Monday night I watched a new show on Slice called My Shopping Addiction. Essentially this is 'Til Debt Do Us Part and Princess meets Intervention Canada. It was interesting. Some of the techniques caused full on meltdowns from the participants, and in the end sometimes they work and sometimes they don't.
It's a neat show to watch.
Here's why it caught my eye. I have a shopping problem. It's something that 80% of the time I can control. However, I have been known to drop a bunch of money twice a year to update and upgrade my wardrobe. By a bunch of money I'm talking between $500 and $700 at each of those two times. Average that over the year and I spend about $100 a month on clothes. When you see that it doesn't look too bad right?
Wrong!
It's still not necessarily stuff that I am going to wear all the time. I have found that in those shopping trips, inevitably I'll get to the purging in the summer and realize I've spent good money on something I liked in the store, I liked on me, but I still haven't actually worn. By now it's too late to return it to the store and get my money back. So, it hangs in my closet, happily waiting for me to figure out how and where to wear the piece.
How do I get past this? I take someone with me. Or I take a moment in the dressing room with the garments I think I want to purchase and mentally go through my current pieces to form outfits. If at least 3 outfits don't come out of that, then I won't be wearing the piece.
Next problem - I told you I have a shopping issue - if I can't immediately see the shoes I will wear with it, it doesn't go home. A new top without suitable foot wear causes a need to find suitable foot wear and the overall tally starts climbing again.
For most of the past 6 years, save for this last one really, I've been able to curb this spending category and shut down my shopping. However, in the past year, this is the single biggest budget-breaker and reason my debt hasn't fallen at all this year.
Here's the other thing that has caused this to start up again. I started working on my health. In doing so, my weight is coming down. As such, I have pieces that are getting bigger on me. With my new found health, I felt the need to reward my progress by finding slimmer silhouettes to showcase my new body and stop feeling frumpy.
Now I've realized that I have far more clothing than any one person needs and I really should do something about it. There are pieces I love that need to be taylored so I can keep wearing them. There are pieces I haven't worn in a really long time - for one reason or another. There are pieces that can be consigned, and those that just need to be made into rags.
This is the one thing, as a PF blogger that gets me into trouble more often than not. I have to be careful about the person I take with me shopping. Some aren't as objectionable as others. Some like to play Barbie with me, to help curb their own shopping issues. Some just don't care enough to tell me the truth about the items. That's why, most often, when I go shopping with someone I DO NOT TAKE MY CREDIT OR DEBIT CARD WITH ME. I have a nominal amount of cash, with which I can enjoy a bit of food and a beverage with the friend (s), but it stops me cold from buying something. This forces me to window shop and take complete stock of whether I truly need the item and will use the item once purchased!
How many times have you seen something in a store and thought how fabulous that is, only to realize months later that it is still fabulous and you'd forgotten all about it? Me too!
For example, purses. I do not by handbags anymore. Why? Not because I don't secretly covet a Coach Purse or something equally as pricey (really it's just to say I have one!), it's because It will sit in my closet taking up space for months if not years between uses.
Instead, I now have one bag (and two I just can't get rid of). That bag is made by Miche - Canada there is an arm in the US (I'm Canadian, hence the link to the Canadian site!). It means I can keep one bag, and I can transform the outside to the colour I want. I have 7 shells for my bag, each a different colour and they are super easy to change out. This has removed all knids of other bags that I like for a while and stop using. It means you won't immediately see everyone with the same style or colour as I have, and means I can literally change the colour to match my shoes every day if I wanted to.
This decision means I no longer wonder what purse I left that thing in. It means I don't find hidden cash in a purse that has sat in my closet for months or years. It stops all of that tiresome switching of purses. I just swap the cover and go!
And so, over the next few months, I'll be coming to terms with my spending habits, and the drive behind these. There are things I need to do to get myself back into a position of comfort, and cut out the baggage I'm carrying around with me.
Learning about your habits is the best thing you can do for yourself. It will help you change the habit. For me, it will help me kick this debt finally.
Stay tuned for some interesting posts in the next couple of weeks. I'm working hard to get this done, starting by working on me, and working my plan.
