Whether it’s a weekend away during the summer, or a Saturday out with friends, a single thing on the calendar can help to shake up the daily grind. And it is also the basic concept that led to the creation of HAGS Clothing.
This one time of the school year when we were all filled with anticipation as we headed to class in the morning.
Summer.
You might even be in class in the middle of winter and already looking forward to it. As the year draws to a close, it seems like all anyone can do is count the days.
Then came the yearbooks.
They would be circulated and signed, typically with a comment along the lines of:
HAGS – Have A Great Summer.
I’m sure most people never really even thought about those four letters.
I did.
Decades after, I launched my clothing label under that name.
When I’ve been building HAGS Clothing, one thing I keep discovering is that I used to love the phrase, ‘suck it up this summer,’ but not summer itself.
The contrast of having something to wait for.
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As a kid, life always feels like it has nice breaks built into it.
There’s summer holiday. Winter break. Spring break. The weekends seem to drag on.
When you get a bit older, everything starts to merge a bit.
Monday becomes Tuesday. Tuesday becomes Wednesday. You go to work, answer email, accomplish things, head home and eventually it becomes Thursday.
I have a business I get how you can get stuck in that cycle.
Always more I could be doing for HAGS.
Another email to answer.
Another product to work on.
Another website change.
Another piece of content.
If you’re not careful, you might talk yourself into always needing to be doing something useful.
I’m beginning to recognize the value in having something on the other side of my work that I’m truly excited for.
It Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Trip
And no, by that I don’t mean you should be scheduling a costly vacation every other month.
Sometimes it’s something really small.
Maybe you’re golfing Saturday morning.
Maybe you’re going to a football game.
Could be everyone just ends up at someone’s house.
It might be a concert, a weekend at the lake, a road trip, or a dinner with friends you haven’t seen for too long.
Sometimes it’s just knowing that on a Friday night you’re not gonna touch your phone, and you’re not gonna do anything.
The actual activity isn’t really the point.
It’s having something that interrupts the monotony.
Here Is What I Have Constantly Appreciated About Summertime
Maybe that’s what Have A Great Summer was all about.
Summer seemed to be one huge thing to anticipate.
Growing up, you didn’t need to plan exactly where you’re headed for the next three months.
You just knew summer was coming.
And somehow that was enough.
That’s the feeling I wanted under the name when I started HAGS Clothing in college at the University of Missouri.
T – I wasn’t trying to come up with some elaborate statement about the company.
I liked what those four words already carried.
Friends.
Trips.
Lake days.
Being outside.
Doing things you actually wanted to do.
Making memories.
My idea was simple, and I wanted to keep it simple.
Then Summer Turned Into Saturday
I had an interesting experience while I was in college.
I also realized that Saturdays could have a similar sense of.
Football Saturdays at Mizzou were the topic of conversation all week.
You knew what was happening Saturday.
Friends are coming over. People were tailgating. All outside. The village is completely different.
And then Monday arrived and everyone was ready to do it all over again.
And this is how Have A Great Saturday came into being at HAGS.
It was not a substitute for Have A Great Summer.
Summer is still where everything started.
Saturday simply illustrated this concept on another day.
Have something you’re excited about.
Spend it around good people.
Enjoy it while it’s happening.
Time Spent With Others Requires More Energy as You Age
One of the things I’ve noticed as I’ve aged is that friendships require more prep work than they used to.
During the school year, you saw your friends on a daily basis.
You didn’t have to schedule it.
And then people graduate. They begin working. Some leave. We all have our own routines.
Getting five people together is now a group text and three weeks of planning.
That’s why I figure those are definitely worth actually going on.
There will always be a reason not to.
There is someone busy. Someone has a work. Someone has a morning.
Sometimes you gotta put something on the calendar, then figure it out.
Don’t Make Every Single Thing Into a Productivity Blocked out your day, health, and work2 – but not your focus.
And now there’s a strange compulsion to make everything useful.
If you work out, you keep track of it.
Require a goal? Shut up. If you write, you need a writing goal.
Traveling, then you require content from the journey.
If you have a hobby, someone will eventually try to convince you to make a side hustle of it.
I am a social media content creator and an online business owner, so I totally get the mindset.
But I also think it’s okay to do stuff that does nothing at all.
Go golfing and be terrible at it.
Go to the lake and sit there.
Go on vacation and don’t make a video of it.
Accompany your friends without giving a justification.
Not everything needs to produce something.
Sometimes the experience is enough.
What I Want HAGS to Represent
HAGS is a clothing company.
We sell shirts, hats and other clothing so I want the company to grow, of course.
But in the end I want those four letters to mean more than just the things I sell.
HAGS started with Have A Great Summer.
It then became Have A Great Saturday.
Perhaps the grander point of both may be to just have something in your life to get excited about.
Work hard.
Build things.
Take your responsibilities seriously.
But leave some room for everything else.
Buy the concert ticket.
Go to the game.
Call your friends.
Reunite when getting everyone together isn’t a pain.
And when the summer does arrive, don’t spend the whole thing looking forward to whatever comes after.
Sample some of it whilst you’re there.
That’s exactly what Have A Great Summer has always meant to me.
And this is what I want HAGS to keep feeling whenever the company evolves.