What if the courage to stop matters more than the determination to continue?
We tend to admire people who finish what they start.
Persistence is a virtue. Consistency signals character. Giving up is often interpreted as weakness.
But what if our attachment to finishing things sometimes prevents us from becoming who we are?
This is the question that emerged from my conversation with Niccolò Pasqualetti, the Italian fashion designer who founded his eponymous brand in 2021. https://niccolopasqualetti.com/
And it begins with a decision that might appear relatively insignificant.
The courage to leave something unfinished
Growing up in rural Tuscany, far from the creative industries, Niccolò knew he was drawn to art and self-expression. What he didn't know was how to turn that inclination into a profession.
So he enrolled in economics and management.
A sensible choice. A structured path. A recognizable future.
One year later, he decided to leave.
What made that decision difficult was not simply the uncertainty of entering an unfamiliar world. It was the feeling of abandoning something he had started.
Niccolò describes himself as someone who likes to move quickly, finish things and maintain control.
Leaving university meant going against that instinct.
And here lies the first paradox.
Sometimes the most coherent decision we can make is to stop being consistent with our previous decisions.
Continuing would have preserved the appearance of discipline. Leaving allowed him to discover a direction that was more genuinely his own.
The perfection paradox
Years later, the same tension remains.
As both creative director and entrepreneur, Niccolò constantly negotiates between imagination and commercial reality.
But what struck me was his reflection on perfection.
He spoke about the pressure to complete everything, to control the outcome, to bring every project to one hundred percent.
And about learning that sometimes it is better to leave something unfinished.
This is a surprisingly radical idea in a culture obsessed with optimization and performance.
We tend to assume that control improves the quality of our decisions.
Yet in creative work, excessive control can become an obstacle to discovery.
The paradox is that the more we try to control what we create, the less room we may leave for something genuinely new to emerge.
Letting go is not necessarily a failure of discipline. It may be a different, more demanding form of judgment: knowing when persistence has stopped serving its purpose.
The paradox of self-expression
There is something else fascinating about Niccolò.
He describes himself as a rather private person, not naturally inclined to expose himself publicly.
Yet he has chosen a profession in which his work is constantly presented, interpreted and judged.
His collections are deeply personal. He tries on the garments himself, lives with them, follows his instincts.
Fashion becomes a language through which he can express something he might not otherwise communicate.
Perhaps this is the most revealing paradox of all.
Sometimes we create not because we are comfortable being seen, but because creation allows us to express what we cannot easily reveal.
His work is not simply a demonstration of creative confidence. It is also a way of negotiating the vulnerability that comes with self-expression.
The decision behind the decision
Towards the end of our conversation, Niccolò described his most important decision in three words:
To let go.
Not just of economics. Not just of a particular career path.
But of the need to control everything, to finish everything, to conform to what others expect.
He was careful to say that this is something he is still learning.
And perhaps that is precisely what makes his answer interesting.
Letting go is not a single act of courage. It is a recurring decision to tolerate uncertainty without immediately trying to eliminate it.
I was left with a thought.
Perhaps the opposite of control is not chaos. It is the capacity to trust ourselves without knowing exactly where we are going.
Niccolò thought he was choosing a creative career.
Perhaps the deeper decision was to allow himself to become someone he could not yet imagine.
The Decision Behind the Decision — Conversations with Decision-Makers
Rosa Bellei in conversation with Niccolò Pasqualetti, fashion designer and founder of his eponymous label.
https://niccolopasqualetti.com/
