Hi from Delhi!
I’m here for my bi-annual factory visit—working alongside our production team, refining design, and developing our future collections. Despite the 6 day work weeks and long hours at the factory, I always find more pause here.
That pause comes from depth, not rest. I’m not juggling ten different tabs in my brain. I’m dropped into one part of the business, using one part of my brain, with one goal. It’s the constant code-switching back home that makes it hard to find real mental space.
Today, I spent hours just sitting and thinking. Looking out the window. Talking out loud to myself. Untangling thoughts that felt clear in my head, but wobbly when spoken.
With access to endless opinions and updates with a few taps on my phone, it’s easy to soften my own voice. To distort my vision. To hesitate on taking the next step. We stay plugged in because we don’t want to miss out—on the new trend, the new tech, the next opportunity. But ironically, the more we tune into the outside world, the more we tune out our inner one.
Here in India—tucked into factory work and somewhat removed from the NY hustle—I’m able to slow down. I detach from the phone, from the noise, and think more expansively.
When my world is limited to what’s physically in front of me, everything shrinks in scale. And when things feel smaller, they feel more possible. More approachable.
I’ve found that fear lives in the vague. The nebulous “they.” The too-big internet. But fear has a hard time thriving in the specific.When the world feels too big, we delay. We get distracted. We compare. We wonder what people will think.
As much as I can, I try to scale down my world and create the ideal conditions for action: quiet, protected spaces where I can move without judgment—and ideally, with encouragement.
When I say scale down, I mean: Curate the people, opinions, and updates you let in. Create space where your ideas can breathe—and your actions can begin. Live outside your phone a little more. Find people who are on a similar journey. People who believe in you. Resist the urge to believe that tuning out means missing out.
These lucid moments away from New York are clarifying. Refreshing. Temporary. And they don’t need to last forever—just a taste is enough to realign.
As someone who’s big on doing, sitting and thinking feels indulgent. I’ve heard this is how seasoned CEOs spend their time. I don’t consider myself seasoned—or a CEO. So I don’t do it often.
But maybe I should.
Maybe this is another version of "go slow to go fast."
Perhaps clarity in thought leads to more focused action.
And focused action pulls the future forward faster.
And maybe—it's just something I enjoy.
Happy Sunday,
Nasrin
P.S. I’ve made so much progress on design this trip—including SETS (!!!) that will drop this summer and corduroy coming this fall! Eee!