Clutter-Free Shopping
Shopping is what makes the world go round, sparks simple happiness and fills the many voids in our lives.
Fashion has transformed over the past 25 years going from two and four seasons to 52 seasons. Yes, you read that correctly fashion companies are putting new items out every week to aid our toxic habits. Fashion is no longer something you use for life, it’s something that if it’s lucky gets used once. Our world is made up of excess and disposable products. If it’s cheap we wear it once and forget about it. If it’s too expensive we hoard it and never let it see the light of day.
I discuss many ways to adjust your habits to reduce the amount of consumerism waste while increasing your bank accounts. These small changes create space and funds for real life experiences. As we shop we are looking for that high; the power to say “Yes, I’ve earned this” or “Yes, this is the key to making me happy.” I find when the package arrives the joy is lost, and the items pile up with all the other “power purchases”, so in the end what’s the purpose? We are on a hamster wheel going nowhere, adding zero value to our days.
I encourage you to take a look at the items you purchased in the last week, month or year and ask.
“Would I buy this again?”
And continue with “what was I avoiding when I purchased this?” When we take a moment to dig a bit deeper, we get to know ourselves and better understand our habits. It’s an eye opening experience and will cultivate the clutter-free lifestyle that you so desire.
Clutter-free is a lifestyle not a crash diet, each day we have the opportunity to choose what’s best and what is worthy of our time and energy.
Quick Tips:
1. Recognize when you are emotional shopping. Take a breath and discuss how this piece will add value to your life before heading to the cashier.
2. Shop with a plan, understand what you have and only buy items that add to your wardrobe.
3. Challenge yourself to a 30 days retail detox, get to know your habits around shopping and find ways to make adjustments to better serve you.
[Photo via bagstowear.co.uk]