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The No Shopping Challenge

Lotte Vesterli on July 12, 2022

Amazon has issued its yearly challenge to the world. It’s a game, and it’s called Amazon Prime Day. You lose if you buy one of Amazon’s “exceptional” deals. You win if you don’t buy anything.

They are using every psychological trick in the book, including inflated “before” prices that just happened to go up one week ago, so that they can offer a huge discount today. If you want to challenge yourself, go to their website. If you want to win the game, stay off the internet as much as you can for the next two days.

You need less stuff, not more.

Training Non-Shopping

Lotte Vesterli on December 1, 2020

The shopping season is a good time to practice mindfulness. We’ve just been bombarded with Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers, and now the Christmas Catalogs are taking over.

We know the happiness from buying more stuff lasts only for a very short while. But if you are feeling unhappy, stressed, or anxious, you are vulnerable to impulsive over-shopping.

Use this period as a training exercise. Every time you find yet another irresistible offer in your inbox or mailbox, take a moment to feel grateful that you have received the offer. Then feel gratitude for the things you already have. And finally, feel gratitude to the universe for giving you the tools to resists the offer.