Why India needs a circular textile reuse revolution

March 30, 2026 Leave a comment

The clothes we wear have a hidden afterlife. Even after a garment is worn a few times and forgotten at the back of a wardrobe, its environmental footprint remains in landfills, waterways, and the atmosphere. The global fashion industry today has a material and emissions footprint so large that it rivals that of entire nations. Each year, around 92 million tonnes of textile waste are generated worldwide, most of it ending up in landfills or incinerators, even though a large share of it is still wearable or recyclable. This is not just a lifestyle problem; it is a climate, water, and waste crisis rolled into one. In countries like India, Brazil, and the United States, the scale of textile waste varies, but the pattern remains the same, with fast fashion fuelling overconsumption, linear disposal systems leaking value, and communities paying the price through polluted land, stressed water systems, and rising emissions.

A practical alternative exists, and it is already visible in the reuse models emerging across cities and communities. The ‘collection-sorting-reuse-recycling model’, where clothes donated by households are graded and channelled into resale, regional redistribution, or material recycling, offers a rare triple win. It can save energy and water by avoiding virgin production, reduce landfill pressure and carbon emissions, and create dignified livelihoods across the value chain. In a world searching for climate solutions that also create jobs, textile reuse is a low-hanging fruit hiding in plain sight.

The environmental logic of reuse is powerful. Producing new clothing is energy and water-intensive, especially when fibres are grown, dyed, finished, shipped, and marketed across continents. Cotton alone accounts for massive freshwater use, while polyester is derived from fossil fuels and contributes to microplastic pollution. The fashion sector contributes an estimated 2–8% of global greenhouse gas emissions, making it one of the most carbon-intensive consumer industries.[i] When a garment is reused even once, a large portion of that embedded energy, water, and carbon footprint is avoided. Lifecycle assessments consistently show that resale and reuse pathways can cut emissions per garment by more than half compared to producing a new equivalent, while also sparing thousands of litres of water per kilogram of clothing.[ii] In practical terms, every shirt reused is a shirt not produced, and every kilogram diverted from landfill is methane not emitted during decomposition.

India’s case illustrates both the urgency of the problem and the promise of the solution. The country generates around eight million tonnes of textile waste every year, which is 8.5% of global post-consumer textile discards. India’s textile and apparel sector generates close to four million tonnes of post-consumer textile waste annually, making it one of the country’s largest contributors to landfill, water consumption, and greenhouse gas emissions. While an estimated 57% of used textiles are reused or recycled, these processes take place almost entirely through informal, fragmented, and unregulated channels. The remaining 43% ends up in landfills or is incinerated, reflecting an unsustainable linear ‘buy-use-discard’ consumption pattern that continues to accelerate with the growth of fast fashion[iii].

While India has long traditions of repair and hand-me-downs, rapid urbanisation and fast fashion consumption are overwhelming these cultural buffers. The result is a growing stream of clothing waste in municipal dumps, often mixed with organic waste, making recycling harder and environmental harm more acute. Yet India also hosts some of the world’s most innovative reuse ecosystems. Organisations such as Humana People to People India is demonstrating how urban surplus clothing can be collected and sold through retail channels, and income used for funding social development outcomes[iv], and Goonj collection channelled to rural communities in dignified ways, linking redistribution to community development and livelihoods.[v] Informal networks of sorters, repairers, and traders already keep a significant portion of textiles in circulation, proving that reuse is culturally and economically viable when supported by the right infrastructure. 

Brazil presents a parallel story shaped by urban consumerism and rising awareness. The country generates millions of tonnes of textile waste annually, with a large fraction still going to landfills due to limited formal recycling and reuse systems.[vi] Yet a growing thrift and resale movement, especially among younger Brazilians, is reframing second-hand fashion as both affordable and aspirational.[vii] Community cooperatives and small recyclers are beginning to integrate textile waste into circular micro-economies, creating jobs in sorting, resale, and upcycling. The lesson from Brazil is that cultural acceptance of reuse can shift quickly when affordability, sustainability narratives, and local entrepreneurship align.

The United States, often seen as the epicentre of fast fashion consumption, offers a different scale of lessons. Tens of millions of tonnes of textiles are discarded each year, but the country also has one of the world’s most established second-hand markets, supported by charities, social enterprises, and commercial resale platforms. Organisations collecting used clothing divert billions of pounds from landfills annually, channelling them into domestic resale, international reuse markets, and recycling streams.[viii] Even in a high-consumption society, reuse systems demonstrate that scale is possible when logistics, sorting infrastructure, and consumer awareness are aligned. The American experience shows that reuse is not marginal, but can be commercially viable, and environmentally meaningful at the national scale.

There could be lessons learnt from Brazil and the USA, and good practices replicated in India. Beyond environmental benefits, reuse models unlock employment that matters deeply for India. Every stage of the circular value chain creates work, from collection crews and logistics managers, sorting centre workers trained in grading and repair, retail staff in reuse shops, resellers in Tier II and III towns, and recycling technicians handling end-of-life textiles. Unlike capital-intensive manufacturing, reuse and sorting are labour-intensive, making them ideal for employment generation in peri-urban and rural contexts. India’s textile and apparel ecosystem already employs tens of millions of people, and circular extensions of this value chain can add new layers of income while formalising parts of the informal economy.[ix] For women and youth, especially in low-income communities, reuse enterprises can offer accessible entry points into entrepreneurship and wage work, from operating neighbourhood collection hubs to running small resale outlets.

Such models fit well within India’s national climate adaptation priorities. The National Action Plan on Climate Change[x]emphasises sustainable consumption, waste reduction, and resource efficiency as pillars of climate resilience. Textile reuse contributes to mitigation by cutting emissions embedded in production and avoiding landfill methane, while also supporting adaptation by reducing pressure on water systems and urban waste infrastructure. In water-stressed cities, every litre saved through avoided textile production matters. In flood-prone regions, reducing landfill volume lowers the risk of waste-choked drainage and secondary pollution. Circular textile systems thus become part of urban resilience, not just waste management.

The social enterprise model further adds public value, where profits from resale and recycling can cover operating costs and fund social programs. By reinvesting surpluses into community education, skills training, or local environmental projects, reuse systems can close the loop between consumption and social impact. This can become an excellent example of regenerative economics, where waste becomes a revenue stream that sustains both the enterprise and the communities it serves. When scaled across cities through partnerships with RWAs, municipalities, and CSR programmes, such models can become a distributed infrastructure for circularity, embedded in everyday life rather than confined to pilot projects.

While reuse alone cannot solve fashion’s environmental crisis, overproduction must be addressed, and durable design, extended producer responsibility, and recycling innovation are all necessary. But reuse is the fastest, cheapest, and most socially inclusive solution available today. It requires no new technology breakthroughs, only better organisation of what already exists and conscious consumerism. 

Embracing circular textile reuse at scale in India is not just an environmental choice, but an essential development strategy. It aligns climate action with employment, urban resilience with rural markets, and consumer behaviour with community benefit. Brazil’s cultural shift towards thrift and the USA’s large-scale reuse infrastructure show that such transitions are possible across income levels and cultures. The question is no longer whether reuse works, but whether policy, capital, and civic will can come together to make it the norm rather than the exception. If India gets this right, it will not only reduce its textile footprint but also demonstrate how climate action can be woven into the fabric of everyday economic life.

(Post Images are generated using AI)

References 

[i] https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/03/1161636#:~:text=The%20fashion%20industry%20is%20one,of%20global%20greenhouse%20gas%20emissions

[ii] Number Analytics. “The Impact of Recycled Textiles on the Environment.” Lifecycle assessment review, 2024.

[iii] https://reports.fashionforgood.com/report/sorting-for-circularity-india-wealth-in-waste/chapterdetail?reportid=813&chapter=3

[iv] Humana People to People India. “Reuse and Circularity in Textiles”, 2026

[v] Goonj (India). Organisational model and impact summaries, publicly available reports.

[vi] Upcycle4Better. “Textile Recycling in Brazil.” Country brief, 2023.

[vii] Greenbook. “The Thrifting Revolution in Brazil.” Market insight report, 2024.

[viii] Planet Aid

[ix] CSTEP. “India’s Textile and Apparel Sector: Ecosystem and Readiness for EPR.” Policy report, 2024.

[x] National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC), Govt. of India

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Small Things Like These

March 23, 2026 Leave a comment

Author: Claire Keegan | 128 Pages | Genre: Historical Fiction | Publisher: Faber and Faber | Year: 2021 | My Rating: 8/10

“Do you mind telling me where this road will take me?’ “This road?” The man put down the hook and leant on the handle, and stared in at him. “This road will take you wherever you want to go, son.”
― Claire Keegan, Small Things Like These

Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These is an unassuming and compassionate novella that explores moral courage within the mundane rhythms of everyday life. When you first hold the book, its title suggests humility as it refers to small acts and ordinary details that weave our lives together. Yet beneath this gentle exterior lies a story both sharp and deep, one that questions societal complicity, personal responsibility, and the price of kindness in a world full of indifference. A film was also released by the same name in 2024, directed by Tim Mielants.
 
Set in Ireland in the mid-1980s, the story follows Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man whose weekly routines revolve around delivering coal to his community in the run-up to Christmas. Bill is a practical, hardworking man with a keen eye for details—both in his business dealings and in the lives of those around him. Keegan’s prose is spare but richly textured as she describes the world through Bill’s grounded perspective, allowing the setting to emerge organically as both familiar and austere.
 
The power of this book lies in its focus on the ordinary. Bill’s days are a series of small tasks that include fetching sacks of coal, repairing fences, observing the changing weather, and spending evenings with his children. Yet it is precisely through these simple moments that Keegan reveals the deeper struggles of her characters and the moral quandaries they face. Her writing shimmeringly captures the texture of lives lived where dignity and survival are in constant negotiation.
 
The crux of the narrative begins when Bill, on his routine deliveries, encounters the Magdalene Laundry, which is an institution that, in real-world history, incarcerated thousands of women labelled as wayward or sinful, forcing them into unpaid labour. In Keegan’s fictional rendering, the institution stands as an imposing, monolithic presence with walls that seem to hold secrets as impenetrable as the silence that surrounds it. When Bill witnesses a young woman in distress, that unsettles him; he is forced to confront realities he has long chosen to ignore. What follows is a quiet yet wrenching moral reckoning.
 
Keegan doesn’t rely on grand gestures or dramatic flourishes to convey her message. Instead, she invites the reader into Bill’s personal life, which unfolds with the careful precision of a meditative revelation. Bill’s internal struggle between comfort and conscience, between the safety of silence and the peril of truth, is the emotional anchor of the story. In a world where systems of power routinely subjugate the vulnerable, Bill’s hesitations, doubts, and ultimately his decisions illuminate the complexity of acting with integrity.
 
One of the most remarkable aspects of Keegan’s writing is her ability to render deeply serious themes without didacticism. The novella grapples with historical injustices, patriarchal structures, and collective negligence, yet it never feels preachy. Keegan trusts her readers to recognise the moral gravity of the situation. Bill’s interactions with those around him further enrich the novella’s emotional landscape. His relationships with his wife, his children, and his neighbours are tenderly drawn, with each character feeling textured, whole, and real. Through these interactions, Keegan shows how communal life can be both nourishing and fraught, underscoring how easily people can slip into patterns of complacency when confronting uncomfortable truths. The warmth of Bill’s home life stands in stark contrast to the chilling secrecy of the laundry, amplifying the moral dissonance at the heart of the story.
 
Keegan’s storytelling is musical, and her sentences are shaped with an almost tactile precision. The Irish landscape, with its grey skies, barren fields, and wind-scoured streets, becomes more than a backdrop and a character in its own right, reflecting the internal desolation and flickers of hope within Bill’s journey. Reading this book is an immersive experience, inviting you to slow down, to notice the small details, to attend to the silences between the lines.
 
At its core, the novella asks a deceptively simple question that what does it mean to be a good person in a world that often rewards self-interest over compassion? Bill Furlong’s story suggests that there are no easy answers, but that even modest acts of courage like speaking up, offering help, acknowledging another’s suffering can ripple outward in ways that matter. This thematic focus on the ‘small things’ resonates with the narrative’s tonal restraint, generating a quiet but persistent emotional force.
 
Some readers may find the novella’s deliberate pacing and understated plot challenging, especially those accustomed to more overtly dramatic narratives. However, it is precisely this unhurried approach that allows Keegan’s thematic concerns to take root. The quiet accumulation of detail replicates the way real moral awakening often unfolds incrementally, through moments of discomfort and reflection rather than sudden epiphany.
 
This book is a remarkable work of moral fiction that lingers long after reading. Claire Keegan has crafted a narrative that is both intimate and expansive, one that honours the ordinary while confronting extraordinary ethical dilemmas. Through Bill Furlong’s quiet courage, Keegan reminds us that the small things, like acts of attention, care, and conscience, are often the ones that define us. It is a novella of great compassion and moral clarity, worthy of contemplation by anyone invested in the possibilities of human kindness amid enduring social wounds.

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The Paradox of Choice

March 16, 2026 Leave a comment

Today when we can open a trading account in minutes using multitudes of apps on our smartphones, start a side hustle overnight, and invest in everything from mutual funds to crypto, it’s easy to assume that greater financial freedom leads to greater happiness and security. After all, classical economics taught us that more choice expands utility and that having more options allows individuals to maximise satisfaction according to their preferences.

However, paradoxically, the modern reality is quite the opposite. The very availability of multiple financial choices, from investment platforms and passive income streams to flexible careers, has made us more anxious, instead of more secure. This tension between freedom and fatigue is at the core of what psychologist Barry Schwartz famously called The Paradox of Choice, that when faced with too many options, people often experience paralysis, regret, and dissatisfaction. In the financial world, this paradox is amplified by behavioural biases, social pressures, and the illusion of control. The promise of ‘financial freedom’ is increasingly becoming a source of stress and decision fatigue.

At the core of neoclassical economics lies the assumption of the rational consumer, an individual seeking to maximise utility given available resources and information. In theory, having more options allows a person to reach a higher indifference curve, implying greater satisfaction. However, this theory assumes two conditions of perfect information and bounded rationality that modern life rarely satisfies. In reality, our capacity to process and evaluate financial information is limited. According to Nobel laureate Herbert Simon, bounded rationality doesn’t really exist as people settle for ‘good enough’ decisions given cognitive constraints.

When applied to financial decisions of choosing mutual funds, stocks, insurance policies, side gigs, or career shifts, the cognitive load of evaluating multiple dimensions (returns, risk, time, opportunity cost, tax impact, and ethical values) becomes overwhelming. And, eventually, this results in anxiety, procrastination, and in many cases, decision paralysis.

Behavioural economics has consistently challenged the rational agent model by introducing psychological realism. The ‘overchoice effect,’ as demonstrated in Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper’s famous “jam experiment” (formally published in 2000), found that too many options reduce the likelihood of making any decision at all, instead of motivating consumers.

Translating this into financial behaviour, investors today face an explosion of options:

  • Thousands of mutual funds and ETFs, each claiming a unique advantage
  • Multiple investment apps with different algorithms and influencers
  • Gig economy trends from freelancing to affiliate marketing to AI content creation
  • Cryptocurrencies, NFTs, index funds, and more

Every new choice promises empowerment but demands research, comparison, and ongoing monitoring. Instead of creating financial autonomy, it traps individuals in a constant state of vigilance, which is the fear of missing out (FOMO) combined with the fear of making the wrong call (FOBO). The result is not empowerment but exhaustion or decision fatigue. Each micro-decision (Should I invest this month? Which stock to pick? Should I switch careers or start a podcast?) depletes mental energy. Over time, this erodes not just financial confidence but emotional well-being.

Daniel Kahneman’s Prospect Theory helps explain why financial freedom can be anxiety-inducing. The theory suggests that people are loss averse as the pain of losing 100 rupees is psychologically twice as intense as the pleasure of gaining the same amount. In an environment overflowing with options, every choice implies multiple foregone alternatives. Every decision carries not just the risk of loss but the weight of opportunity cost. This constant mental simulation of missed opportunities amplifies anticipated regret, a core feature of financial anxiety. Ironically, the very flexibility that defines financial freedom multiplies the avenues for potential regret. The ideology of ‘financial freedom’ is closely tied to neoliberal individualism, which believes that individuals are solely responsible for their economic success or failure. The gig economy and self-investing culture are framed as the democratisation of opportunity, but in practice, they shift systemic risk from institutions to individuals.

In the past, financial security was linked to stable employment, pensions, and collective risk-sharing. Today’s economy glorifies personal agency: ‘be your own boss,’ ‘invest smart, ‘create multiple income streams.’ This narrative sounds empowering, but simultaneously imposes a moral burden that if you are not financially thriving, it’s because you didn’t hustle enough or make the right investments. Digital technology has magnified this paradox. Social media and fintech apps blur the line between information and manipulation. Platforms gamify investing (colourful charts, animations, notifications) to keep users engaged. Influencers promote ‘hot’ stocks on popular social media or ‘passive income secrets’ that fuel financial comparison and insecurity.

The attention economy transforms finance from a domain of prudence into one of performance. People aren’t just managing money, instead they’re managing an identity. The psychological cost is immense and full of information overload, impulsive trading, and the erosion of long-term financial discipline. It is a proven fact that dopamine spikes from small gains, mimicking gambling behaviour, creating cycles of thrill and despair. 

This anxiety can be visualised through diminishing marginal utility of choice. Initially, increasing options enhances utility as people enjoy flexibility. However, beyond a threshold, the utility curve flattens and then declines as cognitive costs exceed the benefits of freedom.

Mathematically, if U = f(C) represents utility derived from choice (C), then

            for small C, dU/dC > 0 (freedom increases satisfaction),

            for large C, dU/dC < 0 (freedom decreases satisfaction).

This inverted-U relationship illustrates that optimal well-being arises not from maximum freedom but from structured freedom, where choice is curated, meaningful, and bounded by context or expertise.

The paradox of financial choice reveals a deeper human truth that enjoying freedom without boundaries can be as imprisoning as constraint. The promise of financial autonomy has mutated into an obligation to constantly optimise, compare, and compete. It seems like we are drowning in option value as every unrealised choice weighs on our psyche. We are victims of decision fatigue as we are living through the privatisation of financial risk disguised as empowerment. True financial freedom, therefore, is not about multiplying options but mastering them and knowing when to choose, when to stop, and when to rest. As with most paradoxes, the solution lies in the balance of the freedom to simplify, ignore, and define what ‘enough’ means in a world that always demands more.

(Cover image is generated using AI)

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Economics is not about money

March 2, 2026 Leave a comment

Most people think economics is about money, but it’s not. If it were, your life would make far more sense than it does. Economics begins much earlier than money, as it starts the moment you realise that you cannot have everything at once. You cannot have a high-paying job and abundant free time. You cannot have absolute security and complete freedom. You cannot say yes to every opportunity without saying no to something else. Economics is not about how much you earn, but what you give up for it. That invisible sacrifice, ‘what you could have done but didn’t, ‘ is the true currency of economics. We seldom talk about it, but it quietly shapes every decision we make.

Think of any random normal day of your life. You wake up earlier than you would like because traffic can be unpredictable. You scroll your phone while sipping morning tea, not because you want to, but because silence feels uncomfortable. You choose a quicker breakfast over a healthier one. You delay a difficult conversation at home. You tolerate a job you dislike because it pays the bills. None of these choices feels ‘economic.’ They feel personal. But every choice that you make is a trade-off. When you choose speed over health, comfort over honesty, income over meaning, you are doing economics. You are allocating scarce resources, such as time, energy, attention, and emotional capacity. Money enters later, as a convenient measuring tool, but the logic is already at work.

In India and several other similar developing countries, we live in a constant state of trade-offs. Long commutes to work steal hours from families. Overcrowded classrooms dilute learning. Low wages are compensated by the promise of stability. We accept these compromises so routinely that they stop feeling like choices at all and begin to feel like fate. Economics helps us see that they are not.

No matter how rich or poor you are, time is always in limited supply. A billionaire has the same twenty-four hours as a daily-wage worker. A student in Delhi and a farmer in Bihar both face limited days and uncertain futures. What differs is not scarcity itself but how it is managed and who bears its cost. Scarcity forces choices, which create trade-offs, and ultimately, trade-offs determine winners and losers.

If economics is about trade-offs, then the most important question is not about what we want, but what we are willing to give up, and who decides? This is where economics moves from being a personal lens to a political one. In democracies, these decisions are meant to be collective, negotiated through debate, budgets, and votes.  When a government invests heavily in urban infrastructure but underfunds primary healthcare, it is not simply prioritising growth over welfare, but is choosing whose time matters. The commuter stuck in traffic benefits from a flyover, while the woman who walks kilometres to a hospital pays the price. These outcomes are often defended as efficiency, but efficiency for whom is rarely asked. Economics reminds us that aggregate gains can coexist with deep individual losses, and that averages hide pain as effectively as they reveal progress.

This way of thinking also changes how we view success. Growth figures, income levels, and productivity rates dominate economic conversations, but they measure outputs, not experiences. A country can grow richer while its people grow more anxious. A company can become more profitable while its workers burn out. A household can earn more while spending less time together. When we ignore these costs, we risk building systems that look successful on paper but feel unbearable in practice. 

There is also a moral dimension to trade-offs that markets alone cannot resolve. Markets are excellent at responding to purchasing power, but often silent about need. They reward those who can pay, not those who suffer most. That is why leaving everything to ‘the market’ is itself a choice, one that often shifts costs onto the weakest. When clean air, safe housing, or quality education are treated purely as commodities, inequality is not an accident, but it is an outcome. Economics helps us see that fairness is not automatic, but must be designed.

This is the uncomfortable truth economics insists on. Every policy, every system, every personal decision benefits one and burdens someone else. There is no free lunch, only cleverly hidden bills. When a city prioritises flyovers over footpaths, it chooses cars over pedestrians. When an education system rewards rote learning, it sacrifices curiosity. When a company celebrates long working hours, it quietly taxes family life. These are not moral failures but are economic decisions. However, pretending they are natural or inevitable prevents us from questioning them.

The most dangerous costs are the ones we don’t notice. When an app is free, we assume there is no price. When a government scheme promises something for nothing, we rarely ask who is paying. When a product is cheap, we celebrate efficiency, not exploitation. But every benefit has a cost. If you don’t see it, it’s probably being paid by someone else, or even by your future self. Cheap food often means underpaid farmers. Free social media means monetised attention. Low taxes can mean broken public services. Fast growth can mean polluted air and exhausted bodies. Economics trains us to ask an unfashionable question: compared to what? Without this lens, we mistake convenience for progress.

At an individual level, thinking economically can be liberating. It replaces guilt with clarity. If you understand that your exhaustion is not just a personal failure but the result of incentives that reward overwork, you can begin to question those incentives. If you recognise that your inability to save is linked to rising living costs rather than laziness, you can demand better policies instead of harsher self-judgment. Awareness does not eliminate constraints, but it changes how we respond to them.

One of the quiet cruelties of modern life is how easily individuals are blamed for structural problems. If you are unemployed, you are told to upskill. If you are stressed, you are told to meditate. If you are poor, you are told to work harder. But you are rarely told to examine the system that made these outcomes likely in the first place. Economics reveals patterns where we see only personal failure. It shows how incentives shape behaviour, how power hides behind ‘market outcomes,’ and how rules written long ago continue to decide who gets ahead today. This does not absolve individuals of responsibility, but it does bring honesty to the conversation. You cannot fix what you refuse to name.

Economics is not about predicting stock prices or defending ideologies, but is more about clarity. About seeing how choices are shaped, how costs are distributed, and how power operates quietly through everyday decisions. You do not need equations to think economically. Instead, you need curiosity and courage to ask uncomfortable questions. And you need the humility to accept that every solution creates new problems. Once you start seeing life this way, it becomes difficult to unsee. You begin to notice the price tags on things that never claimed to be for sale, like time, trust, dignity, and attention. That awareness does not make life easier, but it makes it more honest. And honesty, in the long run, is the most valuable currency we have. When we see costs clearly, we can finally argue about whether they are worth paying, and whether the bill is being shared fairly. India is a masterclass in everyday economics. Families choose stability over passion, young people choose migration over belonging, villages trade environment for employment, and women trade ambition for safety. These are not random decisions but often are rational responses to constraints. When options are limited, even painful choices begin to make sense. Understanding this limitation is empowerment.

(Cover image is generated using AI)

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Birthday Stories

February 22, 2026 Leave a comment

Edited by Haruki Murakami | 224 Pages | Genre: Fiction | Publisher: Vintage Books | Year: 2006 | My Rating: 8/10

“No matter how far you go, you can never be anything but yourself”
― Haruki Murakami, Birthday Stories

I’ve always loved receiving books on my birthdays, as far back as I can remember. When I was in elementary and middle school, my parents used to gift me books, and for several years, since I can recall, I often used my saved pocket money to buy myself the best books, something I still do on my birthdays. On my last birthday in 2025, a few friends and family members gifted me books that could keep me occupied for six months. Among them was “Birthday Stories” by Haruki Murakami. What an amazing way to start my birthday year!

Something is mesmerising about beginning a new year of one’s life with a book that itself revolves around birthdays, those strange markers of time when we pause, introspect and reflect, and sometimes feel the weight of becoming. Birthday Stories is not a novel by Murakami in the conventional sense, but a curated collection of short stories written by various authors, commissioned by Murakami for the Japanese magazine Monkey. The book is a rich anthology that explores how a single day in one’s life can hold joy, dread, memory, regret, longing, and transformation.

A birthday is such a universal ritual of cake, candles, wishes, gifts, and phone calls. Yet, through these 13 stories, the birthday becomes a moment where ordinary life tilts, revealing hidden fractures or unexpected openings. Some stories are gentle and reflective, others unsettling, a few laced with humour or quiet absurdity. As a reader beginning a personal ‘birthday year’ of reading, I found myself slipping into these stories with a peculiar intimacy, as if each one was asking me to examine my own relationship with time and personal evolution.

Murakami’s presence is felt more as a curator than as a dominating voice, which is refreshing. He resists the temptation to turn the anthology into a showcase of ‘Murakami-esque’ surrealism. Instead, he assembles a diverse range of voices that are playful, melancholic, and even experimental. The result is a collage of sensibilities that mirrors the many ways people experience birthdays, often not as a single emotion, but as a spectrum of moods. This diversity keeps the collection from becoming repetitive. Each story feels like a different room in the same house of memory and anticipation.

One of the pleasures of Birthday Stories is how subtly it captures the loneliness that can accompany birthdays. Even when surrounded by people, birthdays can heighten our awareness of time passing, unmet expectations, and relationships that have shifted gears. Several stories linger in this emotional space, portraying characters who are quietly dislocated on their special day. A birthday becomes a reminder of what has not happened as much as what has. This emotional undercurrent resonated deeply with me. Birthdays, after all, are checkpoints reviewing the year that has finished, and not just celebrations. They ask uncomfortable questions, like ‘where am I in my life? What have I become since the last candle was blown out?’

The collection of stories has a playfulness about it, a recognition that birthdays can be absurd social performances. Some stories gently mock the rituals we perform around ageing: the forced cheer, the obligatory gratitude, the awkward gifts. Others find wonder in small moments of a conversation, a remembered taste, a fleeting encounter that feels more meaningful than any grand celebration. This balance between lightness and introspection makes the book an easy yet thoughtful read. 

The anthology format also invites a particular kind of reading rhythm. I found myself reading one story at a time, allowing each to settle, and eventually taking 13 weeks to complete the book. It felt like savouring my favourite Lindt Intense Orange, one piece at a time. In doing so, Birthday Stories began to feel less like a book to be finished and more like a companion to the year ahead with short meditations on time, chance, and the quiet dramas of ordinary lives. It suited the idea of a reading calendar stretching over weeks, not rushing through but returning to in small, reflective doses.

Reading Birthday Stories at the start of my birthday year felt quietly symbolic. It reminded me that growing older is not a singular narrative of progress or decline, but a series of small, often unnoticed stories we accumulate. Some are strange, some tender, some unresolved. Murakami’s editorial touch brings these fragments together on how time moves through us. The book does not offer grand revelations about ageing or purpose; it brings an honest recognition of the ordinary magic and quiet unease that accompany the simple act of marking another year lived. In that sense, Birthday Stories was the perfect birthday gift. Not because it dazzled with literary fireworks, but because it sat beside me, nudging me to notice the emotional textures of passing time. As the months of my reading calendar unfold, I don’t think I will remember this book less for specific plots and more for the reflective awareness it left me with that every birthday, like every story, is a small doorway into who we are becoming.

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