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At ME+iD Tees, we’re all about sharing our interests, our hobbies and our beliefs with those around us. There’s no better way to make your voice heard than to cast your vote for the people you want representing YOU.

After months of build-up, we’re finally just one month away from voting day. Every vote makes a difference, so—whether you do it by mail or in person—please do your civic duty and cast your ballot! Make your voice heard!

Not sure where to start? No problem! You can be well on your way to casting your ballot in just four simple steps:

1. Get informed.

Read up on the issues and the candidates running. Most candidates and campaigns have websites that explain their positions and ideas, so it’s easy to go straight to the source.

2. Register to vote.

Registration deadlines are coming up, so if you’re not yet registered to vote where you live, register as soon as you can, whether you choose to register online, by mail or in person. (Not sure if you’re registered? You can check on vote.org.)

3. Find your precinct or request an absentee ballot.

If you’re not sure where to find your precinct, visit https://www.usa.gov/election-day. Or, if you prefer to vote by mail, you can request an absentee ballot online.

4. Vote!

Now that you’ve learned about the issues and candidates and you are registered to vote, remember to actually get out and get to it come election day! (Or make sure it’s mailed in as soon as you’re done checking those boxes!)

Beyond the Ballot: Ways to make a difference in an election outside of voting

Whether you’re eligible to vote in the coming election or not, you can still influence the outcome of the election by finding additional ways to get involved.

1. Volunteer for your favorite candidate or cause.

A few hours a week or full time—do what works for you in your current life situation. Once you’ve found the causes and candidates you support, consider donating your time making calls, helping with behind the scenes work or passing out fliers. If you’re passionate about the very concept of voting, look into what it would take for you to become a poll worker in your community.

2. Make donations to organizations and campaigns you support.

Don’t have the time to volunteer? Consider making a financial contribution to your favorite campaign or cause. Every dollar can make a difference.

3. Speak up in person and on social media.

This digital age lets us connect with those around us more than ever. Whether you reach out in person or online, try to engage in meaningful discussions about real issues.

4. Wear ME+iD tees that promote voting and causes you are passionate about.

It’s no secret that ME+iD tees are a great way to share something you are personally interested in. Use that power to encourage others to vote or learn about candidates and causes! It’s also likely to help you engage in discussions with those around you, giving you a chance to share your views and listen to the opinions of others.

A few years ago, it was my pleasure and good fortune to attend Harvard University for a program called Project Zero with renowned educational greats Howard Gardner and David Perkins, just to name a few. During this program, we were introduced to the concept of “making thinking visible” as a method of teaching to help students understand and develop their own thinking methods and to help teachers understand what and how students were thinking. This involved using different “thinking routines” to develop new ways for students to “think about their thinking”. It is very powerful stuff and completely changed and enhanced the way teachers and students interacted, taught, and learned. 

In a similar way at ME+iD we are using our custom clothing to make our thinking visible, with the mission of helping people connect and understand each other a little better. When I wear a shirt with one of my passions on it, Guitars for example, this tells others that I think about guitars. My shirt makes my thinking visible! And, in turn, people will start conversations with me about their thoughts related to guitars. Knowing how this works can be a very useful tool if you are looking for an opportunity to meet new people and connect with those around you. Your shirt becomes a window into your thoughts, loves, and passions.

Although we are experiencing the effects of a pandemic, living in lock down, wearing masks when we venture out in public, and communicating virtually; we can still use our clothing to communicate a message that we choose. Since now, more than ever, we all need a little reassurance, friendship, gentleness, and positivity in our daily lives, instead of just wearing our passions and interests, we can choose uplifting, humorous, encouraging messages that may bring a smile to someone’s face (even if their face is covered by a mask!). We are all in this together and figuring out how to serve others in some small way will make everyone feel better. So, let’s make our thinking visible by wearing clothing with messages that will bring a smile, warm hearts, take people’s minds to a better place, even if just for a few minutes. My new shirts will say “Thank You Heroes!”, “Smiling Under My Mask”, “This Too Shall Pass”, and “Choosing Happiness”. What do you want yours to say? Share your thoughts with us at info@meidtees.com so we can share them with the world.

Imagine that a work colleague you’ve only seen in the hall walks up to you and asks, “If you could invite anyone in the world to dinner, who would it be?” Would you feel comfortable answering? For most people, the answer is an easy yes. The question is relatively benign, and it wouldn’t be difficult to come up with an answer, even if you had to give it a little thought first.

Now imagine that same co-worker walks up to you and invites you to go rock climbing. Assuming you’d never spoken to this person other than passing hellos, would you join the co-worker on a mountain or entrust your life to their climbing skills? Not likely.

Choosing the right team-building activity is essential for ensuring that your exercises are productive. Forcing people into uncomfortable situations because “that’s the way it’s always been done,” is more likely to result in a bigger gap in communication and camaraderie than choosing an activity that offers flexibility and encourages emotional and psychological connection. 

And those emotional and psychological connections are important. The Harvard Business Review posted the results of a two-year study that showed high performing teams all have one thing in common: a feeling of psychological safety. Members of the team were comfortable making decisions because they weren’t afraid of being ostracized or punished for making a mistake. 

According to an article in Psychology Today, two of the five fears all humans have in common include loss of autonomy (being imprisoned or controlled by circumstances) and ego-death (humiliation and shame). 

You can help reduce those fears in the workplace by building an environment where employees feel comfortable socially and psychologically. How do you build such an environment? Read on for some of our favorite effective team-building exercises:

1. Icebreaker Shirts 

Instead of dragging the teams through physical challenges, try a softer approach. Consider opening your team building event with a cocktail party or luncheon. Invite each person to wear a customized ME+iD t-shirt and challenge everyone to talk to five or more people they don’t know well. The t-shirts act as a natural icebreaker and provide a quick way for people to start a conversation. The low-pressure technique may also help some teammates find others with common interests in the group.

A quick note for those unfamiliar with ME+iD tees: ME+iD tees display a hobby or interest in large letters (bikes, horses, foodie, movies, vegan etc.) sitting over the question “What’s your thing?” The shirt invites people to strike up a conversation, pressure free. Before your event, simply invite your employees to each choose a shirt that identifies something they are passionate about. If they don’t see something they want, they can customize their own. 

2. The 36 Questions

In the study “The Experimental Generation of Interpersonal Closeness,” psychologist Arthur Aaron determined that a series of 36 questions could help foster a quicker bond (or personal intimacy), even between strangers. While this study has been used to help people identify potential romantic partners, the questions are not romantic in nature and lend themselves to a great team-building event. 

The questions start easy (such as “Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?”) and then get tougher as the group works their way through the list. The final question asks each person to share a personal problem and ask their partner for advice on how to handle it. 

The theory behind Aaron’s study is that creating an environment of mutual vulnerability can allow two people (even strangers) to build a close relationship quickly because both parties have to trust their partner, at least a little, during the exercise. 

See the appendix of the full study for the list of questions.

3. Two Truths and a Lie 

In this activity each person tells two true things about themselves and one lie. The rest of the group has to guess which statement is untrue. Challenge team members to be open with their truths and to talk about things people might not know about them. 

Creating a team environment that offers challenges—but doesn’t feel scary or threatening—helps teams work together better. Positive emotion makes it easier for people to solve problems with more open communication and ideas.

One of the biggest advantages of investing in a ME+iD hoodie is that it opens you up to conversations with anyone. Whether you want to make friends after moving to a new neighborhood or you want to stretch your current social circle, having a ready-made icebreaker is an easy way to start those first face-to-face conversations.

While we think the ME+iD hoodies and tees can be pretty powerful tools, simply ordering the hoodie or shirt isn’t going to do you a lot of good if you don’t wear it to its full potential. Maximize the power of your conversation-starting clothing using the tips below.

Strategize your outfit

If you know you’ll be going somewhere with lots of people, toss on your t-shirt or hoodie. The more people that see your custom clothing, the more chances you have to strike up a conversation with someone new. Great places to meet new people include public transportation, parks, bars, parties and sporting events.

Of course, given social distancing guidelines, your person-to-person interactions should take place from at least six feet away from your new acquaintance for now. You’ll still be able to connect with those around you, even if you don’t have as long of a conversation as you might have had otherwise.

Smile

Your ME+iD shirt can only do so much if you never look up from the ground (or your smart phone). Make sure you work on perfecting a confident smile and eye contact. Don’t be afraid to say hello or strike up a conversation yourself. Make yourself approachable by paying attention to the people around you, putting your phone away, and smiling when you make eye contact with someone.

Keep the conversation going

Once you strike up a conversation with someone, keeping that conversation going can be a bit tricky, particularly if it isn’t something that comes naturally to you. You want to ask questions so you can get to know the person better, but you don’t want to pepper them with so many questions that they feel like they’re being interrogated.

One way to focus a conversation is to think of it as a three-step process:

Step 1: Ask or Inquire. Ask a question to move the conversation forward. For example, “I love that band on your shirt. Have you ever seen them in concert?”

Step 2: Follow up: Ask a follow-up question to their answer. If they respond “Yeah, I got this at their show last week.” You could say, “Awesome. How was the show?”

Step 3: Relate. This step is probably the most important. Instead of asking another question, relate it to you. So, you could respond, “I’ve been trying to get tickets to their show for ages,” or “I’ve seen them a few times. They really are great.”

You can continue the cycle from there if you want to keep chatting.

Don’t give up!

Don’t get discouraged if no one comments on your hoodie or shirt. It’s a numbers game. The more you wear your shirt, the more you increase your chances of engaging with new people.

Challenge yourself to try sitting through one or two commutes per week without your headphones on, making eye contact with 10 people a day or making brief conversation with your server the next time you pick up takeout. (Once dining in is back in full swing, you can get even more practice with servers at sit-down restaurants.) As you get more comfortable chatting with people, you’ll naturally appear more approachable, which in turn will help people feel more comfortable chatting with you about your ME+iD hoodie.

When most of us think about job hunting, our brains go straight to the obvious: resumes, interviews, cover letters.

We tend to skip over a key ingredient of job searching success: social skills. Specifically, practiced social interaction with people in real life. It’s important to remember that recruiters and hiring managers aren’t hiring a piece of paper (no matter how pretty your resume may be); they’re hiring a person, someone they believe will positively impact the workplace environment and build up others.

That’s where ME+iD apparel comes into play.

Our tees and sweatshirts are meant to facilitate communication in the offline world, to provide opportunities for complete strangers to make connections, both big and small. This means there are two ways ME+iD apparel inherently lends itself to helping you become a much hotter item on the job market.

1. Advertise your area of expertise in an open, friendly way.

The first way ME+iD apparel can help you get a job is rather obvious, but worth mentioning just the same. By wearing your skillset or career choice on your tee, you automatically become a walking, talking advertisement for yourself.

The best part? You’re opening the door for conversation about your career path in the least pushy way possible, and you’re opening that door to every single person who catches sight of your shirt.

2. Increase your SEL skills.

The second way ME+iD apparel can help you land that dream job is less obvious, but no less important: Wearing ME+iD apparel can help you increase your SEL skills.

SEL (social and emotional learning) is a process through which we make responsible decisions, manage emotions, achieve goals, and establish and maintain relationships. SEL skills include communication, collaboration and problem solving—skills that are expected to become more and more important as our workforce relies heavily on technology.

ME+iD tees naturally give the wearer opportunities to practice speaking with others and to build face-to-face relationships, whether those relationships last a lifetime or the length of the store check-out line.

Remember, while ME+iD tees can open the door for you, they can’t carry the rest of the conversation for you. If you struggle with interpersonal interactions, we recommend taking a few pages (or a lot of pages) out of Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People.”

Carnegie devotes quite a bit of time on the art of making people like you, explaining you should do everything from actively listening to smiling. Our favorite tip, however, is one that connects directly to the “What’s your thing?” on the bottom of every ME+iD tee: Be genuinely interested in other people. Care. They’ll know it, and they’ll like you for it.

Ready to share your passion with those around you? Customize a ME+iD tee to show off your talents and/or career path to start connecting your way to your dream job. 

The way we dress says a lot about us. It’s one of the clearest nonverbal ways we have of communicating our personalities and lifestyles.

Your oversized tee paired with bright pink hair and lime green leggings might scream “wild and crazy” or your neatly pressed blouse and dark skinny jeans might say “classy and tame.”

That lab coat or work badge or messenger bag might showcase your line of work, while your team jersey or your martial arts gi hints at your hobbies.

Every day, every outfit, you are sending a message (either loudly or subtly) from you to the world: “This is who I am.”

The choices we make when it comes to wardrobe and presentation are almost always centered around how we perceive ourselves. Of course, that then influences how others perceive us.

Even with all of these messages we’re sending with our wardrobe choices, there’s still some guesswork involved with most articles of clothing. You might see someone wearing your favorite athletic shoes and find yourself wondering if it’s a style choice, or perhaps they’re really into basketball like you are. Are those yoga pants about comfort, or does that lady over there love a good Surya Namaskara as much as you do?

The way we dress offers clues about us, but there is also a certain ambiguity. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course, but sometimes you actually want to say what you really mean instead of just hinting at it with your wardrobe choices.

ME+iD apparel gives you the option to tell the world in no uncertain terms, “Hey, this is my thing.”

Graphic design, pickleball, yoga, fishing, entrepreneurship—it doesn’t matter what your thing is, as long as it represents YOU and the brand you want to create for yourself to share with the world.

In Forbes’ 10 Golden Rules of Personal Branding, they quote Tim Salau, a community builder and the founder of Mentors & Mentees: “Your personal brand should follow you everywhere you go. It needs to be an authentic manifestation of who you are and amplify what you believe.”

What do you believe? What message are you trying to share with the world? What’s your thing?

By sharing your answers on a ME+iD tee, you’re broadcasting your personal brand while inviting others to talk to you about it and to share their beliefs and interests right back to you. Your clothing choices give you the opportunity to start IRL conversations based on a mutual interest and clear willingness on your part to be approached.

Since we at ME+iD fully recognize that it’s not just about what you say but how you say it that counts in building your brand, each ME+iD tee design is eye-catching and tasteful, not to mention fun and engaging.

Want to build your brand? Customize your own stylish tee and start sharing your message today.

Lots of things are missing from our lives during the COVID-19 crisis: hair stylists, schools, babysitters, sanity, toilet paper… The list could go on. But one of the things people seem to be missing the most is regular social interaction.

Why is that? Are humans really hardwired to be social?

According to Dr. Matthew Lieberman, a UCLA neuroscientist, the answer is yes, we are. In his book “Social: Why Our Brains are Wired to Connect,” Dr. Lieberman explains why social connection is as important as food and shelter.

“Mammals are more socially connected than reptiles, primates more than other mammals, and humans more than other primates,” he said. “What this suggests is that becoming more socially connected is essential to our survival. In a sense, evolution has made bets at each step that the best way to make us more successful is to make us more social.”

Even the introverts among us have to admit that the social distancing and quarantining are getting old, fast. We crave interaction (even if only on a small scale, for some of us) because that’s how we’re built.

ME+iD was founded on the idea of connecting people face to face, facilitating easy conversations with those around them through a simple, stylish means. While starting a conversation with the person standing six feet away from you at the grocery store might not be all that advisable at the moment, it doesn’t mean you’ve lost all chance of connection with those around you.

In fact, small, simple connections might just be more important than ever since they can help you fill that social-sized hole in your heart. Wondering how to facilitate those small, simple connections without breaking social distancing? We’ve got a few ideas just for you:

• Smile at those around you. (Wearing a mask? No worries. It’s usually pretty easy to tell when someone gives a genuine smile even if you can’t see their mouth thanks to other facial cues like sparkling eyes, raised cheeks and wrinkles at the corners of the eyes.)
• Wave at your neighbors. It’s an easy way to show you care—without getting too close, of course.
• Video chat regularly with family members and friends. Text messages are fine and phone calls are nice, but there’s just something about seeing those nonverbal cues during conversation that really takes it to the next level. (Plus, grandkids can be seriously funny to watch.)
• Watch Netflix with family members simultaneously. Thanks to Netflix Party, you can have an easy virtual movie night with your loved ones.
• Wear a ME+iD tee. While you aren’t trying to invite up-close and personal conversation at the moment, you can still use a ME+iD tee to share a little piece of yourself (or an uplifting message of your choice) with those around you, letting them know you care while sending a silent, simple message: We will all get through this together.

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