Speaker 1: Hello everybody. I'm Jemma Spake and welcome back to the
Speaker 1: Psychology of Your Twenties, the podcast where we talk through
Speaker 1: the biggest changes, moments, and transitions of our twenties and
Speaker 1: what they mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, Welcome back
Speaker 1: to the show. Welcome back to the podcast. New listeners,
Speaker 1: old listeners. Wherever you are in the world, it is
Speaker 1: so great to have you here. Back for another episode
Speaker 1: as we, of course break down the psychology of our twenties. Today,
Speaker 1: we are answering a question I have been having of
Speaker 1: myself recently, Why am I spending so much money? Specifically,
Speaker 1: why have I been using money to self sue, to
Speaker 1: feel better about my life, to take away bad feelings
Speaker 1: about the state of the world, probably more than I
Speaker 1: ever have. We're talking about a phenomena that has been
Speaker 1: popping up all over social media, in financial columns on TikTok,
Speaker 1: this concept of doom spending. I also think it's a
Speaker 1: great time to talk about money. With the holidays coming up.
Speaker 1: The urge and the desire to spend perhaps more than
Speaker 1: we have beyond our means is very very strong within us,
Speaker 1: and I want to talk about this specific type of compulsion,
Speaker 1: this specific reason why you and I, people in their
Speaker 1: twenties are spending all this money on things that maybe
Speaker 1: we don't really need. Doom spending is basically the desire
Speaker 1: or the impulse to spend money more rapidly and in
Speaker 1: larger sums in response to our anxiety and uncertainty about
Speaker 1: the future and about the world. It is this tendency
Speaker 1: to live in the now, to spend because the future
Speaker 1: is uncertain, to treat ourselves. It's the use of mine
Speaker 1: to manage our emotions. And you might be thinking, like,
Speaker 1: what is the problem with that? Like I work hard
Speaker 1: for my money, surely I should be, and you are
Speaker 1: allowed to spend it however I want. But there is
Speaker 1: a level where it actually gets out of control. It
Speaker 1: can begin to become a maladaptive coping mechanism, and it
Speaker 1: can actually in a way feed into our pessimism about
Speaker 1: the future in a way that is a little bit unhealthy. Also,
Speaker 1: you know, it takes away from our ability to plan
Speaker 1: financially and to save and to achieve you know, financial freedom,
Speaker 1: financial sustainability, to have long term financial goals. And although
Speaker 1: we may not be thinking about that in our early
Speaker 1: twenties or in our twenties at all, it is still
Speaker 1: an important conversation. So in this episode, we're going to
Speaker 1: talk about what doom spending actually is, why we do it,
Speaker 1: what it says about the times we're living in, and
Speaker 1: how to get control of about how you spend money
Speaker 1: in a really healthy gentle and I think sustainable way.
Speaker 1: Without further ado, let's get into it. Let's begin with
Speaker 1: the basics. We always do this at the start of
Speaker 1: every episode. I feel like a broken record, but just
Speaker 1: so we have a clear definition of doom spending. What
Speaker 1: I'm talking about is not just spending because you feel
Speaker 1: like it. I'm talking about the use of spending often
Speaker 1: that's impulsive as a way to calm a sense of
Speaker 1: uncertainty or a threat. It is an emotional coping mechanism.
Speaker 1: It's not buying things that you actually need. It's not
Speaker 1: buying things that you know you want and you feel
Speaker 1: like you should treat yourself to. It is buying because
Speaker 1: the future doesn't feel like it's coming, and so you
Speaker 1: want to live in the now and a way to
Speaker 1: feel better about perhaps the future not coming, which, by
Speaker 1: the way, it is, is to you know, spend and
Speaker 1: to fill your wardrobe and to get the dopamine of
Speaker 1: small purchases. To give this some historical perspective, this is
Speaker 1: actually nothing new. It might feel this way, but we
Speaker 1: are actually not the first generation to live through scary times.
Speaker 1: We probably won't be the last, and economic spending does
Speaker 1: increase in times of geopolitical uncertainty. There's also other interesting
Speaker 1: cases of how money responds to our emotions in uncertain times,
Speaker 1: some whacking examples. One that we found was that in
Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds there was this Baptist preacher named William Miller,
Speaker 1: and he had this huge following, and he was like,
Speaker 1: guess what, Jesus is going to return in eighteen forty four.
Speaker 1: The world's going to end. The chosen few are going
Speaker 1: to ascend into heaven, and so let's live it up.
Speaker 1: You know, take out loans, build your dream house, buy
Speaker 1: nice dinners, buy the car you want. I don't know
Speaker 1: if they had cars, and the eighteen hundred they definitely didn't,
Speaker 1: but you know what I mean, Like they were spending
Speaker 1: all this money so lavishly because they didn't think they
Speaker 1: would have to repay their debts. And then you know,
Speaker 1: the logic was that the apocalypse was so near. Why
Speaker 1: not have fun now? And then the apocalypse didn't happen
Speaker 1: and this whole community essentially went bankrupt. So we have
Speaker 1: seen examples of this in the past. You know. Now,
Speaker 1: obviously it's not a religious apocalypse, it's climate change, it's inflation,
Speaker 1: it's AI, it's the twenty four hour news cycle. But
Speaker 1: the psychological pattern is the same. When the world feels unstable,
Speaker 1: we turned to consumption as a way of asserting control
Speaker 1: because spending money is one of the only things that
Speaker 1: we can do that feels like it does something or
Speaker 1: gives us something back, and that's doom spending. Why is
Speaker 1: that the case? Why does spending money kind of feeling well?
Speaker 1: When we spend money? Basically, our dopamine system is activated.
Speaker 1: I feel like you guys already know that. But it's
Speaker 1: not just when we get the thing. It's when we
Speaker 1: see something we like, when we anticipate a purchase, when
Speaker 1: we click check out, when we're waiting for the parcel
Speaker 1: to arrive, when we go and collect it. Every single
Speaker 1: element of this process triggers the release of dopamine, and
Speaker 1: at all those various touch points, our mood is briefly
Speaker 1: improved and our stress is briefly lowered over time, we
Speaker 1: learn through association that we feel better from spending. We
Speaker 1: feel nice, and also it's accessible to us. We get
Speaker 1: something in return, we get a good, we get an item.
Speaker 1: So psychologically, spending functions like an emotional regulation strategy, much
Speaker 1: like eating comfort food, much like scrolling social media. In
Speaker 1: cognitive behavioral terms, if we want to go really psychological,
Speaker 1: it is what we call negative reinforcement. The behavior, the
Speaker 1: act of buying, of shopping removes distress, and that's pleasurable,
Speaker 1: and so it's more likely to be repeated. So the
Speaker 1: thing that we really need to note is that doom spending, yes,
Speaker 1: is tied up in materialism. It's not necessarily about materialism.
Speaker 1: It's about fear. It's about comfort, it's about control, it's
Speaker 1: about feeling safe. Almost second, the evidence does really confirm
Speaker 1: it's not just that, you know, we're a generation that
Speaker 1: has more money. It's not just that shopping is more accessible,
Speaker 1: that delivery like is more accessible, that things come faster.
Speaker 1: Political and global context is driving over spending. Studies and
Speaker 1: financial reports show that impulse spending has rapidly increased since
Speaker 1: the pandemic, and especially during the pandemic. That is when
Speaker 1: a lot of these habits were triggered. You know, online
Speaker 1: shopping was one of the very few joys we seemed
Speaker 1: to have control over. I was so broke during the pandemic,
Speaker 1: so broke, and I used to spend one hundred dollars.
Speaker 1: I remember, I had like a little bit of money
Speaker 1: in my bank account from my restaurant job that I
Speaker 1: was obviously I didn't have, And I would spend like
Speaker 1: one one hundred dollars on something and then I would
Speaker 1: return it, and then I would buy something else and
Speaker 1: then I would return it. I think I recycled that
Speaker 1: one hundred dollars like five times. I even remember, like
Speaker 1: I bought this tartan puffer jacket. I don't know why,
Speaker 1: Like there was no weather that required me to buy that,
Speaker 1: and then I returned it. And then I bought like
Speaker 1: basically something exactly the same and returned that because of
Speaker 1: the dopamine, And this is where a lot of us
Speaker 1: learnt this habit. According to twenty twenty three data from
Speaker 1: the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, credit card balances
Speaker 1: in the US rose seventeen percent between twenty twenty and
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two. That is the sharpest increase in decades.
Speaker 1: Similar things happened in a lot of other countries where
Speaker 1: credit card data is like readily available, So in the UK,
Speaker 1: in Australia, across Europe, in Canada, across all these countries,
Speaker 1: we could see this trend. Psychologists who are studying still
Speaker 1: studying post pandemic consumer behavior. That sound kind of sounds
Speaker 1: like a tongue twister, but post pandemic consumer behavior. Note
Speaker 1: that collective trauma, economic precarity, social isolation. Basically, what it's
Speaker 1: all created are these shorter planning horizons. The future feels bleak,
Speaker 1: it feels uncertain, and so we tend to not think
Speaker 1: that it's going to happen. When you ask people in
Speaker 1: their twenties or in their thirties, people our age, Hey, like,
Speaker 1: how far do you think in the future. For me,
Speaker 1: it's probably only six months, And that's not normal, Like
Speaker 1: you should be able to plan and think about your
Speaker 1: life long term. But I think the state of the
Speaker 1: world means that it's really hard to Everything is changing
Speaker 1: so far. It's like you just can't imagine the world
Speaker 1: beyond six months. So if you can't imagine the world
Speaker 1: in six months, why are you going to save for
Speaker 1: a financial goal that's ten years away, like buying a house.
Speaker 1: Why are you going to save for a financial goal
Speaker 1: that's fifty years away or forty years away, like retirement.
Speaker 1: The appeal of this immediate gratification in the face of
Speaker 1: like really scary stuff often overshadows, you know, a more
Speaker 1: rational decision making process that is reliant on us being
Speaker 1: able to imagine a future with us in it. Another explanation,
Speaker 1: spending money is just a nice distraction. When you're thinking
Speaker 1: about when you're hal's going to arrive, When you're thinking
Speaker 1: about how this next outfit is going to change your life,
Speaker 1: you're not thinking about everything else that's going wrong. And
Speaker 1: this really aligns with like the infamous little treat narrative. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm a big fan of this. I love a little treat.
Speaker 1: I'm a big believer in little treats. It's not inherently
Speaker 1: bad to treat yourself, and I actually think it's, you know,
Speaker 1: an important part of self care and self comfort. But
Speaker 1: when treat culture turns into habitual, high spend behavior, especially
Speaker 1: when it's triggered by fear or anxiety, that's a coping mechanism,
Speaker 1: not a reward. And add that to the fact that nowadays,
Speaker 1: like companies and the global economy and you know, big
Speaker 1: brands are taking advantage of that. Is it really about
Speaker 1: us or is it being manipulated for profit? The other
Speaker 1: day I was Insidney driving to the airport and I
Speaker 1: saw this massive billboard that was like from McDonald's and
Speaker 1: it said existing question mark, you deserve a little tree.
Speaker 1: That that's a marketing con like. That is not self care.
Speaker 1: That is McDonald's trying to get you to buy the
Speaker 1: thing that they have designed for you, to spend money
Speaker 1: to fill their pockets. And especially nowadays, when we are
Speaker 1: bombarded with targeted ads, we are streamlined into buy now
Speaker 1: buttons and limited time offers and sales. I think the
Speaker 1: shift from reward to regulation, it can happen really subtly
Speaker 1: and is impacting a lot of us. It's impacting me
Speaker 1: for sure. You know, there really is something to be
Speaker 1: said about doom spending, the fact that so many people
Speaker 1: in their twenties are spending more money than they probably have,
Speaker 1: and the role of technology and social media. Think about
Speaker 1: the last time you scrolled your Instagram feed. You will
Speaker 1: see news of genocide, news of political unrest, news of
Speaker 1: climate disasters, and then what happens after that. Add for
Speaker 1: a designer bag, we can get away pair of sneakers,
Speaker 1: phone case, sweater, t shirt, buy now, Buy now, Buy now.
Speaker 1: That's emotional whiplash. You are going from panic and despair
Speaker 1: to pleasure and intrigue. And that is not accidental. It's
Speaker 1: engineered social media platforms, and there have been articles on this.
Speaker 1: There have been people who have come out who were
Speaker 1: involved in making these systems, who have come out and said,
Speaker 1: we designed it this way. They are made to monetize
Speaker 1: your attention because when ads make money, they make money,
Speaker 1: and the way ads make money is if the site
Speaker 1: holds your attention long enough to trigger an emotion that
Speaker 1: will produce a sale. Fear, outrage, sadness, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: These all heightened arousal. They keep us scrolling more and more.
Speaker 1: And once you're in that heightened emotional state, once your
Speaker 1: defenses are lowered, once the world feels terrible, you're more suggestible,
Speaker 1: you're more reward seeking, you're more likely to act impulsively.
Speaker 1: The discomfort we feel when we flip between threat and
Speaker 1: reward requires an antidote. We want a solution, We want
Speaker 1: to feel better, and then this algorithm these social media platforms,
Speaker 1: they serve it right up to us. A twenty twenty
Speaker 1: four study by researchers in Indonesia found that exposure to
Speaker 1: emotionally charged content significantly increased impulse buying in people in
Speaker 1: their twenties in young adults. Essentially, after being emotionally activated,
Speaker 1: people were more likely to buy stuff and when they
Speaker 1: were asked why, oftentimes they couldn't really explain it. So
Speaker 1: this is when spending because you want something, spending because
Speaker 1: you do deserve a little treat, and spending because you
Speaker 1: don't really know why you're spending, and because it's a
Speaker 1: form of coping and a mo regulation. This is when
Speaker 1: the line really begins to blur and what began as
Speaker 1: harmless distraction as actually feeling a need like you do
Speaker 1: need clothes and you do need things in your life,
Speaker 1: can quietly turn into like a routine, an addiction, a
Speaker 1: really toxic habit. So let's talk about the signs that
Speaker 1: your doom spending might be going too far and what
Speaker 1: you can do about it after this short break, So
Speaker 1: how do you know when treating yourself has tipped into
Speaker 1: something else? Entirely most of us don't wake up one
Speaker 1: morning and think like, oh no, I have developed an
Speaker 1: unhealthy coping mechanism. What will I do about this? Like
Speaker 1: it really creeps in slowly, it's disguised again is as
Speaker 1: fun as keeping up with trends. But here are the
Speaker 1: signs that it's gone a little bit too far. Firstly,
Speaker 1: you notice that your biggest shopping days aren't actually when
Speaker 1: you need anything, aren't when you've just gotten paid, aren't
Speaker 1: when you're celebrating. They actually occur when you're anxious, when
Speaker 1: you're overwhelmed, or you're sad, Especially if you are shopping
Speaker 1: a lot at night, big red flag inhibitions are lowered.
Speaker 1: Often that's when our biggest feelings come about. We're tied
Speaker 1: from the day. Shopping is the band aid. Secondly, this
Speaker 1: one's the obvious one. You're spending beyond your means, and
Speaker 1: you're seriously spending beyond your means. You know. A huge
Speaker 1: thing that has boomed in recent years is these buy now,
Speaker 1: pay later, buy and for delayed payment options. Even using
Speaker 1: credit cards to pay for small things that aren't necessities
Speaker 1: also comes under this. Now, I don't think these kinds
Speaker 1: of options are inherently bad at all. To be honest,
Speaker 1: I use Klana. I use like the PayPal for in
Speaker 1: I don't know what it is like the for payment things,
Speaker 1: especially because I don't get paid regularly. It like helps
Speaker 1: me break up my budget. And I used to use
Speaker 1: it when I was working as a consultant and I
Speaker 1: got paid monthly, just to kind of like make the
Speaker 1: things I was repaying for weekly and monthly as well.
Speaker 1: I think they offer flexibility, but they also allow you
Speaker 1: to go a little bit too far. Behavioral economists have
Speaker 1: highlighted that separating the payment from the consumption reduces what
Speaker 1: we call the pain of paying. This is a concept
Speaker 1: that was coined in the nineties and the pain of
Speaker 1: paying is an important part of the buying process and
Speaker 1: is basically the psychological discomfort that makes us hesitate before
Speaker 1: a purchase. When we use later pay options, it delays
Speaker 1: or disguises the payment so our brain feels like it
Speaker 1: can experience all of the rewards, a none, or a
Speaker 1: fraction of the cost until later on. That is the danger,
Speaker 1: and again they're not necessarily bad, they're not all bad,
Speaker 1: but what it does have the potential to slip into
Speaker 1: is chasing payments slipping into debt if they are used
Speaker 1: for things to pay for things that are beyond our means.
Speaker 1: Even if you want to use these platforms to pay
Speaker 1: for your shopping, you have to ensure that you actually
Speaker 1: have the money there to use it if you needed to.
Speaker 1: And that's how you prevent the cost from stacking up
Speaker 1: when you have no other way to pay for these
Speaker 1: or when the payments are due. I think something really
Speaker 1: related to this that shows doom spending has gone too
Speaker 1: far for you is if you found yourself deliberately ignoring
Speaker 1: bank statements, deliberately ignoring notifications, feeling a sense of dread
Speaker 1: when you open your banking app. Financial avoidance is a
Speaker 1: huge red flag and a huge coping mechanism that a
Speaker 1: lot of us in our twenties have because your brain
Speaker 1: is trying to shield you from all the fear and
Speaker 1: shame and the guilt and just keep all the good stuff,
Speaker 1: keep all the purchases, keep all the dopamine. But that
Speaker 1: cycle actually makes get worse. You're no longer aware of
Speaker 1: how much is coming in and out of your account
Speaker 1: each week. You don't know how much you really need
Speaker 1: to live. At first, it's an easier option to just
Speaker 1: not look, but I promise you. I have done that
Speaker 1: when I Again, when I was working as a consultant,
Speaker 1: I had terrible financial habits, which is ironic. Having financial accountability,
Speaker 1: even if you really have to stare your shopping and
Speaker 1: you're spending straight in the face, is so much better
Speaker 1: for you long term. So if you have recognized this
Speaker 1: pattern in yourself, how do you stop now? I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna say like, swear off spending altogether. Go cold turkey
Speaker 1: never works. I don't think it's realistic. It's like telling
Speaker 1: yourself never to eat sugar again. You can eat sugar
Speaker 1: by Lake Tuesday instead. The goal is to retrain your
Speaker 1: brain to replace emotional spending with more sustainable forms of
Speaker 1: regulation and of control. So here are a few tips
Speaker 1: of like how to start how to do that? First,
Speaker 1: let's flip it around. If doom spending is about spending
Speaker 1: because the future feels uncertain, doom saving is about saving
Speaker 1: because it feels uncertain. It's like a little way to
Speaker 1: create a sense of safety and a sense of the
Speaker 1: future in a very small, very tangible way. You don't
Speaker 1: have to start with huge amounts. Actually, research always shows
Speaker 1: us small, consistent you know, saving goals is key. Five
Speaker 1: or ten dollars a week. It actually increases your sense
Speaker 1: of confidence in your own ability to manage money, but
Speaker 1: also feelings of psychological well being and feelings of self trust,
Speaker 1: like hey, like, I'm proud of this. I'm I'm taking
Speaker 1: this thing that I earned, that I worked hard for,
Speaker 1: and I'm building something for my future, And the very
Speaker 1: fact that it's there has this weird reverse way of
Speaker 1: telling you that there will be a future, which is
Speaker 1: really what we're trying to get down to at the
Speaker 1: end of the day. Behavioral economist Richard Thaylor. He called
Speaker 1: this approach mental accounting, reframing savings not as deprivation but
Speaker 1: as a reward, as an act of self care, as
Speaker 1: an act of self trust, as an act of yeah,
Speaker 1: future investment, like you're saving for the life that one
Speaker 1: day you're going to really love and enjoy. And this
Speaker 1: really counters the idea that we explored earlier of temporal
Speaker 1: discounting or present bias, because the future feels are so uncertain.
Speaker 1: You know, we spend more money now, but if we
Speaker 1: save more, the possibilities for the future, the trip, we're
Speaker 1: saving for the dream house. They expand I found this
Speaker 1: incredibly interesting article published in twenty eleven in the Journal
Speaker 1: of Marketing Research that found across four studies, participants who
Speaker 1: were basically asked to interact with realistic, computer generated simulations
Speaker 1: of their future using virtual technology were more likely to
Speaker 1: accept a larger sum of money down the line. So,
Speaker 1: just to like roll that back, they got all these people,
Speaker 1: these participants, and they put them in these simulations. They
Speaker 1: let them create these simulations of like really beautiful future
Speaker 1: and they were really realistic. And then they said, oh, hey,
Speaker 1: by the way, you actually get paid for this. Would
Speaker 1: you want fifty dollars now or do it mean to
Speaker 1: give you one hundred dollars at the end of the
Speaker 1: term or one hundred dollars in three months. And the
Speaker 1: people who had seen these really positive versions of themselves
Speaker 1: and whose futures seemed really happy and bright, they wanted
Speaker 1: to wait. In all cases, they wanted to accept the
Speaker 1: later monetary reward over the immediate one. And I just
Speaker 1: think I love this study. It really brilliantly demonstrates that
Speaker 1: keeping that future self in mind, forcing yourself to really
Speaker 1: imagine them when making these financial decisions when going to
Speaker 1: buy stuff, goes a long way. Next, the next tip
Speaker 1: that we can really do for ourselves is just reallocate
Speaker 1: where your money goes. Psychological research consistently finds that spending
Speaker 1: on experiences, rather than material goods like a new top
Speaker 1: or a new pair of shoes, leads to greater and
Speaker 1: longer lasting happiness. Why Because experiences connect to identity, and
Speaker 1: experiences connect to relationships, and experiences connect to a deep
Speaker 1: sense of memory and sense of self and sense of interconnectedness.
Speaker 1: Spending on experiences as well build stories, gives you stories,
Speaker 1: gives you memories that make you excited for future memories,
Speaker 1: and they give you something that's going to last a
Speaker 1: lot longer than plastic and a lot longer than clutter.
Speaker 1: And Like, don't get me wrong, I love things. I
Speaker 1: love clothes, I love buying stuff I have. I have
Speaker 1: so many purchases that are just stupid that I still
Speaker 1: really really value. But are they going to be the
Speaker 1: things I take with me? No? I literally can't. But
Speaker 1: buying the concert ticket, doing the day trip, spending a
Speaker 1: little bit of extra money so that we can get
Speaker 1: a nice place on the girl's weekend, Like, those things
Speaker 1: really anchor me, and they anchor us in memory and
Speaker 1: in belonging, and they are a great, great way to
Speaker 1: form novel and exciting experiences that just makes life worth
Speaker 1: and feel worth living. Another way, I'm full of tips today.
Speaker 1: Another way to begin reallocating your spending that I do
Speaker 1: is I create, and I have created a twenty four
Speaker 1: hour rule. And friends of mine have seen me use this.
Speaker 1: They can tell you it works. When I see something
Speaker 1: I want, I do not buy it right away. I'm
Speaker 1: allowed to buy it eventually, but I have to wait
Speaker 1: minimum to twenty for hours. I get my notes app
Speaker 1: up on my phone. I write it down. I write
Speaker 1: down the item, the price, the date I initially wanted
Speaker 1: to buy it. Then I just let it sit. This
Speaker 1: short delay activates what psychologists call system to thinking, that slower,
Speaker 1: more deliberate part of your brain that handles logic and
Speaker 1: that handles long term reasoning. When you give the impulsive
Speaker 1: part of your brain pause, this system too. This second
Speaker 1: system locks in and allows you to spend better align
Speaker 1: it's been in, more alignment with your values. Most of
Speaker 1: the time. You will find that the desire fades once
Speaker 1: the emotional charge passes, and if it doesn't, then you
Speaker 1: know the purchase actually matters to you. It's more intentional,
Speaker 1: it's not reactive. Like I said, I've done this for years.
Speaker 1: I keep a want to buy list on my phone,
Speaker 1: and in preparation for this episode, I was like, what
Speaker 1: have I got on there? I haven't actually looked all
Speaker 1: the way back for a little while. I just add
Speaker 1: things on. I cannot even remember putting some of these
Speaker 1: things on the list. One of them was like white
Speaker 1: Abercrombie jeans. I literally listened them here and Imagen and
Speaker 1: Willie shirt, what even is that? Like, I don't I'm
Speaker 1: sure it's great image and Willy, I'm sure you make
Speaker 1: great shirts. Like but I don't know what that is.
Speaker 1: This print that says love is a kiss on the forehead,
Speaker 1: super cute. I don't know what that print looks like.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's great, but like I didn't need it.
Speaker 1: There was another thing that was on There was a
Speaker 1: Gani key chain that was three hundred dollars. Like what
Speaker 1: I think that was when like everybody was doing those
Speaker 1: like trinkets on the bag situation, which I love. I
Speaker 1: got into it, but like three hundred dollars, Like that's
Speaker 1: so much money, that's so much money, and like I
Speaker 1: wasn't even that. I was like, thank god, I didn't
Speaker 1: buy that. That distance like provided some clarity. It has
Speaker 1: saved me. I think I did like a little calculation
Speaker 1: of like five things, and it was totally over twelve
Speaker 1: hundred dollars just because I waited, just because I had
Speaker 1: this list. There is, of course, other ways of going
Speaker 1: about this. I have a friend who and I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna give her a shout out because she she said
Speaker 1: she was gonna do this at the start of the year.
Speaker 1: It is what is it like November now and she's
Speaker 1: still doing it. She is only allowed to buy secondhand
Speaker 1: goods for the whole year, unless it's like underwear. And
Speaker 1: I cannot tell you the amount of times that I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna lie I low KEI wanted her to break
Speaker 1: the pact. I wanted her to break I promised to myself.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Emma, but like she because you know, something
Speaker 1: looks really cute on her or whatever, but she genuinely
Speaker 1: like has stuck to it. Her deepop purchases are amazing,
Speaker 1: Like she's doing so well, and I just like feel
Speaker 1: like that's another system where it's like you're allowed to buy,
Speaker 1: you're allowed to spend, you do so more sustainably. Another
Speaker 1: friend of mine. Albeit, I will say she lives with
Speaker 1: her boyfriend. They don't have much space, but they have
Speaker 1: the one in, one out rule, so she can buy stuff,
Speaker 1: but she has to get rid of something. And she
Speaker 1: has a great closet. She has a full closet. But
Speaker 1: it really allows her to be conscious of what is
Speaker 1: really reflecting me. What do I really want to spend
Speaker 1: my money on? Is there anything that like? Is this
Speaker 1: really gonna bring me value? I'm gonna wear this enough
Speaker 1: that I should throw something out or I should donate something.
Speaker 1: It sounds simple, but it's a subtle form of what
Speaker 1: we call a commitment device, a behavioral nudge, a behavioral
Speaker 1: rule that adds accountability, and that reminds you that every
Speaker 1: purchase does have a cost beyond money. It costs you space,
Speaker 1: it costs you attention, It costs you your emotional bandwidth
Speaker 1: as well. And I think it also allows you to
Speaker 1: build a sense of identity through intentional ownership. Like your
Speaker 1: life is not a trend, your emotions are are not trendified. Right.
Speaker 1: You can't let your emotions be the thing that determines
Speaker 1: who you're going to be because you spend money to
Speaker 1: soothe them. You really develop a sense of personal style,
Speaker 1: develop a sense of a personal brand, you really develop
Speaker 1: a sense of personal like money values. That is so
Speaker 1: so powerful. I think what we're really talking about here
Speaker 1: is just mindful consumption, slowing down, having a sense of intention,
Speaker 1: being deliberate about what you fill your life with. So
Speaker 1: many studies say our physical possessions impact our mindset and
Speaker 1: our psychology. So don't just like fill up your space
Speaker 1: with shit you don't need and stuff that like isn't
Speaker 1: important to you, because then your life's going to feel unimportant,
Speaker 1: and your environment's going to feel cluttered, and it's not
Speaker 1: going to feel like yours. Finally, one of the biggest
Speaker 1: tips to help you with your doom spending increase the
Speaker 1: pain of paying. One of the reasons spending has been
Speaker 1: come so automatic is that you don't have to put
Speaker 1: in your credit card details, you don't have to hand
Speaker 1: over cash. The other day, I bought my friend this.
Speaker 1: I just had to do the mental math. This episode
Speaker 1: will be out after her birthday, But for her birthday,
Speaker 1: I bought her like this really beautiful I guess, like bathrobe,
Speaker 1: like beach towel robe that she wanted for her birthday,
Speaker 1: And it literally took me less than a minute to
Speaker 1: buy it, to the point where I was like, oh
Speaker 1: is that wasn't Did I actually purchase that? And it
Speaker 1: was like, yeah, I did. No friction, No friction. We
Speaker 1: need to reintroduce the pain of paying, the sting that
Speaker 1: stops us from spending. Delete your saved cards on your phone,
Speaker 1: turn off Apple Pay, turn off your one click check out,
Speaker 1: use cash. These small bits of friction make you purchase conscious,
Speaker 1: make you money conscious. Before you click by, like, there's
Speaker 1: just a couple more seconds where you have to really like,
Speaker 1: you have to go find your card, you have to
Speaker 1: punch in your details. That delay again, it gives you.
Speaker 1: It gives your brain, your rational brain, a chance to
Speaker 1: catch up and a chance to be like, hey, wait
Speaker 1: do I actually need this? You know, is this actually useful?
Speaker 1: What impulse am I trying to suppress here? When it
Speaker 1: takes energy to buy something, you have time to reevaluate,
Speaker 1: You have time to realign it with being intentional, with
Speaker 1: adding value to your life, with spending according to your values.
Speaker 1: And I think that just makes you a much more
Speaker 1: powerful person, and it gives you a much stronger, much
Speaker 1: more strong mindset and even sense of personal identity. It
Speaker 1: goes quite deep. So to wrap up this episode, I
Speaker 1: think what doom Spending really reveals is so much more
Speaker 1: than materialism and consumption. I think it's so easy for
Speaker 1: people to be like you're just like you're you're just consumerist,
Speaker 1: and like you just like spending money. It's like, no,
Speaker 1: this is about a sense of control we have in
Speaker 1: our twenties right now, you and me, our generation, do
Speaker 1: you like, do you ever just sit down and realize
Speaker 1: what we have lived through the amount of like history
Speaker 1: defying events that have occurred in our lifetime and we
Speaker 1: have to read about it or see it or are
Speaker 1: exposed to it constantly. Of course, your brain wants something
Speaker 1: certain even if that's certainty, the only way you can
Speaker 1: get it is like a parcel at the front door.
Speaker 1: That is for some of us, like the best we
Speaker 1: can do right now. And so there's no shame if
Speaker 1: that is something that you've relied on. There's no shame
Speaker 1: if like sometimes like going on a shop, going on
Speaker 1: a spree, like buying stuff makes you feel better. I
Speaker 1: just want you to know about it, and I just
Speaker 1: want you to think about whether that's actually what you
Speaker 1: want from what you want from your life and if
Speaker 1: you want to keep spending the way that you are,
Speaker 1: if deep down you know it might be a problem.
Speaker 1: You know, I think this is like, guys, to get
Speaker 1: really deep. It's the psychology of your twenties in a nutshell.
Speaker 1: This is about learning how to sit with uncertainty without
Speaker 1: letting it rule you, recognizing when we're trying to fill psychological,
Speaker 1: mental emotional gaps with things, and just gently redirecting. So
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you for listening. If you've made it
Speaker 1: this far, I like to do this thing you guys
Speaker 1: know at the end of my episodes where like to
Speaker 1: reward your attention span and to reward you for listening,
Speaker 1: you get the secret code for the episode. So today,
Speaker 1: if you made it this far, what is something currently
Speaker 1: on your buy list that you're putting off buying? Is
Speaker 1: it white jeans? Is it three hundred dollar garning key Jane,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Drop it down below. What are you
Speaker 1: currently thinking about buying? How much is it? Do you
Speaker 1: need it or not? I want to hear what's on
Speaker 1: everybody's lists, not in a way that like to encourage
Speaker 1: people to buy them, just like I just want to
Speaker 1: know for curiosity. I want to thank our research assistant
Speaker 1: Libey Colbert for her contributions to this episode. She is
Speaker 1: a hero. She is a champion and we love her. Also,
Speaker 1: make sure that you are following us on Instagram at
Speaker 1: that Psychology podcast. It's December coming up, and you know
Speaker 1: what that means. It means guest month. Yes, that's right,
Speaker 1: a whole month just of guests, just of really cool
Speaker 1: people that I got to talk to. So if you
Speaker 1: want to know who's going to be on the show,
Speaker 1: make sure you're following us over there, or that you're
Speaker 1: following us slash subscribed whatever you are listening to this episode. Again,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you listening. I appreciate you giving us a
Speaker 1: five star review and your support for the podcast. And
Speaker 1: until next time, stay safe, be kind, be gentle to yourself,
Speaker 1: spend consciously, and we will talk very very soon.