Stirring Point

Stuff. It’s everywhere, and our piles of it keep growing. Big Box stores peddle stuff to us like drug dealers. Online retailers use slick marketing to jam it down our throats. Buying things provides a ready hit of dopamine that keeps us sprinting along the hedonic treadmill. The more we buy, the more it seems there’s no way off. 

We all feel it. It’s programmed into us. The promised happiness of a new gadget that’ll solve our digital needs. A new sweater to replace last year’s style. Biologically, we feel a draw to collect more, and psychologically, we’re convinced we need it.

Most of us are victims of this thinking, even the more “mindful” among us. I once sat in front of a Buddhist monk and listened as he described his desire for new prayer beads. “They were polished and felt so smooth in my hand.” He needed them, he thought, even though he already had a perfectly nice set wrapped around his wrist. The most famous of the mindful, the Dalai Lama himself, has a respectable watch collection, including a Rolex and a Patek Phillipe.

We have more than we know what to do with, and we still can’t stop buying. Our closets are packed; our drawers are stuffed; our garages and sheds overflow with boxes. If that’s not enough, we rent storage spaces and fill them from floor to ceiling.

Eventually, we crack under the weight of clutter and look for ways to clear out some of this junk. We donate, we purge—we swear off new purchases. In a neurological reversal, dopamine rewards us for this behavior too. We feel light and liberated for a period, with our desires hogtied and tossed in the closet. Eventually, though, the strength of “needs” slips into the world of “wants.” We pull up Amazon on our phones or drive to Target and splurge on something unnecessary. There are so many temptations, and the urges feel overwhelming.

Documentaries and books offer road maps on how to declutter our lives. Minimalism tells us to “love people and use things,” not the other way around. They suggest concepts like the “90/90 rule” for your wardrobe. Have you worn the item in the last 90 days? Will you wear it in the next 90? If the answers are both no, get rid of it. There are caveats, of course, like your grandfather’s jacket with the elbow patches or your mother’s favorite sweater that she wore around the holidays. For seasonal items and your Sunday best, they suggest bumping the time frame to 120 days as a guide. It’s important to note that most minimalists aren’t ascetics who refuse to own things. They are, however, attempting to snip some of the strings that guide our hands to our wallets when it comes to mindless, impetuous purchases. They recognize that we can’t buy our way to happiness; we’re caught in a cycle, and we need to retrain our minds. Own less stuff; keep what’s necessary; indulge mindfully; spend time on things that matter most: family, friends, and seeking experiences. Have less, enjoy more.

Minimalists and consumer reductionists are byproducts of an abundance that stems from a level of wealth. Excess spending is a first-world malady and a privilege of prosperity; it’s a symptom of having enough. The question is, how do we slow this behavior, break the habit, and reestablish our priorities?

The guidelines of minimalism are useful interventions for those who can stick to them. For most of us, though, the urge to purchase is relentless, and what we need are actual reformations. To practice a “have less, enjoy more” mantra, decluttering our homes is a good start, but it’s not enough. We must also declutter our minds.

Decluttering the mind is a lifelong pursuit, and a strong first step is to establish priorities. Start by identifying the obvious “junk” in your day. “Junk” is not only the piles of physical stuff we don’t need. It’s also the stories and narratives compelling us to buy more things that make us feel incomplete without them. Target marketing employs algorithms that use our online footprint to suggest items that fit our persona. Google, Instagram—they all do it. To slow the onslaught of virtual hawkers, switch to “Incognito” mode for searches, or reduce your time on social media. Trying sitting and writing out your definition of “needs” vs. “wants,” then make two columns and list out what belongs in each. When finished, meet your “needs” column with rigor and cross out anything that feels like a creative workaround. Circle one “want” on the opposite list and let that be a gift to yourself for the month. It’s a gift, not a reward. This isn’t about what you deserve or don’t deserve. It’s about pattern mapping—what’s necessary and unnecessary. All the other “wants” will have to wait. And after a few weeks, those “wants” may fade away.

Be discerning. There are certain things that fill your life with joy. Books, music, gadgets that truly improve your day—there’s no need to rob ourselves of these pleasures. We all know inherently what supplements our well-being, and we should feel no guilt for our indulgence with these things. The purpose of decluttering the mind is the recognition that the goal posts of desire are always moving. What we have today is what we wanted yesterday. But it’s not enough, and it’ll never be enough. The posts will keep moving, and so it’s time to try a new game.

I’m not a minimalist or a strict reductionist. I value these approaches and weave them into my worldview. But I’m conscious of the “why” behind my buying and militant about the balance of items I keep in my home. I prosthetize the messages above and still suffer from the same urges, the same mental clutter, and the same desire for more. So do the minimalists and reductionists. The key to their success is their pattern recognition and their ability to cull mindless accumulation. But that success is not exclusive to them alone. It can be ours too if we slow down and think before we click and pay.