Break Your Shopping Habit

I’ve been down on shopping for a while now.  You can see my disillusionment in my post from six months ago, The Burden of Ownership.  I guess that’s what attracted me to the book “No New Things” by Ashlee Piper.  The subtitle of the book is “A Radically Simple 30-Day Guide to Saving Money, the Planet, and Your Sanity”.

Piper’s method is chock full of sensible suggestions. Her “no new things” challenge asks you to commit to only 30 days in which you buy only what is absolutely necessary.  Each week has a theme and a series of actions that increase your awareness of the effect your shopping habits are having on you, your space, and the planet.  She also includes some fascinating history on the evolution of shopping and how we arrived at this level of over-consumption.

Part of what makes shopping so compelling these days is that it is so easy.  Because you can store your credit card information on shopping websites, the act of shopping becomes what she calls “frictionless”.  One way to ensure that you purchase more mindfully is to delete that information from the sites, requiring you to get up out of your chair and take the card out of your wallet in order to buy something.  Slowing the process down just a little will give you time to think, “Do I really want to buy that?”  Another way is to put something in your cart but not buy it right away.  If you still want it 24 hours later, go back and buy it.

I loved this quote, as it dovetails nicely with my thoughts about the burden of ownership: “For every item we bring into our lives, we become its inventory manager.  That’s right: from the moment of purchase, you are responsible for the upkeep, repair, and end life of your things—and that, my friend, is more of a full-time job than we often realize.”

Even before reading this book, I had started canceling the few mail order catalogs that I was still getting.  I found that browsing a catalog often led me to visit the site and buy something, even if I wasn’t in the market for anything.  By eliminating the temptation of the catalog, I plan to go to those sites only when I am truly in need of something.  So often, we go to shopping sites out of boredom.

If you feel that you have gotten into a shopping habit — either on-line or in person — give Piper’s “No New Things” method a try.  It’s laid out clearly and only requires a 30-day commitment.  I’ll close with another quote from the book that is one of my favorites, for obvious reasons:

“Science supports that organizing our spaces boasts unexpected benefits like healthier bodies, better sleep, enhanced cognitive function, and even fewer accidents.”