Yesterday I was a guest on another man’s podcast and a question about luxury watches came up. We talked about how I am saving up for one and that it’s false advertising (on top of financially stupid) for me to put something like that on credit.

This statement led to the host asking about the dissonance between faking it until you make it and false advertising.

I gave an adequate answer, but I’ve had some time to flesh the idea out in my head a bit more and believe this is an important aspect of desiring and learning to dress better. I’ll be painting in broad strokes here because it helps to get the idea across.

Let’s assume we can somehow take all of the qualities for which men are respected and appreciated – attributes like courage, confidence, strength, honor, mastery, generosity, etc. – and bottle all of these virtues up into a scale of Admirable Masculinity.

On the low end of the spectrum, we have guys with very little Admirable Masculinity. They don’t aspire to be much, aren’t confident, don’t take risks, don’t know how to behave socially etc. On the top end of the spectrum are those who are paragons of Admirable Masculinity. They epitomize everything that it means to be a man and do so with what appears to be effortlessness.

Now, I’m certainly not the first man to look at things this way. In this corner of the Internet there are others who use the dichotomy of the Alpha and Beta makes, and those who break it down ever further into sub groups such as Gamma, Delta, Sigma, etc.

Either way of looking at this works, but let’s stick with our scale.

If I’m a man who is a five on our scale of Admirable Masculinity and I dress like I’m a nine or ten, the cognitive dissonance is too much and it’s apparent to everyone around me that I’m a fraud. However, if I only dress like the other fives on the scale, I can’t use my clothing as a way to kickstart my improvement. Even worse, it can keep me from progressing even as I better myself in other areas.

The sweet spot is to dress like a six or seven. There’s enough dissonance to make me uncomfortable, therefore forcing me to either dress worse or improve my level in other areas. But there’s not so much of a disconnect that I become overwhelmed.

An example of this in another arena is weight lifting. If I have a goal of being able to deadlift 500 lbs, I’m an idiot for loading up the bar the first time with 500 lbs. It doesn’t matter if I have the ideal diet, proper equipment, and best coach – I won’t be able to lift that weight without working my way up to it.

At the same time, if all I ever do when I deadlift in the gym is 5×5 at 135 lbs, I’ll never reach my goal of a 500 lbs deadlift either. Without forcing myself to try to lift more weight this week than I could the week before, I’m never going to get any better.

Progressive Overload at the gym is faking it until you make it. Progressive Overload is also a system that can work with a man’s appearance.

Once I move myself up in Admirable Masculinity from a five to a seven, I won’t see any further improvement without faking it until I make it again. I won’t be more honorable without pushing myself out of my new comfort zone, I won’t be stronger without lifting more weight, and I won’t look better without re-evaluating my wardrobe and what it says about me.

So, once I reach a seven, it becomes imperative that I start to act like an eight in order to catalyze more growth. It’s a continuous feedback loop where my self-improvement leads to more of a need to fake being at a higher level, which leads to reaching said level, which leads to more of a need to fake being at an even higher level, etc. etc. etc.

It’s uncomfortable, but that’s a huge aspect of being a man. Comfort is overrated. It doesn’t mean there is never any room to relax and appreciate having moved from a five to an eight, that a man can only be content when he’s maxed out on all Admirable Masculinity. It does mean that we need to be able to be content with where we are, proud of where we are, while continuing to hunger to be better. It will take a lifetime, but that’s the purpose of our lifetime.

We’ve all seen the above quote. It’s a good one and Tom Ford was correct in making it. However, it is becoming increasingly less true.

We live in a culture that no longer celebrates excellence. Not only do we not celebrate it, we ridicule, mock, and deride it. The average Westerner doesn’t want heroes. Heroes make him uncomfortable. They remind him of his dead-end job, his excess belly fat, his poor sense of style, lack of ambition, and contentment with mediocrity. Heroes don’t serve to inspire him. They shame him – even when they dare to tell the average man he can be like them, they make him feel ashamed for not living up to his potential.

Rather than using heroes as a way to motivate, the West is doing everything it can to get rid of them. Fat acceptance, rabid egalitarianism, reality TV… it’s all a rush to the bottom of the barrel where everyone is the same and no one is excellent.

I want nothing to do with it.

An unapologetic pursuit of excellence is the new rebellion. It’s a complete rejection of the morals and ideals that have been projected onto us for the last 20+ years. It’s a way of saying, “Let the average have their average. I want better.”

Every other form of rebellion has had its uniform. Look at the punk movement from the late 70’s and early 80’s, 0r what the barbarians of Rome wore while the empire was crumbling. Well a suit is the new punk rock and those who unashamedly pursue masculine excellence are the new barbarians (h/t Jack Donovan).

So I’ve created a little tweak to Mr. Ford’s statement. One that makes it fit our current setting.

Because it’s now considered bad manners to aspire, to refuse to settle, to see truth for what it is, to see men and women as different, to accept a natural placement of people according to their work ethic and natural abilities, to want equal opportunities but not equal results, to see the world as an “us” and a “them.” Because so much of what used to be considered good is now considered evil, I am happy to know that our dressing well offends the sensibilities of people in the world who are nothing like us and want to see us fail. Let them be offended.

Let’s get a little disclosure out of the way right off the bat. I work for a company that does custom suits, shirts, etc. – not just as a sales guy, but high enough up the (relatively small) ladder that my input helps shape the direction of the company. Beckett & Robb is technically a competitor to Dragon Inside, although our demographics and approaches are a bit different.

Today’s situation will be similar to the review I did of Combatant Gentlemen a few weeks back. However, while my previous review was done on a suit made for my large brother-in-law, today’s suit was made for my younger brother, who just happens to fall on the opposite end of the spectrum.

Cache is 6′ tall and weighs in just under 130 lbs. He’s tiny. Of all of my family, he’s the skinniest, and he likes it that way. Maybe a few more months of him reading the blog will convince him he needs to put on a bit of muscle, but for now he’s content being long and lean. One of the downsides Cache experiences by having such a build, is that it’s next to impossible to find good-looking suits. He got pretty close with H&M a couple of years ago, but there are some obvious flaws here.

The most egregious is the length of the jacket, and it’s a detail that’s indicative of the overall problem with fast-fashion companies – they rely heavily on trends. A year ago this short jacket would’ve been considered on point, now it’s already silly and outdated. For someone with a build like Cache’s, even more. By having the jacket so short, it exaggerates the length of his legs, making him appear taller, slimmer, and more effeminate. All three of which are implications his build has on its own and don’t need to be over exaggerated.

Add to it the skinny lapels (make his shoulders look small and his head look big), the long pants (make him look both tall and sloppy), and the low rise in the crotch (too Bieberesque) and the suit makes a young, skinny guy look like a kid waiting for someone to treat him like an adult. Not a fun image to battle for a guy who’s getting married in a month, finishing college this year, and starting a career.

Like me, the kid has gorilla arms and finding an off-the-rack shirt with the right sleeve length is next to impossible.

Well a few months back a representative from Dragon Inside reached out to me to see if I was interested in wearing one of their suits. I almost immediately wrote them off because of the name and it’s still the biggest drawback of the company – which is too bad, because they have a lot of good things going for them.

What convinced me to try them out was a mention of an Italian mill called VBC (Vitale Barbaras Canonico), it’s a mill we use at B&R and I have a couple of suits made with their cloth. This is a massive improvement over the cheaper Asian mills that are sources for the majority of online custom tailors and was enough to get me to give them a shot.

The measurement and order experience with Dragon Inside was very similar to what I’ve experienced with other companies. They have the client take measurements and provide instructional videos detailing each step. Once each measurement was submitted, Cache and I went through step-by-step to determine things like lapel width and type, pocket configuration, lining, etc.

All of the above have come to be expected in the online world. However, unlike any other company I’ve dealt with, I received an email from a customer-service rep about two days after submitting the order wanting to clarify a few things. A couple of Cache’s measurements came in beyond their normal allowances and they wanted to ensure that the measurements were taken correctly. It’s a simple step, but a big one and the second major point in favor of Dragon Inside.

Arrival of the suit and shirt took a little over a month. Once it was here, Cache tried everything on and they were pretty close on the first go. The shirt was a bit too tight and restrictive in some areas and Dragon Inside immediately offered to remake it. The jacket sleeves were too long but, this was one of the points that their customer service rep called to talk about. It was an error on my part and, rather than remeasure Cache (who was living a few hours away from me), I let my ego and my apathy get in the way and told her I was sure about the measured length on his sleeves. I guess I deserved to have them come back too long.

With the suit it was a quick alteration and one they’ve offered to reimburse me for. I’m not going to let them give me the money because I need the reminder that tailoring is like woodworking – it’s ALWAYS better to measure twice and cut once.

After we got the new shirt in and the sleeves altered, everything looked great. Here’s the result.

Addressing the issues from before, the length of the jacket is perfect – especially for someone as tall and slim as Cache, the break and rise of the pants are now right where they should be, and the wider peak lapels add some visual heft to his shoulders. The jacket is a bit snug in the waist for my taste, but it’s how a Cache likes it and we can let it out when he comes around to wanting it a bit larger. By going with the third piece it makes him look older and more respectable. They also made a shirt for him, and the sleeve length is right where it should be. Cache told me his fiancée became visibly weak in the knees the first time he walked out in this thing.

A few more details on the suit. It’s a half-canvassed jacket and construction is done in Bulgaria. It is the Premium Dark Grey Fine Herringbone 3-Piece and retails for $689 custom or $639 RTW. The shirt is their White Two-Fold Twill and it retails for $119. Dragon Inside has a 365 day limit on alterations, which is pretty generous in this industry.

All-in-all a great this is a great suit. High-quality material, construction standards that go beyond the norm, great customer service. The price isn’t as friendly as others and for a bit more it’s possible to purchase clothing that’s made better, but Dragon Inside knows their niche. If only the name were different…