Buy Less and Live a More Sustainable Lifestyle

There is nothing wrong with shopping, it can be a fun way to spend some time and make yourself feel better.

However, these days, what with online shopping and t likes, it has bever been more convenient to shop until you drop, and if you are constantly buying things that you don’t really need out of boredom, or maybe to fill some kind of void in your life, then it may not be the healthiest habit to have.

Not only that but buying lots of things you don’t really need is not great for the environment either.

Luckily, it is possible to live a really happy and sustainable lifestyle by buying less, even if you are a shopaholic.

Sound good?

Here are some simple tips to help you buy less and live a more sustainable lifestyle that you will truly love:

Start by decluttering

If you have been a shopaholic in the past, chances are your home is filled with clothes, books, knick-knacks, and all manner of weird and wonderful things that you never really use and which add nothing to your life.

The first step to living a more suitable lifestyle is to go through these things and work out which you would like to keep and which you would like to sell, or even better, donate. 

Why do this?

Not only will it clear space in your home, but it will show you just how much time and money you waste on buying things you don’t really want or need, which should spur you on to rein things in a little in the future.

Become a curator

Once you’ve had a clear-out, it’s a really good idea to start thinking of yourself as more of a curator.

This, in effect, means buying things more mindfully. Whenever you’re shopping, think about whether you really need a piece, whether it will add something important to your life or not. If you don’t really need something or truly find it beautiful, then chances are you don’t need it.

Be like a gallery curator; look for only the best pieces that enhance your existing, and leave the rest.

You will find that not only do you buy less, but you are much happier overall with the pieces you do buy.

Learn how to make do and mend

Something that can really help you to live a more sustainable lifestyle is learning how to make do and mend.

After all,  if you can fix what is broken or modify items you already own so that they are more suitable for you now, then you will not need to purchase nearly as much new stuff.

Making do and mend traditionally only applied to learning how to sew and fix clothing, but these days you can apply it to everything from home DIY jobs to basic tech fixes like learning how to unpartition a hard drive.

Basically, the more skills you can learn to help you keep using the stuff you have for longer, the more money you can have, and the more sustainable your lifestyle will be.

Work out what your true taste is

When you’re a shopaholic, it can be tempting to buy all kinds of everything because everything catches your eye, and you get a real buzz from buying.

This often leads to you buying a lot of stuff that you will never ever use.

Something that can help you break this vicious cycle is to work out your true taste.

This means working out which styles, colors, textures, and applications are really attractive, flattering, and useful to you.

Once you have this information, you will almost naturally disregard anything that doesn’t fit and naturally only buy the things that really work for you and which you will truly love.

Spend more money on experiences

If you can’t get over the impulse to spend when you are feeling down, or you feel like you need a treat, for example, try to buy experiences instead of stuff.

Not only experience, whether they be a great gig or an art class, more fulfilling, which means you won’t need to keep buying more to fill the void, but they typically use up fewer resources on your part, which means you can live a bit more sustainably as a result.

Of course, some experiences, like traveling the globe, will take up a lot of resources, so you may need to look into offsetting them if you want to maintain a sustainable lifestyle, so just be aware!

Delayed gratification

If you are finding it really hard not to impulse buy that pair of gold heels that really won’t match with anything else or you can’t resist upgrading your phone even though the one you have actually works perfectly well, something that may help you to break the habit is the practice of delayed gratification.

Basically, every time you see something and have the urge to buy it, Wait, write down the details on a list and review it in 28 days.

If you still really want it after 28 days, then go ahead and buy it, but more often than you might think, the initial excitement will have died down, and you will no longer be interested in acquiring it.

Buy used

If the urge to buy hits and nothing is going to scratch the itch other than buying something, then if you are serious about being more sustainable, hit the local thrift stores and vintage shops or even garage sale and pick up a bargain or two that has already been loved by someone else, an which can be loved by you until it reaches the end of its natural life. 

‍Buying used is great for the environment, and it will save you a lot of money too - what’s not to love?

Buying less and loving a more sustainable lifestyle is imminently achievable, and it is something we should all be looking to do more of as the climate crisis becomes more pressing.