How can you (we) all go about buying less stuff?
I have bought many things over the last few decades. I started with bike parts, I was forever looking to build the ‘ultimate’ bicycle.
I have easily spent tens of thousands of dollars on bike parts of the last 20 years. But every time I got something new, I would lust for something even newer. The more I got, the more I’d want. It was pure greed and indulgence.
But looking back, some of my favourite rides (most of them actually) weren’t done on my most expensive bikes. Most of my favourite rides were made on relatively cheap bikes!
Whenever I see a product now I ask many additional things:
1. Where did it come from / how was it made? What was the the environmental cost of manufacture?
2. Will I be able to resell it, reuse it, recycle it or compost it when I am finished with it? (and the packaging)
3. Do I really even need it? Or do I think I just ‘want’ it?
4. What are the “false promises” being advertised?
5. Will the new item create extra ‘worry’?
The next time you go to buy something, stop yourself and ask whether you really need it. Never buy on impulse. Never! Wait. Put things in your ‘watch’ list. Meanwhile, look for the most sustainable or ecological alternative. If you still think you ‘need’ something after one or two months, by all means, go ahead and buy it.
Ever since I started doing this, I almost never regret anything I have purchased.
This is what Spanish people tend to do and I think it is very wise. I know because I lived in Spain from 2005 – 2014. When the 2009 crisis hit, we couldn’t just buy whatever we wanted whenever we wanted. We had to sort out our priorities into ‘wants’ and ‘needs’. Spanish people waste much less than people from other 1st world nations, if only because they don’t buy as much crap to begin with. Make sense?
If you think something new will make you happy, try to focus on any additional problems that you think this new thing might bring. For example, if you get even more things than you have now, perhaps you will need more security to look after all of these things? Or perhaps you will need more storage space? Or perhaps you will need to hire a cleaner? Or perhaps you will need to spend more just to maintain all of it? Or perhaps you will be so busy working for all of it, that you won’t actually have time to use any of it? (that’s the classic rich man’s mistake by the way)
For my most expensive carbon bikes, I would worry that they would get stolen, or I’d wouldn’t want to walk on the beach with them, because I’d worry that sand would get into my cleats/pedals/drivetrain. So I didn’t really go as many fun places as with my more basic aluminium training bikes. Did the more expensive bikes make me all that much faster or fitter? No. Did they make me get out and ride more? No (probably the opposite). Did they cost more to maintain? Yes. Was the most equipment fussier to maintain? Yes, definitely.
Is it better to be able to ride a cheap bike fast? Or is it better to ride an expensive bike slow? I can tell you from personal experience that the former is so much more rewarding than the latter — getting your arse handed to you when you are using expensive equipment and you are way out of your league is more than embarrassing.
So I have eventually come to realise that things alone cannot make me happy. The happiest people in the world (buddhist monks) have the least amount of possessions, not the most.
Do you know who had one of the biggest bicycle collections in the whole world? Robin Williams. And look at where he is now. That’s right, he got so depressed, he commit suicide.
If possessions and money alone made us ‘happy’, then millionaires would never kill themselves. But they do.
True happiness lies in exactly the opposite direction to what most people think.
Apart from that, the environmental cost of blatant consumerism is very high. So that’s another great case for minimalism.
And lastly, I thought I’d let you all know that this year I have officially changed my ‘non-religion’ from simply ‘atheism’ to “zen buddhism” (because it’s more a way of life). I don’t kill animals (no, not even spiders). Why, just today I was cleaing the outside of our house with a water jet and I saved a moth, two big juicy spiders and a preying mantis…!
That’s all from me today,
Thanks for reading,
Take care,
—Leslie
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