A recent conversation with my sisters unveiled a shared source of stress this month: consumerism. One sister has a teenage daughter who has recently discovered the allure of shopping. My youngest sister, with a new house, finds herself scrolling through social media, feeling pressured to fill every corner with purchases. Meanwhile, I’ve been inundated with vendors pushing travel products and urging me to “sell sell sell!”
Add in the Black Friday deals enticing us to spend more time on our phones, coupled with endless images of women with seemingly perfect bodies adorned in the latest fashion and makeup – and the recipe for dissatisfaction becomes clear.
People are drowning in things. They don’t even know what they want them for. – James Baldwin
Consumerism: An Addiction of Modern Life
Bear with me a moment as I get through the definitions.
Consumerism is the act of buying and consuming goods, driven by societal pressures and marketing, while materialism represents the mindset that places excessive value on material possessions and defines one’s worth through ownership. Essentially, consumerism is the behavior, and materialism is the belief system that fuels it.
If we view consumerism as an addiction – similar to drugs or alcohol – we can better protect ourselves from being consumed by it. We understand that a glass of wine is fine, and perhaps a little marijuana is acceptable. But abusing these substances leads to an unhappy life. It’s all about balance.
Wisdom of Needs vs Wants
My parents understood the dangers of materialism and worked to impart this wisdom to their children. Every purchase was prefaced with my mom’s pivotal question:
Do you need this or do you want it?
Once I began earning my own money, that wisdom momentarily slipped away. Having been raised with few material possessions, I felt a compelling urge to fill my life with all the things I’d missed in my childhood.
Yet, my mom’s question never truly left me. I unconsciously pondered “needs vs wants” during every shopping trip, often resulting in guilt over spending money on unnecessary items. Eric had to teach me how to enjoy spending money, and I didn’t find a good balance until my 40s.
Shopping Differently: A Conscious Approach
We must stop shopping, and yet we can’t stop shopping. – J.B. MacKinnon
Feeling the dissonance building inside me this month, I turned to bibliotherapy and began reading J.B. MacKinnon’s The Day the World Stops Shopping. The book provided immediate perspective.
What Happens when we Stop Shopping?
This is the question MacKinnon poses throughout the book, and I can say for certain what happens from my perspective. Two years ago, I stopped shopping – or rather, dramatically reimagined my approach to purchasing. I still buy things I need, but my definition of “need” has significantly narrowed. When I shop, whether online or in-person, I go armed with a specific list and commit to purchasing only those items.
I make myself rich by making my wants few. – Henry David Thoreau
The result? I’m happier with my body, more content with my life, and I find myself with more time and money to invest in truly fulfilling experiences. I worry less about potential financial disasters and find joy in passing along items I no longer need to those who could use them.
Was it Easy to Stop Shopping?
No, in fact it was much harder than I thought it would be. I never realized how much shopping becomes a habit. When you suddenly quit, there’s a void of time and mental energy that needs to be filled. I still struggle sometimes with how to best fill that void. And just like any addiction, I find myself getting sucked back into the consumerist fray every November when the holiday deals start rolling in.
One of the reasons Eric and I travel so often is to escape the typical American lifestyle. As a traveler, we become minimalists when fitting everything into a suitcase. We think carefully about need vs want. With the type of travel we seek, we are often surrounded by others who value experiences over possessions, abundance over affluence. Do this long enough, and old habits begin to break. We realize how little we need to be happy.
Beyond Affluence: Redefining Abundance
MacKinnon explores how affluent countries reach a point where increased wealth doesn’t equate to greater abundance. Once our basic needs are met – shelter, food, health, companionship – everything beyond becomes excess. We acknowledge this truth every time we say “money can’t buy happiness,” yet our world constantly bombards us with messages telling us otherwise. And if we surround ourselves with people who have more than us, the temptation becomes even harder to resist.
We are persuaded to spend money we don’t have on things we don’t need to create impressions that won’t last on people we don’t care about. – British economist Tim Jackson
Re-committing to the Mission
After two years of not shopping, I’ve mastered the art of letting go when it comes to clothes, home decor, cosmetics and skincare – the things I spent so much money on in years past. What I didn’t realize is that I’d unintentionally replaced that addiction with another — travel.
Travel has become my consumerism drug of choice, and I don’t just mean the act of traveling. I also refer to the time and mental energy spent researching and thinking about it. At first, I justified the obsession by saying “it’s my job now,” but no job should become an obsession. My tipping point was this month when I found myself promoting Black Friday travel deals. It felt wrong every time I posted a marketing deal, like dark forces were oozing into me, promising “if you sell this tour you can afford that expedition cruise you’ve been dreaming about!”
When I founded Trips to Walkabout, I began with a mission statement to help people travel in a more fulfilling way. I never wanted to “sell travel” and yet within a few months of becoming a travel agent I found myself being lulled by the Pied Piper of the Travel Industry. I could feel the pressure to increase profits, to focus on promoting big tour companies rather than sticking to my mission of connecting local tour operators with clients.
It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor. – Seneca
Even as I write this, my phone is lighting up with email notifications telling me how to sell travel and how to maximize profits. I know this is helpful to those who really need to earn their living as a travel agent, but it just fills me with disgust.
So I’ve returned to my original intent – helping people travel in the best way possible. Saying no to work that doesn’t meet my mission or values. Measuring success by joy and fulfillment, rather than profit and loss. I worked hard so I could be in this position and I’m not going to squander this privilege by letting consumerism take back control.
Navigating the Holiday Season Mindfully
This holiday season, don’t get sucked into the Black Friday madness. No need to hide in your house like a hermit or lock your phone in a box so you’re not tempted to shop. Instead, shop with intention.
- Prepare a balanced list of genuine needs and wants.
- Set a spending limit and feel no guilt, knowing you’ve purposefully allocated those funds.
- Shop local and choose local tour operators for travel
- Spend more time cultivating the pure joy you experienced as a child, before cash and credit cards became part of your vocabulary.
Embrace abundance through mindfulness, not material accumulation.
Wishing you a joyous holiday season!
Clare and Eric
