See the Delight

I thought I'd bring out this vintage thrifted ModCloth dress called See the Delight.  Apparently whomever named this dress thought the print was of matches, but it's actually straight pins.  How embarrassing.  But, the topic of today's post is not pun-failures from over a decade ago: I thought we'd talk shop(ping) instead.

It's been a while since I've done an update on how my efforts at reduced spending have gone, so let's dive into it.  So far, half way through 2025, I'm doing really great.  I'm not doing as well as I would like, May was a major slip-up on spending, but it's all part of a process and rather than giving up I decided to just get back on track and keep going.  One of the main things I did was to break-up with luxury brands.  I can satisfy my shopping itch with thrifted items just as well if not better than I can with over-the-top high fashion items.  And I tend to wear them far more too.

The other thing I've done is to continue tracking every single penny spent and try to stick to a monthly spending limit.  Again, I'm not doing perfect, those Memorial Day sales kind of got me in trouble, but over all, I'm actually doing it and feeling like I'm finally making progress!

I was recently watching a YouTube video by Caroline Tucker titled: You Don't Like Fashion, You Like Consuming.  The thesis of her essay was that "influencers" claim to love fashion, but what they're really doing is just buying tons of (usually fast fashion) items, unboxing, and trying on.  Haul after haul after haul.  After which, those things disappear from their feed never to be seen again.  Eesh, I've definiely been guilty of that in the past.  I dont' get rid of the things that I buy once I'm done with my photos though, with prom dresses being the only real exception, I usually keep things.  So, Caroline is not wrong and the reason for this influencer led shopping craze is three fold:  

1.  Influencers get a dopamine hit from shopping and viewers get a dopamine hit from watching people unbox and display their hauls.  Because of that dopamine hit from something new, this is the content viewers crave seeing over someone wearing the same top for the fifth time even if it is worn a different way.  But the sad fact is, as much as we can descry influencers for doing this, it's a two-way street.  As much as I agree that the hauls are out of control, the fact is if people weren't interested in that sort of content, creators wouldn't make it. 

2.  Influencers make money from people buying the things they link to.  People seem to have forgotten that most of this content isn't coming from a regular person who's just excited to share their finds with others, which is where I'm sort of the exception.  I rarely use affiliate links anymore; I just enjoy sharing my finds and the outfits I create from them, but I am also not a professional influencer.  I work an eight to five in a tiny dark cubicle.  Being an influencer is a job and they can't make money off an item that sold out three years ago.  The best way for them to earn is to be constantly posting new links for people to click and try.

3.  It's much harder to get creative and keep restyling an old piece than it is to just buy something new.  Personally, I love clothes, especially old clothes, and that's why I started a fashion blog.  Actually, I originally started out by posting pics of myself wearing the same dress lots of different ways to ModCloth's Customer Style Gallery, but when they sold out, the new owners immediately got rid of that.  And then unfortunately, I fell into the trap of over consumption all too easily and have been trying to claw my way out of it for years now, because it's so much easier to just click and buy something new than it is to think about and then experiment in order to put together an outfit with existing items, but it's also way less fun and way less rewarding long-term to be constantly buying new things.  There is a sense of enjoyment and satisfaction, dare I say I See the Delight, when I wear an old piece in a new way that gives a serotonin boost rather than a dopamine hit.  Plus, there's no dopamine hit from waiting for a purchase to arrive.  It's a delayed gratification and the brain craves something now which is how you know it's part of an addiction cycle and really bad for you. 

As I have set some more goals for myself to shop less and enjoy more this year, I have been watching content like this to help remind me of why I'm doing what I'm doing and how important it is for my overall wellbeing.  It's good for me not only to hear what someone else has to say about it, but also to think things through for myself, to remind me of why I need to stay the course.  And, since I am trying to spend less, it feels wrong to profit off of others' spending, which is why I'm getting out of the affiliate game.  It's not something I was every really successful at, and not something I want to do anymore.  I don't want to contribute to someone else's financial woes.   So, if you love fashion and outfits, you're in the right place.  And I promise not to tempt you if I can help it.

Outfit Info:  Bea & Dot See the Delight Dress by ModCloth

 

A Spending Diary

As the new year began, I was thinking about and by logical extension talking more about my on-going efforts at becoming more balanced in my spending habits.  If you've been reading the blog for a while, you know that I occasionally talk about wanting to curb my spending.  Over the years I have tried a number of methods to rein in my shopping, and have had success in all spending areas but one--dresses.  In the end, I find that I really do love dresses and it really has been a lifelong dream of mine to have a massive dress collection.  I've also learned that I don't make connections with people easily or often and tend to use my dress collection to fill that void, so starting to form more and better relationships has been a co-goal this year.   The year is slipping by me and I can't say I've had many triumphs socially, but I continue to try. 

I know it may seem hard to believe, but I can stay on a strict budget when it comes to anything but dresses. My home has always been quite moderate, my office has always been orderly and clutter free, but when it comes to my collection of dresses...well, it's safe to say it can be overwhelming.  Since most of my efforts to stop spending have had mixed results at best, I thought I would try a different approach by instigating a Tracking year.  Instead of setting a budget, I decided to just spend 2024 writing everything down.  You can't change habits if you don't acknowledge them.

When it comes to health coaching, the most common place to begin is with a food diary.  Coaches often require their clients to write down every bite they eat for two weeks or more and then go over the data together.  Many people with health issues aren't really aware of what they're eating and have this general idea that they "eat healthy."  If they're very conscientious and honest about writing down every bite, they often find not just the culprits (i.e. lots of sugar or caffeine) but also the patterns (i.e. cravings occur at certain times of day or around certain events/stressors).  

The first step to really being honest about a problem is to focus up and examine it.  Once these patterns emerge, it's much easier to get a strategy in place to address them.  So just like the food diary, I decided this year once again to keep track of every penny.  Not only am I tracking my spending, I have been tracking the days, times of day, and the feelings surrounding each purchase in order to identify my patterns and come up with strategies for success that help me cope with stress and don't involve spending money.

Wow, has it been eye-opening.  And incredibly helpful.  For years I had a really terrible habit of not looking at how much I was spending.  I didn't want to know because I knew it was too much and if I didn't look at it, I could pretend it wasn't that bad or at least plead ignorance.  But, deep down the guilt was always there because while I didn't have a number to acknowledge, I did know it was too much.  Writing it down really has helped me to be aware of my patterns and keep me accountable.  

Again, I haven't stopped spending, because trying to do a No-Buy Year or even a Low-Buy Year when I haven't built a foundation of good habits and self-control in this area would be like deciding to take up jogging by starting with a marathon on day one; in other words it would be a recipe for certain failure.  But being on a Tracking Year felt like a good step in the right direction. As proof of this progress, I just completed a 40 day No-Buy challenge.  That's something I don't think I could have done just a few years ago.  The secret to reaching any goal is to just keep moving toward it.

Now that I have put in the time to build that foundation, a Low-Buy year feels more doable, and a No-Buy year may be on the horizon.  I may not be perfect at it, but as long as I am continuing to improve, I will eventually reach my goals.

Outfit Info:  Caterina Blackwatch Check Swing Dress

Other Things

January 1st is typically the time when people attempt to change.  January 10th a.k.a. "Quitter's Day" is the point at which most people give up on all their New Year's Resolutions.  And so it goes with most attempts to change all throughout the year.  The fact is that most attempts end in failure, and I've been a casualty of that statistic many times in my life.  However, I've long said that one of the major keys to success is: Just keep showing up.  So, I am.  And reading Atomic Habits is part of that.  

I spent a couple of months reading Atomic Habits by James Clear and really trying to digest each chapter before moving on.  During this process I had two revelations that I wanted to share.  First of all, in my attempt to stop my shopping habit, I have tried to replace it with new hobbies.  Clear mentions in the book that this can be tricky because it takes time and effort to learn a new hobby or skill to the point where you enjoy the activity.  In the beginning, it's a struggle and the payoff, in the form of accomplishment and good feelings, just isn't there yet.  Because of that learning curve, and the frustration that it brings, it's easy to give up and go right back to your old habits.  So, when choosing a new hobby to try to replace my shopping as something enjoyable to help me relax, rather than trying something new, I decided to go back to something old that I used to really love and am already somewhat skilled at.  

The second revelation was that I used to have lots of interests and hobbies.  Now I pretty much only shop and pretty much only for clothes.  What happened?  When did this interest become my sole obsession?

I love clothes.  And I realized that I always will.  So, rather than trying to stop shopping, I just need moderation, I need balance again.  I need to go back to having lots of interests, hobbies, and pursuits instead of just one sole obsession.

To that end, I started thinking back to my life "before" and the things I both enjoyed and was already somewhat good at to incorporate with things I want to learn and become good at eventually.  I landed on fitness and Felt.  Strange combo?  Yes, I know, but I have to start somewhere.

You see, I would love to take out all my stress and care by cooking a wonderful meal or creating a marvelous painting.  While I am pretty good at cooking, I find it to be a grind.  And as far as painting goes, I'm just awful at it and it's frustrating.  So, while I don't have to stop working at these things, they just can't be my go-to as a form of stress release or a new good habit.  

Working out has always made me feel better and sleep better and there are some forms of it, like ballet, that I actually enjoy.  By Felt, I am talking about a hobby I picked up in Japan called Felt Sweets and I did a post about it in the beginning days of my blog which you can see here.  As much as I loved it (by the way, not one single person participated in the blog giveaway, so I stopped posting about it) it's a hobby that fell by the wayside once we were back in the states and supplies were a little harder to comeby.

Since these two things check all (for felt sweets) or most (for fitness) of the necessary boxes, I am choosing to try to focus more on them and less on shopping.  In addition, I'm looking at and thinking about other things that I like(d) to do that I can add to the mix for a less obsessed and more well rounded life.

Quitter's day is just a few days away and if, like me, you don't want to become a casualty of this day, I encourage you to find ways to keep showing up, keep trying, and to stick with things and not let go until you get results.

Outfit Info:  Anthropologie Larksong Corduroy Dress-thrifted, Green Turtle Neck-Thrifted, Qupid Shoes are old from ModCloth

Shopping Successes

I started talking about my shopping struggles a few years ago, hoping that putting it out there would really give me some accountability or maybe even support.  Can you guess what happened instead?  People got nasty.  I shouldn't have been surprised, it's the internet after all, but it wasn't just the internet; it was in real life too.  To be fair, there were some who were supportive and encouraging, but that wasn't the end of it.  In fact, it was mostly real-life people, people who called themselves my friends, who were the first to draw blood.  Ah, people.  It's times like this that I really  can see why hoarders feel safer surrounded by towers of things rather than flesh and blood relationships.

What I learnded from that experience is this: be careful to whom you confide your stuggles.  Some people will want to help lift you up; others will use your vulnerability to gossip about you, criticise and destroy you.  I learned a long time ago that we all have problems, all of us struggle in some area, so even though it's not easy to be in the very vulnerable position of honesty about one's faults and failings, ultimately, it is a happier way to live than to be forever hiding things, but it still ok to be selective about whom we choose to reveal the honest truth about ourselves.  "That's none of your business," is a perfectly valid response to questions asked by people you do not fully trust.  To that end I realized that I haven't really talked much about what I have been doing with my struggles with shopping since then though and thought it was high time to delve into that subject once more.  

Over the past couple of years, I have tried a lot of different techniques to help me rein in my spending and haven't been 100% successful at any of them.  That's because I love clothes, like really, really love them.  Ever since I was a very little girl, in fact for as long as I can remember, I have wanted a collection of beautiful dresses.  Now I'm a collector, but there's nothing wrong with carefully curating one's collection.  I have learned that this is something I don't ever really want to let go of completely (God save me from the bland, beige, minimalist wardrobe!) but I can scale back.  I can also be kind to myself when I slip up or outright fail to refrane from spending.  

The main indicator for success at anything is when someone just keeps going, and keeps trying.  So, I keep trying and I can tell with each passing year and with every new attempt, I actually am making progress.  I have had times in my life where each day revolved around online shopping.  Now, I only indulge a few times per week and carefully track my spending.  I still spend more than I would like to, I wish the things I loved didn't cost so darn much, but they do.  

The best thing I can do, is to create a strategy for success that is firmly based in reality.  For example, a lot of the Decluttering and Minimalist Influencers talk about having a No-Buy Year.  And I thought about it, then I realized that for me, having a No-Buy Year would be like deciding to take up running by entering a marathon on day one.  I wouldn't make it; no one would.  You have to train and prepare for a long time to be ready for a marathon and someone who has spent a lot of time shopping can't just switch it off for a whole year cold-turkey.  I do think I might get there one day, but if I don't, that's ok too.   I'm only human, after all, just like those who support me and those who detract.

While I still get new things on a semi-regular basis, I have been trying to focus more on thrifted items in order to help me stay on my budget and I'm pleased to report that I've actually gone months at a time now without buying anything at all and that's huge because I wasn't white knuckling it the whole time, I just wasn't interested in buying anything.  I think the reason, more than anything, is that I am really just feeling at peace with myself right now, not out of control, guilt-ridden, or self-hating, but truly at peace with myself, faults and all including my spending, but also with my place in life, my job, the whole lot.  That is pretty amazing and it inspires me to keep going.

Outfit Info: Dear creatures dress thrifted from ThredUp

The 80/20 Rule

As I've whittled down my wardrobe to re-wear only the essentials, I have found myself wearing this Community Brunch Dress from ModCloth at least a couple of times per month.  It's the perfect blend of whimsical print, vintage style, and toned down colors so I wear it to work or out running errands a lot.  I've had this dress for years and it was one of the very last ModCloth purchases that I made and because of my closet overhaul, I wear it quite a lot.  Since I have so loved this new system, I thought it was high time we talked about it.  It's also high time I post pics of this dress since I realized I've had it forever and never taken a single outfit photo with it.

There is a lot of good advice out there for being conscious consumers and keeping clutter to a minimum.  In all my watching of Decluttering and Minimalist content, I have found a few nuggets of wisdom that I have been able to implement successfully into my daily life.  One of the most helpful has been the 80/20 rule.  The rule in a nutshell and as it applies to this particular blog is that most of us use 20% of our things 80% of the time.  It makes perfect sense because the human race has very little experience with accumulation of goods for much of its history.  Whether because most goods were handmade and therefore difficult to get, or because things were made of natural materials which breakdown over time much quicker than synthetics, or because most people for most of history lived in some sort of peasant status, having lots of stuff is fairly new to all of us and we really don't know what to do with it all.

In order to simplify, and have less decisions for our brains on a daily basis, we tend to gravitate toward the same things over and over and it averages out to about 20% of what we have.  Personally, I have untold hoardes of dresses and yet, when I am home doing farm or housework, I usually wear my gauze overalls with a tank or tee underneath.  They're comfortable and I don't mind getting them dirty.  It should also be noted that that sort of thing used to just be for the weekends, but now I am home more, so those items get far more wear.

Once I realized this, I whittled down my closet to just 20% of its original size in an attempt to really get the most wear out of everything.  This coincided with renovating my closet and really wanting to keep it looking organized and spacious.  And while I can honestly say that I wear everything in there much more, I have noticed that now that there's less in there, I still don't wear everything.  So, when I had 50 dresses in my closet, I probably wore 10 the most.  Now I have 15 dresses in my closet and regularly wear five on a rotation to work and three on a rotation at home.  There are about 3 others that get worn at least once or twice a month for nicer occasions.  So, of my 15 dresses, I am wearing 11 regularly; I am using a higher percentage of my clothes (nearly 75% instead of 20%, essentially flipping the ratio) even though I am wearing only slightly more by the numbers game alone.

The average number of times an article of clothing gets worn used to be 120 times per year*--clothes had a very long lifespan.  Thanks to fast fashion (and I would really like to lay the blame on cheap synthetic fabrics) clothing now usually gets worn as little as 5 times before being thrown away/donated/sold.  That's not nearly enough in my opinion, but I have noticed that after about 5 washes, most of my synthetic stuff is pilled up, scratchy, linty, and generally just ready to be thrown away.  In addition to setting this 80/20 rule for myself, I have also made a commitment to wear each item 30 times before discarding it or putting into storage.   I know some people create a spreadsheet to track the number of times they wear each piece, but I don't want to get that obsessive with this project just yet.

For the present, I am content to let 80% of my wardrobe stay in storage while I really make the most of what I have.  It's kind of a relief to not have to worry about what to wear for a while. because as much as I love my clothes, at times it was really stressful.  In fact, I developed this ritual of picking out my outfits for the whole week on Sunday afternoon.  I enjoyed that process, but it was time consuming and now I just grab the same things for work or play each time and go, and that feels like a perfect fit for my life right now.

Outfit Info:  Community Brunch Dress from ModCloth, Cardigan from YeMak, shoes from Honiara Vintage.

Statistic from *https://www.panaprium.com/blogs/i/times-clothing-worn