To being the best man you can be

Men, yes you manly men out there - I think we all need to pay a little more attention to dress, style and grooming for success both socially and in business. Here are some tips for the fellas which your mama may not have told you and for the women with jamaa's who may need some prompting courtesy of Primer Magazine with one or two life lessons thrown in for good measure.

1. You know that feeling you get when you’ve finished dressing and you know you look good? You should strive for that feeling every time you dress. Those times where you look at yourself in the mirror and you’re not sure something matches correctly? Trust yourself, it probably doesn’t.

2. Want to start dressing better? When you don’t know what to wear in the morning the default should be a button up shirt. And polo shirts and t-shirts are not the uniform for weekends either.

3. A guy should always have a blazer he can wear with jeans. Most times a suit jacket won’t work, you need something shorter.

4. You’ve bought that nice new suit great – now do everyone a favour and please REMOVE the tag on the sleeve

5. Different scents for different events. Consider having a fresh, light cologne for the daytime and work hours, and a more full-bodied scent for evenings and going out.

6. The proper way to put on cologne: Hold your arm straight out and spray towards your chest. You only need one, two tops. Don’t spray it into the air and walk into it; that smelly water is expensive and this method wastes most of it. If you’ve got a bottle with no spray, apply small dabs under your ears and to your wrists.

7. Keep those nails cut. Next time you’re on the toilet for 5-10 minutes, put down the newspaper and use the time for grooming your finger and toe nails (yes those trotters of yours should not be shredding bedsheets) The goal is to maintain a thin white line at all times.

8. Here’s a priceless tip - dark or patterned underwear will mask ahem...“normal wear and tear.”

9. Tt only costs about Ksh3000 to replace your entire underwear collection. Why are you forcing yourself to wear ratty undies from god knows how long ago? For the cost of a medium priced bottle of whiskey, everyday can be nice underwear day.

10. White athletic socks should only be worn with athletic shoes.

11. Rejection is just an emotion. Learn to not take it personally or you’ll never be as successful as you want to be.

12. Skip the formalities of talking to a stranger and trick yourself into being more friendly by pretending that you know the person. Think about those greetings you give and the faces you make when you’re happy to see someone you know. Do that, but with a stranger.

13. You have to stop worrying you’re going to offend someone and really go for it. The worst case is you lose something you never really had, the best case is you get what you want.

14. Always have one spare birthday card and one spare multi-purpose card for emergencies.

Full list