15 Style Mistakes You Can Fix Now

Remember, it's not about being trendy, it's about looking good.

Let's face it, we all need help sometimes. And like it or not, we're judged by how we look and how we handle ourselves in social and professional settings.

The 15 style tips below aren't meant to turn you into a metrosexual—none, for instance, will instruct you to blow $600 on a pair of shoes. These tips are for the everyday guy. They're meant to help you gain confidence when you walk into a meeting or the next cocktail party, and they'll help make your wife or girlfriend feel proud to stand next to you. You're a grown man—it's time your wardrobe grew up too.

But, remember, it's not about being trendy, it's about looking good. Just follow these tips to looking better.

1. Match your belt and shoes. If you're wearing black shoes, put on a black belt. And brown shoes demand a brown belt. A good, general rule is to never mix the color of your leathers.

2. For crying out loud, pull your pants down. You may be pushing 40, but you don't need to hike up your pants like you're ready to start walking the mall. And it's even worse if you tuck in your shirt like Napoleon Dynamite.

3. On the flip side, pull up your pants. Seeing some 19-year-old's boxer shorts is bad enough; we don't need to see your tighty whities. You should have stopped buying "baggy cut" jeans years ago.

4. Pay attention to your shoes. You could be wearing $100 jeans with a sharp-looking shirt, but you'll still embarrass your wife or girlfriend with those old loafers that should have been pitched in the 1990s. Buy quality shoes that look smart and stylish. Remember, people check out shoes. Potential employers often will look at them to judge a candidate's attention to detail. Good rule of thumb: Spend your money on shoes, not shirts and pants. Also, make sure your socks are a nice "bridge" from the shoes to the pants. If you're dressing up, match the pants. If you're wearing nicer shoes with jeans -- match the shoes. And save the tube socks for the gym and lounging on weekends.

5. Wear clothes that fit properly. At this age, trying to look trendy is a cry for help. And just because that fitted (another term for "your nipples are showing") medium T-shirt looks good on Jake Gyllenhaal, that doesn't mean it looks good on you.

6. A side note to No. 5; if you're short and stocky, don't wear horizontal stripes—you'll look 3 feet tall. (My wife has to remind me of this once a year).

7. Don't worry if you're a little chunky; just wear what looks good on a guy with a little heft. You can't go wrong with black. It's slimming, classy and makes you reek of confidence.

8. Put away the tank top—even at the gym. You're not 12 years old anymore, and no one wants to smell your pits.

9. If your woman's not happy, you're not happy. After getting ready to go out, if you see concern on her face when she looks you over, change your clothes. There's a 98.9 percent chance she's right.

10. Man boobs are our kryptonite, and we have to fight back. They're an immediate turnoff to women, even though most don't mind a plump guy. Attack the problem head-on: Go to the gym, and wear clothes that don't cling to your body. We have Phil Mickelson to thank for officially raising this to a national emergency. We're at Defcon 1.

11. If you wear glasses, remember they're a window into who you are. Update them at least every other year and consider style when choosing them. And don't skimp. Expensive glasses are infinitely better than those $50 specs on special at the local mall.

12. Drop the baseball hat. Yes, it was standard issue in college, but those days are gone. The only exceptions to this rule: Working in the yard, casually hanging out, or playing drums for the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

13. If you have to wear cologne, tone it down. You get points for wanting to smell good, but those points are immediately taken away when your co-workers can smell you in the break room—10 minutes after you left. Just spray a small amount into the air and walk through it. Less is more.

14. If you have a hairy chest, you cannot wear a V-neck without an undershirt. This is not 1977 and your name isn't Smokey. Or Simon Cowell, for that matter.

15. No socks with sandals. And if you do wear open-toed sandals, keep your feet groomed. Have you even looked down there since last summer? Trust us on this one.

18 Things A Grown Man Should Never Have

1. A black eye. Unless the rim hits your face mid-dunk, your peepers should remain unblemished. You're smart enough to talk your way out of any fight you're going to lose.

2. A witty e-mail signature. Quotes and song lyrics should be heard during toasts and karaoke performances, respectively. Don't let your electronic correspondence become the digital version of a motivational poster.

3. An empty refrigerator. Your larder should be amply stocked, your pantry provisioned. Always aim to be ready to create an on-the-fly, three-course dinner for her...along with breakfast in bed.

4. PlayStation thumb. When they're relaxing, grown men can behave like children. But if you devolve long enough to cause calluses or button-shaped bruises, you're assuredly missing out on life.

5. A key chain with a bottle opener. This bauble is both a gauche reminder of your college days and proof that you don't know how to apply leverage using available, impromptu bottle openers: a lighter, the back end of a fork.

6. A lucky shirt. Every shirt is lucky when worn by a man who knows that the harder he works the luckier he'll be.

7. An unstamped passport.

8. Olympic dreams. Exceptions: curling and archery.

9. Less than $20 in his wallet. Fiduciary nudity is negligence. A real man should always carry a business card and enough dough to pick up coffee, bagels, and the Sunday paper without whipping out the plastic.

10. A name for his penis. Even if it's a really clever name.

11. Any beer that costs less than $20 a case. And no exception for the grand-slam 30-pack that crosses that price threshold.

12. The need to quote The Big Lebowski/ Caddyshack/Superbad. Reciting someone else's lines reminds people that you haven't the wit to write your own.

13. A futon. Sure, beds are for sleeping. But such a meager, slouchy spread has never, in the history of sex, inspired a woman to say, "Take me on your futon."

14. Code words for ugly women. Actually, code words for anything.

15. A Nerf hoop in his living room. Keep the adolescent accoutrements where they belong: in the rec room or above the wastebasket in someone else's office.

16. A secret handshake.

17. Drinking glasses with logos. Especially those kitschy McDonald's Hamburglar ones.

18. A recent story with the phrase "So I said to the cop…" ;-)

How to Be an Optimist ?

Why optimism is a way to get happier, healthier and even catnippier to the opposite sex.

Lise Funderburg argues that optimism isn't the refuge of bubbleheads; it's a scientifically proven way to get happier, healthier and even catnippier to the opposite sex.

Recent research suggests an optimistic state comes from a series of active inner processes, psychological somersaults. That's good news because it means that optimism—like other skills such as putting on eyeliner or hitting a tennis ball—is something we can improve with practice.

Here are five exercises rooted in scientific studies to help train your brain for optimism.

Play Interpersonal Ping-Pong.
If you serve up a smile to people, they usually bounce it back. Hit them with a snarl, and watch them scowl instead.
• Research shows that facial expressions and the moods that accompany them are contagious, probably because they evolved as a means of nonverbal communication between people.
• You can use the infectious effects of a grin to jump-start an optimistic outlook in yourself by sending others what you want them to lob back at you. A kind word to the man behind the deli counter can get your day bouncing in the right direction.

Short-circuit pessimism.
There's another reason for putting on a happy face: It influences your brain in a positive way.
• In one study, subjects who were asked to hold a pen in their mouths (causing them to inadvertently make the facial muscle movements characteristic of a smile) rated cartoons to be funnier than did other subjects, even though they were unaware that it was the smile that was boosting their reaction.
• There's an interesting biological reason for this effect: When you feel down, your brain tells your face you're sad, and your facial muscles respond by putting on a depressed expression—and convey back to the brain that, yes, you're feeling blue. Consciously changing the facial muscles so they don't correspond to what you're feeling is a way of sending a different message: "Hey, it's not so bad down here after all." The brain will respond by beginning to change your mood accordingly.

Explain success and failure like an optimist.
Research shows that it's not what happens that determines your mood but how you explain what happens that counts.
• If an optimist encounters a computer program she can't figure out, she's likely to say, "Either the manual is unclear, or this program is hard, or maybe I'm having an off day." The optimist keeps the failure outside herself ("the manual"), specific ("this program") and temporary ("an off day"), while the pessimist would make it internal, global and permanent.
• When success occurs, optimists say, "Of course dinner turned out; I'm a good cook," while pessimists say, "Boy, was I lucky today," literally snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. If you start to speak to yourself in a more positive way when you succeed and fail, you'll gradually become more optimistic.

Stack the deck in your favor.
It's easy to be envious: Compare yourself to those with thinner thighs and fatter bank accounts and you'll always come up wanting—and pessimistic. But the corollary is also true: No matter how bad things get, there's always someone who's worse off.
• In one simple study, subjects were randomly divided into two subgroups. One group was to finish the sentence "I wish I were a ___." The other was asked to complete the sentence "I'm glad I'm not a ___." When individuals rated their sense of satisfaction with their lives before and after this task, those who completed the "I'm glad I'm not a ___" sentence were significantly more satisfied than before.

Learn to shift your focus.
Pessimists can't stop depressing facts or negative thoughts from poking into their consciousness, but they can choose not to dwell on them.
• If you look through a camera lens, you'll find that when one part of the picture is in focus, the other areas blur a bit. (This is a distortion, sure, but sometimes we need to sustain the idea of being in a protective bubble to feel optimistic.) This active self-direction of your own moment-to-moment perspective allows you to create a new life story, one in which you take charge of your emotions and actions.
• Since research shows that those who feel they have a better sense of control tend to be the most optimistic, why not take charge of where your psychological lens is focused?