While I'm not anti-consumerism per se, I can definitely understand some of the arguments made against consumerism based on my own frustrating experiences over the years.
It all started way back when I was in my early to mid-20s, as I was putting myself through college and working at a mall. Because I was young and lived at home with mom and dad, and only had three bills to pay (car payment and car insurance payment, as well as community college tuition), it was fairly easy for me to get a credit card, or two, or three.
Because I was young and naive, my thought process was that I'd keep the balances low even as I shopped the women's clothing stores and Bath and Body Works with wild abandon, while dining out here and there with friends and co-workers, and sometimes picking up the tab using one of the credit cards. There were also the concert tickets, the periodic use of the card to fill up my car with gas, etc.
By the time all was said and done and two of the three cards were close to being maxed out, I literally had nothing to show for all the plastic money I had spent outside of clothes, a high interest rate and balance due, and a minimum payment in the triple digits.
Though there were occasional lapses over the next ten years or so, I smartened up when it came to credit cards, especially when I bought my first home and couldn't afford a large credit card debt.
SEE ALSO: Decluttering Expert Marie Kondo Makes Candid Admission About 'Tidying Up'
Five years after I bought my home, I was officially debt-free, outside of my mortgage payments, keeping one high-limit credit card in reserve for emergencies like a major car repair and things of that sort. But I still liked to shop for clothes and things like home decor, furnishings, etc, as a form of "retail therapy," which I engaged in fairly often (without charging it).
Though I wasn't great at it, at least once a year or so I would declutter my house, vowing to turn over a new leaf on the shopping because what ended up happening was that I would buy certain things with the intentions of using them, but about half the time (or more) they would end up collecting dust in my home office or spare bedroom closet, waiting for me to "make the time" for them that I rarely ever did.
But my shopping pace remained faster and more persistent than my decluttering pace, and though I got rid of a lot of stuff before I moved back in with mom to become her full-time caregiver three years ago, I still had enough that required me to have to rent a storage unit to hold the extra stuff, a unit I have to this day and which mostly still has the same things that I put in it when I moved back home.
We aren't hoarders by far, but after finally getting the Christmas decorations placed around the house and getting the tree decorated a few days ago - which meant I could finally put away the five or so Christmas bins that had been staring me in the face in the living room, I looked around and thought to myself "we just have so much stuff!"
Stuff that we rarely, if ever, use. Stuff that collects dust, stuff that makes it harder to keep a tidy home. Stuff that I (again) bought for purposes of using around the house, but which has collected more dust as it has sat there unopened for months and months (and in some cases longer than that, to my shame).
Not that I wasn't aware of this already, but I had a clarity-of-mind moment during that particular visual inspection: all the visual clutter was bad for my productivity. It's visually overwhelming, thinking about all of the things you, ideally, need to do in each room to get and then (hopefully) keep things manageable, and visually appealing and stimulating.
I thought back to something Mom taught my sisters and me many years ago about making up the bed in the morning and putting away any clothes you may need to: it was two simple things, but taking the few minutes it took to do them made a big impact on how the rest of your room looked, even if it didn't make the room look "perfect."
The same thing can be done with clutter, once you define what the clutter in your house actually is, and it all starts with one room, or one space within a room. Find items you can either donate, sell, give away to a friend or family member, or throw away, some of which may involve a little "tough love" with yourself and your belongings. Set your timer for five minutes a day (read more on that clever productivity trick here) and put a couple of bins or boxes next to you, along with a trash bag, and spend that time getting your house back in order bit by bit.
This is something I plan to do in the new year, not just with the house but also with that storage unit I'm paying too much money for. I think I can do it, but the tricky part is going to be making sure I don't go back out to buy new things to "fill up" the spots that may look a little bare around the house.
Thoughts and prayers would be appreciated...
