Science and the Dalai Lama agree: No matter what good or bad things happen to us, we quickly return to a relatively stable level of happiness. Another latte, a new smart-phone, a new Tesla, a castle, or winning the lottery provide, at best, a short hit of dopamine similar to gambling or cocaine.[1][2] After the high has worn off, we're left with the bills, the debt, the clutter, and the landfill.
Smart people who study happiness categorize factors into groups such as physiological, safety/security, social, and purpose/autonomy. We need just a few material items to address our physiological needs: too hot, too cold, thirst, hunger, illness, injury.[3] The other categories don't require additional material possessions. Adding more stuff to an already happy, healthy person just weighs them down.
Why do we keep buying things? First, the addiction is real. Second, our brains are wired for surviving in a world of scarcity. The over-abundance of stuff is a recent phenomenon that our biology and culture hasn't adapted to yet. Conversely, our culture includes mechanisms that bombard our brains with 5,000 targeted advertisements a day.[4] These programs hack into our subconscious desires and are engineered to subvert our rational thinking processes to have us compulsively click the "buy" button. Did I ever really want this gadget taking up space in my closet or was my brain momentarily hijacked by professional psychologists, artists, and data scientists? How will I ever know?
But wait... There's more... Our shopping addiction doesn't just affect our finances, happiness, and clutter. It goes though the whole supply chain. If we adjust the consumption throttle down a little, the whole system slows down. Less mining, less drilling, less shipping, less landfill, less pollution, and for every single step less CO2 released to the atmosphere.
What do we do with this extra money as it accumulates in our bank accounts, before it burns a hole in our pockets. It helps to have a clear goal...
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