens.

They tank.

More often than not, the final episode is 'meh' compared to the weeks prior when they were fighting for their lives, figuratively speaking. Of course, there were some real winners over the years, but most of the designers sank to mediocre levels of performance at Fashion Week, underwhelming the judges and the fans. They got lost without the structure and suffering of previous challenges that forced out genius design after genius design.

The Metaphor

We all bemoan the disadvantages that cause us suffering. The classics I hear the most, from business leaders to artists, are 'not enough':

• time
• money
• healthy people
• help
• freedom

And yet, if psychological experiments created through reality TV prove anything, it's this: we resist the process that makes us great.

The much-hated swamp land of high pressure, difficult circumstances, and 'not enoughness' is actually the soil of our greatest opportunities: the opportunity for peak creativity, workable solutions, and life-changing breakthroughs.

The Benefits of Structure and Suffering

It's not just Project Runway that taught me this, I see it everywhere. The pain from forced structure and suffering are some of the greatest portals of transformation that people's lives pass through, and this is why.

Performance

The challenge of limiting structure and circumstantial suffering is a catalyst for performance; it puts pressure on us to reach for our true genius and explode forward. Like diamonds, there's a certain amount of pressure needed to properly develop genius, top potential, and true creativity. This pressure plays a crucial role in awakening our purest gifts and talents.

Expansion

When there's no other choice but to expand, grow, adapt, and be better- it's incredible how much can happen. We're often so much more capable than we realize. Thus, the pressure of structure and suffering wake us up from this smallness with a kick in the pants to expand.

"We discover our character through decisions made under pressure" - Dan Millman

Creativity

They say structure breeds creativity, suffering creates solutions. There's rarely a more creative person than he who hath the fire of suffering hot on their tail.

Confidence

Structure and suffering test our character, they force us to face aspects of ourselves. These high-pressure situations force deep discoveries about who we are and what we're capable of. Gaining this intimacy with ourselves that challenges bring, produces deep confidence on the other side. Confidence is the gold coin in the metaphysical realm, it makes a lot more happen with a lot less effort. Thus, confidence gained is a huge benefit regardless of the technical outcome.

Why This Is Important

Plain and simple: we forget it's ok for things to get exceptionally challenging.

It's ok that running a business can sometimes feel like an unending stream of unsolvable problems, with never enough people, time, or talent.

It's ok that healing can feel like a new, impossible challenge every week.

It's "ok" that we are under a lot of pressure as a country to figure out weird, unexpected scenarios within a massive time crunch and a sense of 'losing the whole game' hanging in the air.

Like cold plunging and deep breathing, like sunshine and daily movement, 'structure and suffering' have great benefits too. It's not always about avoiding/fixing/eliminating the challenges, but making sure we face them with the expectation that we walk out with all the benefits.

I'm all for solutionizing. I'm a big fan of self-help. Self-care is foundational. I'm all for regulating our nervous systems and avoiding unnecessary problems.

That said, there are seasons of unavoidable suffering. If you're in one, and it's really hard, this is a friendly reminder that we can do hard things. If unwanted structures and pressurous suffering are your circumstances, then let it pull the genius, the raw talent, the wild soul inside you, out into the world. Play your note. The best, most surprising results come out of the challenges we hate the most.

"No pressure, No diamonds"