Happiness, Material-Free

All around us, there are messages telling us to buy stuff. On the Internet (blogs included), we see continuous advertising trying to get us to purchase a product or service. It’s the main reason for television, and movies are continually made with products placed throughout, so that we aren’t always sure what is advertising and what was put in there by the director.  Flip on the radio or open up a newspaper or magazine, and you’re bombarded my more advertising. Go to a shopping center/mall, and the urge to buy comes from every direction.  This message to continually buy, buy, buy … and that it will somehow make us happier.  Here are some ways to stay in our modern society, but find ways to escape materialism.  Here are some suggestions:

Limit television. Think about which shows you really, really love, and only watch during that time. When the commercials come on, go do something else. Or use Tivo to watch TV. Or even give up cable TV entirely, if you dare!

Boycott the news for a week.

Limit Internet reading.  Just do it once a day, for 30 minutes or so. If you can do that, you’ve gone a long way towards tearing yourself away from advertising.

Give up magazines for books. Magazines are also designed with advertising in mind. And they rarely give you much value. Try reading an ad-free book instead. It’s a much better use of your time.

Don’t go to the mall or Walmart. Find a place where you don’t need to spend money to have fun — like a park or a beach.

Monitor your urges. Once you become more aware of your urges to buy things, you can start to control them.

Declutter. It’s a rewarding process, and at the same time, it makes you realize how useless all our consumer shopping is.

Buy used. Look in thrift shops or garage sales or flea markets or similar places.