Why can’t you have it all

April 20, 2026 Leave a comment

We grew up on a promise that if we worked hard enough, planned carefully, and optimised intelligently, we could have it all. Modern culture reinforces this belief on a daily basis that we can have a successful career, a loving family, financial security, good health, lasting friendships, purpose, and inner peace. Social media displays curated snapshots of people who appear to be excelling simultaneously in every domain of life. We have been hearing since our childhoods that balance is achievable with the right morning routine of ‘early to bed, early to rise, makes a person healthy, wealthy and wise’. Yet beneath this narrative lies a simple truth that you can’t have it all, at least not all at once, not at full intensity, and certainly not without significant trade-offs. The reason is not a lack of ambition or discipline, but scarcity, which is the most fundamental principle governing both economics and human life.

Scarcity is often associated with money, but today, the scarcest resources are time, energy, and attention. Every human being, regardless of wealth or status, receives the same twenty-four hours each day, making time the most democratic of all constraints. No one can accumulate unused hours or borrow from the future without cost. We speak casually about ‘managing time,’ yet time itself cannot be managed as it flows at a constant pace. Every hour invested in one activity is an hour unavailable for another, managing only the choices between time availability. The professional who chooses to work late trades time that could have been spent with family. The parent who prioritises caring for children may delay career advancement. The entrepreneur who pours weekends into building a venture sacrifices leisure and rest. These trade-offs are often invisible in the moment, but they accumulate quietly over the years. Life does not unfold in parallel tracks where everything progresses simultaneously. It unfolds sequentially, through seasons that demand different commitments.

If time is the vehicle of life, energy is its fuel. Two individuals may possess identical schedules yet operate at dramatically different capacities. Energy fluctuates with sleep, nutrition, stress, age, emotional well-being, and sense of purpose. Modern ambition frequently assumes that energy can be summoned indefinitely through willpower, caffeine/nicotine, or motivation. But biology imposes limits, cognitive fatigue reduces clarity and creativity, and emotional exhaustion diminishes patience and empathy, while physical depletion erodes resilience. Burnout is not a failure of time management but is the inevitable consequence of sustained energy misallocation. Many high achievers discover that even when their calendars appear optimised, their internal reserves are depleted. They attempt to excel in multiple demanding roles of being a professional, parent, partner, and friend simultaneously without acknowledging that each role draws from the same finite energy pool. Over time, the system protests, sleep suffers, health declines, and relationships strain. The pursuit of ‘having it all’ quietly converts into chronic exhaustion.

Perhaps more than time or energy, attention defines scarcity. In the digital age, attention has become a commodity aggressively competed for by corporations and platforms. Notifications, news feeds, emails, and endless streams of content fragment focus into micro-intervals, with us being connected to everything and fully present in almost nothing. Attention determines lived experience; whatever captures our focus becomes our reality. When attention is scattered across dozens of stimuli each hour, depth disappears, and conversations become half-engaged exchanges. Work becomes interrupted bursts of activity, and leisure becomes simultaneous scrolling. Creativity, which requires uninterrupted thought, struggles to emerge in fragmented environments. Intimacy, which depends on sustained presence, weakens under constant distraction. The desire to ‘have it all’ often leads to diluted attention spread thinly across many domains, leaving none fully nourished.

Technology reinforces the thinking that multitasking is efficient, but cognitive science consistently demonstrates the cost of task switching. Each shift of focus consumes mental energy and reduces performance quality. We may believe we are building a career, nurturing relationships, maintaining fitness, staying informed, and cultivating a side project all at once. We may be engaging partially in each, achieving adequacy but rarely excellence. To choose one path intensely is to decline others, at least temporarily, as excellence is exclusive by nature and rewards those willing to concentrate rather than diversify endlessly.

The pressure to ‘have it all’ is further amplified by comparison, especially as digital platforms present curated narratives where achievements are showcased without context. We compare our daily struggles to others’ peak moments and conclude that we are falling behind. Yet every visible success rests upon invisible trade-offs. The CxO with rapid career progression may have sacrificed personal time. The entrepreneur enjoying autonomy may endure financial uncertainty. The individual projecting calm online may be filled with anxiety privately. Role overload has become a defining feature of modern adulthood. We inflate our identities, attempting to be accomplished professionals, devoted family members, socially conscious citizens, physically fit individuals, and culturally relevant participants all at once. Without conscious prioritisation, this multiplicity breeds internal conflict.

Trade-offs are not signs of failure but are expressions of values. Every yes carries an implicit no. When we resist acknowledging trade-offs, we drift into reactive living, responding to emails, obligations, and external demands rather than intentional priorities. Economics teaches that scarce resources must be allocated toward what yields the highest perceived value. The same principle applies to life, and time, energy, and attention must be directed consciously. Without deliberate allocation, they will be consumed by urgency rather than importance. The question shifts from ‘Can I have it all?’ to ‘What is worth the cost?’ Clarity transforms scarcity from limitation into guidance.

Fragmentation carries hidden consequences as shallow engagement reduces satisfaction. When attention is dispersed continuously, creativity declines and emotional presence weakens. We may touch many aspects of life but rarely hold any deeply. The paradox of modern abundance is experiential thinness. Surrounded by options, we struggle to experience fullness. Having everything available does not equate to inhabiting it meaningfully.

Perhaps the problem lies in our definition of ‘having it all.’ If it means maximising every measurable domain simultaneously, which is unattainable. But if it means living in alignment with consciously chosen priorities, it becomes possible. Fulfilment may not require expansion in all directions, but it does require coherence. When time, energy, and attention align with core values, life feels integrated even if certain ambitions are deferred. We may not achieve extreme wealth, recognition, and perfect physical condition simultaneously, yet we may experience deep contentment through purposeful work, loving relationships, and sustainable health practices.

Designing a life within scarcity requires discipline and ruthless prioritisation to clarify which domains deserve peak focus. Protecting energy through sleep, movement, and boundaries preserves capacity. Practising attention hygiene, limiting digital intrusion and creating focused blocks enhances depth. Strategic neglect acknowledges that some areas will temporarily receive minimal investment without inducing guilt. Redefining success as alignment rather than accumulation reduces external pressure. These practices do not eliminate scarcity, but teaches us to navigate it wisely.

There is liberation in accepting limits, where comparison loses some of its sting when we acknowledge that no human can optimise every dimension simultaneously. Even the most accomplished individuals operate within constraints. Everyone trades something. The artist may trade financial stability for creative freedom. The corporate leader may trade time for influence. The activist may trade comfort for impact. The parent may trade professional acceleration for presence. No path is without a cost, and recognising this universal truth fosters humility and self-compassion.

Ultimately, the longing to ‘have it all’ often masks deeper desires for security, significance, love, belonging, or meaning. When these needs are identified clearly, excess pursuits lose their urgency. One may discover that respect matters more than status, intimacy more than visibility, and contribution more than accumulation. You cannot maximise career, family, health, wealth, friendships, and personal growth simultaneously at peak intensity. Human existence is bounded by time, powered by finite energy, and shaped by limited attention. Yet within those boundaries lies possibility. You may not have everything, but you can choose what receives your best. In a culture obsessed with expansion, the rare act is deliberately selecting what truly matters and committing to it fully. You cannot have it all, but you can have enough, deeply experienced and consciously chosen. And in the arithmetic of a scarce world, that may be the closest approximation of abundance available to us.

(Cover image is generate using AI)

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Project Hail Mary

April 13, 2026 Leave a comment

Genre: Space Sci-Fi | Year: 2026 | Duration: 157 mins | Director: Phil Lord and Christopher Miller|  Medium: Theatre (PVR Cinemas) | Trailer: HERE | Language: English| Cast: Ryan Gosling, Sandra Huller, James Oritz, and others | My rating: 4.5/5

Favourite Dialogue:“Why, question? Evolution hate death.”

Project Hail Mary is adapted from the book ‘Project Hail Mary’ by Andy Weir. It is certainly among the best Sci-Fi movies I have watched in the last 10 years. The film is about survival, curiosity, friendship, and the stubbornness of hope. The film adaptation has not lost the magic of Andy Weir’s books, and leans heavily on problem-solving, intellect, and a deep sense of humour, and also explores further into emotional terrain that feels both intimate and cosmic.

The core of this layered film is deceptively simple, featuring a lone astronaut, Dr Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling), who wakes up aboard a spacecraft with no memory of who he is or why he is there. As his memories gradually return, he realises that he may be humanity’s last hope to prevent extinction. This story of amnesia developing into purpose acts as a powerful storytelling engine. It enables the audience to rediscover the stakes alongside Grace, creating a layered tension that is both intellectual and emotional. Grace has been recruited by Eva Stratt (Sandra Huller) to save the world. He, along with many other scientists, has been told that an infection is affecting the sun. In the next few decades, life on the planet will cease to exist. 

What distinguishes Project Hail Mary from many contemporary sci-fi films is its unapologetic embrace of science. This is not a film that glosses over the technicalities of astrophysics, microbiology, and orbital mechanics, which are all treated with a level of respect rarely seen in mainstream cinema. The film translates complexity into narrative urgency. Every equation solved, every experiment conducted, feels like a small step away from annihilation.

In many ways, the film follows in the lineage of The Martian, but it evolves beyond it. While The Martian was about one man surviving against the odds on Mars, Project Hail Mary expands the canvas to an interstellar scale. The stakes are existential and not personal, unlike The Martian. And yet, the film feels more personal because of an unexpected friendship that emerges in the vast emptiness of space between two different species. The relationship that develops between Grace and his unlikely counterpart, Rocky, is the soul of the film. It is here that Project Hail Mary transcends genre conventions. The film is no longer just about saving Earth, but more about connection across unimaginable divides of space. It explores communication not just as language but as intent, empathy, and trust. 

The performance of Gosling carries much of the film’s weight. Ryland Grace is not a traditional hero. He is not a trained astronaut or a fearless explorer. He is, in many ways, an accidental saviour—reluctant, flawed, and often overwhelmed. This vulnerability makes him relatable. His fear is palpable, his humour disarming, and his determination deeply earned. The wry, self-deprecating, and occasionally absurd humour provides moments of levity that make the darker moments more impactful.

Project Hail Mary strikes a careful balance between realism and wonders visually. The spacecraft interiors are utilitarian, almost claustrophobic, reinforcing the isolation of Grace’s journey. In contrast, the depiction of vast, silent, and indifferent space serves as a constant reminder of the scale of the challenge. The film does not rely excessively on CGI spectacle, but when it does deploy visual effects, it does so with purpose. Each visual set-piece advances the narrative rather than distracting from it.

The narrative oscillates between past and present, gradually revealing how humanity arrived at this desperate moment. These flashbacks are integral to understanding the moral and ethical dilemmas that underpin the mission. Governments, scientists, and ordinary individuals are forced to make impossible choices. The film does not offer easy answers. Instead, it presents these decisions with a moral ambiguity that feels uncomfortably real.

Project Hail Mary grapples with questions of sacrifice, responsibility, and the collective versus the individual. It examines the idea of scientific progress not as an abstract pursuit but as a lifeline. In an era where science is often politicised or misunderstood, the film stands as a quiet testament to the power of human ingenuity. It suggests that our greatest strength lies in our ability to think, collaborate, and adapt.What I loved most about this non-linear film is that there are no explosive battles or dramatic confrontations in the traditional sense. The tension arises from equations, experiments, and the ticking clock of extinction. I found its intellectual core to be a deeply rewarding viewing experience. For those accustomed to more conventional sci-fi, this may require an adjustment in expectations.

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Why good projects struggle for funding

April 6, 2026 Leave a comment

The social impact sector’s irony is that some of the most thoughtful, community-centred, transformative projects struggle to secure funding, while others that are not so well designed, and sometimes even superficial, find their way into donor portfolios. This contradiction is often explained as a failure of proposal writing or organisational capacity, but such explanations only scratch the surface. The deeper truth lies in understanding donor behaviour, including the incentives, constraints, and biases that shape funding decisions. Good projects are overlooked not because they lack merit, as ‘merit’ is not the primary currency in the funding ecosystem, but because of factors like alignment, risk perception, measurability, and institutional incentives.

At the core of the problem is the simple fact that donors do not fund the ‘best’ projects; instead, they support those that align with their priorities. Every donor operates within a specific thematic, geographic, and strategic framework, often influenced by board directives, political factors, or institutional legacy. A project that is highly relevant to a particular community may still be rejected if it does not fit neatly into a donor’s current focus areas. This creates a subtle but significant distortion in the sector, as organisations begin to design projects around donors’ language and preferences rather than the lived realities of communities. In this process, genuinely valuable ideas can become invisible, not because they lack worth, but because they are misaligned with funding narratives.

This is further compounded by the deeply risk-averse nature of development funding. Donors are not neutral actors, and they are accountable upward to their boards, governments, shareholders, or trustees. This shapes a cautious approach to funding, where the emphasis is on minimising risk rather than maximising impact. Established nonprofits with proven track records are preferred over emerging grassroots organisations, even when the latter may have deeper contextual understanding. Similarly, tried-and-tested models are favoured over experimental or innovative approaches. The consequence is a filtering mechanism that systematically excludes many high-potential projects simply because they appear uncertain or difficult to manage. Ironically, the very qualities like innovation, localisation, and adaptability that make a project transformative are often the ones that make it seem risky.

Now there’s a growing emphasis on measurability in funding decisions. Donors desire clear metrics, defined outputs, and quantifiable results for results-based management and data-driven accountability of projects. While this has enhanced transparency, it has also created a bias toward interventions that can demonstrate immediate, tangible results. Projects focused on infrastructure, service delivery, or training programmes tend to perform better because their outputs are easily measurable. Conversely, initiatives aimed at changing social norms, empowering communities, or strengthening institutions struggle to articulate their impact within the same frameworks. The most complex and deeply rooted development challenges are often the least measurable within the funding cycle, and therefore the least fundable. Good projects operating in these areas are disadvantaged not because they are ineffective, but because their effectiveness cannot be readily quantified.

The nature of donor engagement further complicates the picture, despite frequent references to ‘partnership,’ much of development funding remains transactional. Organisations submit proposals in competitive, opaque processes with limited opportunity for dialogue or feedback. In such an environment, relationships matter enormously. Organisations with prior visibility, networks, or access to donor ecosystems often have a significant advantage, even if their projects are not fundamentally stronger. Trust, built over time, can outweigh the intrinsic quality of a proposal. Conversely, new or lesser-known organisations, particularly those operating at the grassroots level, find it difficult to break into these networks. As a result, good projects often fail not on their own terms, but because they are evaluated in isolation, without the benefit of relational context.

This dynamic is closely tied to a broader structural bias within the global development ecosystem. Local organisations, despite being closest to the communities they serve, receive only a small fraction of direct funding. Donors frequently cite concerns around compliance, financial risk, and administrative capacity, which leads them to channel funds through larger intermediaries. While this may simplify management from the donor’s perspective, it creates a distance between resources and realities. Local initiatives, which may be highly effective and deeply embedded, often remain underfunded or entirely excluded. This is not merely an operational issue, but reflects an implicit hierarchy of trust, where proximity to power and familiarity with donor systems are valued over contextual knowledge and lived experience.

Equally important is what might be called the ‘proposal illusion’, with the tendency to compare the quality of a project with the quality of its documentation. In practice, donors assess proposals, not projects. This places a premium on articulation, structure, and the ability to translate complex realities into donor-friendly language. Organisations with access to skilled writers, consultants, or international exposure are better positioned to succeed, even if their fieldwork is not exceptional. On the other hand, grassroots organisations that may be doing outstanding work often struggle to present it in ways that resonate with donor expectations. The result is a system where storytelling can overshadow reality, and where good projects are overlooked because they are not packaged effectively.

Time horizons further skew funding decisions as donors tend to operate within short funding cycles, typically ranging from one to three years, with success evaluated within this limited timeframe. This creates a preference for projects that can demonstrate quick wins, rather than those that require sustained engagement over longer periods. Yet most of the development challenges, like education reform, livelihood transformation, and social cohesion, are inherently long-term and demand patience, continuity, and iterative learning. When funding is short-term, even well-designed projects can struggle to show meaningful results, making them less attractive to donors. This leads to what is often described as the ‘pilot trap,’ where innovative ideas receive initial funding but fail to scale or sustain due to a lack of long-term commitment.

Another big challenge is the persistent reluctance to fund organisational overheads. Donors often prefer to allocate resources directly to programmatic activities, placing limits on administrative costs such as salaries, systems, and governance. This undermines the very foundations that enable effective implementation. Strong organisations require robust systems, skilled personnel, and institutional stability. When these are underfunded, the quality of implementation suffers, reinforcing donor perceptions of risk and inefficiency. This creates a vicious cycle in which organisations are unable to build capacity, and good projects become difficult to execute at scale.

Underlying all of these factors are the incentives that shape donor behaviour. Funding decisions are rarely neutral as they are often influenced by a range of external and internal considerations. Corporate donors are often guided by brand alignment and visibility, favouring projects that can be showcased or communicated easily. Philanthropic foundations may be influenced by leadership vision, legacy goals, or thematic interests. In each case, the logic of funding extends beyond impact alone. Good projects that do not align with these broader incentives may struggle to gain traction, regardless of their potential.

Bilateral and multilateral donors operate within geopolitical frameworks, where aid allocation may reflect strategic interests as much as development priorities. In the wake of global economic slowdowns, traditional sources of Official Development Assistance (ODA) are shrinking. The U.S., U.K., and several European governments have all announced significant cuts to their ODA budgets. These reductions should have sparked debates about the failures of the aid system, but they largely passed with little reflection. The outcome is a development finance environment that’s simultaneously more selective and more risk-averse. Funders now prioritise large-scale, measurable, and politically ‘safe’ projects that can boast short-term, quantifiable results. Small-scale social initiatives, particularly those addressing systemic or cultural issues like inequality or governance, find themselves outside the funding radar. Even when progressive funding streams exist, for example, climate justice or inclusive innovation programs, they come wrapped in new conditionalities of alignment with national development strategies, ESG benchmarks, or private-sector co-financing. These conditions further alienate grassroots actors who can’t meet such formal requirements.

It is also important to acknowledge a more fundamental constraint of scarcity, as the pool of available funding is limited, while the number of worthy projects is vast. Even in a perfectly functioning system, not all good ideas can be supported. This introduces an element of competition that is not purely based on merit. Projects must not only be good, but must also be timely, visible, and strategically positioned. In such an environment, marginal differences in presentation, alignment, or relationships can determine outcomes, leaving many strong proposals unfunded.

Projects that are technically sound but insufficiently rooted in community realities often struggle to convince donors of their sustainability. Funders have been increasingly looking for evidence of participation, co-creation, and local ownership. However, these elements are difficult to demonstrate within conventional proposal formats, leading to a gap between genuine engagement and its representation. Good projects that are deeply participatory may still fall short if they cannot adequately convey this dimension to donors.

These dynamics suggest that the funding ecosystem does not necessarily reward the intrinsic quality of projects. Instead, it rewards alignment, clarity, measurability, and perceived reliability. This does not mean that donors are acting in bad faith; rather, they are responding to their own constraints and accountability structures. The system, in many ways, is functioning as designed. However, the consequences are significant, as innovative, context-specific, and potentially transformative projects often remain unfunded, while safer, more conventional interventions dominate.If we are serious about tackling poverty, inequality, and climate injustice, we must start by rethinking how funding itself operates. It is not enough to design good projects, but one must also learn to translate them into the language of donors without diluting their essence. This requires strategic proposal architecture, effective communication, and relationship-building. For donors, the challenge is more profound as it involves rethinking risk, expanding definitions of impact, and creating funding mechanisms that are flexible, inclusive, and long-term. Without such shifts, the sector will continue to produce good ideas that never see the light of day, not because they are unworthy, but because they do not fit the system that is meant to support them.

(Cover image generated using AI)

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not purport to reflect the views or opinions of any organisation, foundation, CSR, non-profit or others.)

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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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