last updated March 16, 2008
Embracing Compulsive Consumerism: How to Turn the Tables on This Crippling Addiction
 Hiding from your credit card statements? Actually believing this weekend is the sale to end all sales? It's time to turn your "shopaholic" title into one of pride. Even after the credit cards are cut in half, and only lists are used while shopping, the urge to shop is still going to be there. There are two fundamental ways to change how your shopping skills affect your life. One way is to alter where you shop, and the other is to use shopping to benefit others. The shifts in behavior can be a breakthrough in successfully altering a dependence on the thrill of a "good deal."
Compulsive shopping is unlike other addictions. Unlike smoking, drinking, or other addictions, shopping is a necessary activity to survive. In some ways, we are all hard wired to buy, buy, BUY! Beginning with Saturday morning cartoon toy commercials, shopping was programmed into the brain long before a Visa became available. There is an internal satisfaction to ownership; a "good" feeling in acquiring a new possession. It is this consumer "high" that is addictive, in conjunction with personal feelings of worth based on number of possessions. Here are some ways to substitute for that shopping high and possession driven self-esteem, without negatively impacting your credit score.
Begin by embracing virtual reality. Enable cookies on your web browser and peruse your favorite online shopping sites. Put as many items as you wish into your shopping cart. Then, close your browser. If at first this is too tempting, start by using this exercise in the company of a loved one who can ensure you do not purchase the items. Part of the appeal of compulsive shopping is the control to select items. This exercise allows you to select all the items you desire, in all the colors and styles available, without the pinch in the pocketbook. Plus, the items remain in your shopping cart, so you still possess them, just virtually. Finally, review your selections at a later date to accurately gauge just how much your shopping impulses cost your family. No more will shoes you forget you even bought pop up in the closet. Now they remain safely in Internet shopping carts, and can be ogled at will, but never worn just the same. For a bonus, gloat over any poor product reviews that come. You didn't buy it, so no hassle for you!
To utilize this shopping fix will require an email address, but you can easily acquire one for free from various web-based email providers. Many online shopping sites require a login and password, linked to an active website. It is best to use a separate email address than your regular email address because the websites will send regular electronic sales flyers to the email address on file. It will also send any purchase confirmations to the same email address, so to keep yourself honest give the new email address and password to a trusted loved one who is willing to check on your activities. Under no circumstance should this exercise ever require a credit card, and never opt to have a credit card linked for an "express pay" option. If you have previously linked a credit card during earlier purchases, or any other form of payment to an express pay type option, contact the website and request it be removed.
One step further into the realm of virtual goods lies in the video game world. Massive Multi-Player Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs for short) are virtual worlds with interaction, activity leading to a type of currency, and a way to spend the virtual currency on virtual goods. Again, an active email address is required. Only participate in FREE communities, or ones with relatively low start up costs such as purchasing a single game CD or monthly subscription rates lower than $10. Themes vary widely from medieval type quest games where weaponry and outfits can be purchased, to games with pirates and puzzles where houses, artwork, clothing, and boats are up for grabs. For most games, the virtual possessions and profile statistics are awe-inspiring to other players, and bring bragging rights to forums. Accrue as many trinkets, accessories, or weapons as desired, without one worry of paying down a credit card balance.
If online gaming is too much of a temptation, as some games are geared towards encouraging a player to spend more and more to level up his or her character, try another form of gaming. If you or a member the household own a gaming console, such as an Xbox, Playstation, or even a hand-held Nintendo DS or PSP, traditional role-playing games are another avenue. Game series such as Final Fantasy, Harvest Moon, Pokemon, and Animal Crossing are great examples of virtual worlds to build up virtual retail bliss. Computer games also exist, such as The Sims series, but all of these games require a game purchase. On the other hand, no matter which game set you choose-- a free MMORPG or the planned expense of a traditional console or computer game-- both types will also soak up spare hours of time previously available for shopping. This is a tailored selection of a hobby that will not only stop the craving of shopping, by allowing you to work towards ownership of highly desired or rare items, but it also serves the purpose of eating up free time.
Use real shopping to help real people. One way to still shop 'til you drop, but keep your checkbook out of the red is to shop for others. Many communities have elderly or handicapped people who would welcome the help in accomplishing daily tasks such as grocery shopping. Becoming a volunteer shopper can be as easy as contacting a local assisted living community, or offering your services on an online bulletin such as Craigslist. If you are uncomfortable with being solely responsible for another's shopping, see if you can tag along as a volunteer to help during a shopping field trip for an assisted living community. Another way to become a shopping volunteer is to help friends and acquaintances. See if grocery shopping is a hated chore for a friend, and if the two of you could chore trade. Many compulsive shoppers still receive a "high" even when purchasing for others, and volunteering shopping services could be an easy way to utilize this trait for positive results.
If people turn you off, or you just aren't comfortable with volunteering, volunteer your bargain hunting prowess anonymously to the masses. For this exercise, leave all credit cards at home, and hit the stores armed with a small note pad and pen. Every time you find an incredible deal, write it down. Once you go home, detail your local bargain finds on a blog or posting board for others to see. Reach out to other compulsive shoppers by enlisting their aid in covering more stores. All habitual sales shoppers know major department stores put out toppers Wednesday or Thursday evening. Other shoppers are usually ignorant of the many ways to get a good deal. Creating an online support group of compulsive shoppers may work in your favor. Schedule to sweep stores in pairs, working in a team to prevent each other from purchasing, while providing a great service to those who are clueless sale shoppers. Since purchases often act as trophies-- physical displays of a bargain hunt, capture, and kill-- an online record of deal finds can work in the same manner. Think of it as similar to catch-and-release sports fishing. You don't need the fish mounted on your wall to prove you caught the fish, if you have the picture!
Don't forget that compulsive shopping is still a harmful addiction. The cycle of purchase elation and debt guilt and depression is a hard one to break. Compulsive consumerism can easily break up relationships and undermine the ability of an otherwise healthy adult to provide for him or herself. The first step in any addiction is to first admit to having a problem and then taking appropriate steps to shield yourself from the addiction's harmful effects. Initial steps do include cutting up credit cards, contacting debt specialists, and shopping supervised by a loved one and eventually a list. However, once these steps are taken, it is still difficult for a shopping addict to simply stay away from shopping. Commercials will still inundate the addict, and regular shopping is still necessary to live. In conjunction with more traditional approaches to ceasing compulsive consumerism, the above shifts in consumer behavior can provide the satisfaction of a good buy, without the downside of an increasing debt to income ratio.
Use virtual window shopping to feed the craving of bargain hunting. Be sure to keep all credit cards away if the urge to purchase the online goods is too strong. Use cookies and total in shopping carts to see just how much money frivolous spending costs you and your family. Continue in the virtual world by joining a free gaming community to acquire virtual commodities through gaming effort. Picking up this new hobby plays directly to your strength as a savvy shopper while protecting you against your weakness of over spending. Plus, it eats up valuable free time to further keep your charge card away from the mall. If virtual shopping just isn't working for you, try volunteering your shopping services to those who aren't able to shop for themselves. Offer to be a helper for an elderly care facility's shopping field trip, or see if friends and family members could use your shopping skills to save them retail headaches. Finally, immortalize your shopping trophies with an online community sharing your sale discoveries instead of tying them to useless, over-priced pieces of plastic. Work with other compulsive shoppers to create a network of empathetic intervention, while helping out others. Encourage users of the sales information to post their end results, so you have a "face" put on the legwork, increasing the satisfaction.
Remember, a true shopping addiction isn't going to go away over night; not any more than a smoker is going to quit cold turkey successfully the first time. Celebrate your small triumphs in besting this silent strangler of livelihood, just not with further purchased rewards. Take time to try out the above unconventional tactics to see if they can help you stay on the road to recovery. Even if you simply are worried you are developing dependency on your debit card to deal with emotions, try alternate ways to get the same feelings without the detriment of debt. Prevention is always more potent than a cure, but takes a high level of self-discipline. Don't get overwhelmed by being a "shopaholic." Embrace your shopping skills for activities that give you joy and forever remove the guilt of crushing debt.
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