How to Stop Your Shopping Addiction (the easy, fun way)

Want to stop your shopping addiction once and for all? Are you sick of your shopoholic tendencies and want to claim back your money and time? Well, with this easy and fun two phase approach, you CAN quit your shopping addiction! 

A shopping addition is both expensive and time-consuming. You spend hours browsing the mall or online shops spending money left and right on whatever your vice is – shoes, clothes, bags, vacations, gadgets, food.

To save your money and your time, you must stop your shopping addiction problem.

There are two phases to quitting a shopping addiction. These are two practical, actionable steps to stop your shopping problems. These won’t help you with the psychological reasons for your shopping addiction; it will simply help you stop spending money and time shopping.

Phase 1: Go on shopping sprees, WITHOUT your wallet

I’m about to give you the keys to the castle. The first phase of stopping a shopping addiction is to SHOP! Yes, you heard right, shop till you drop.

Go to the mall, walk through every store, try on everything your little heart desires. The fancy shoes, the glittery top, the jeans that make you look 10 pounds skinnier. Go crazy zigzagging through the mall.

BUT, big but here, don’t buy a thing. In fact, leave your wallet in the car or at home. You can’t bring any money with you as you go on these shopping trips. You don’t want to be tempted to actually purchase something.

Don’t forget to go shopping at home too. Hop online and head to your favorite stores’ websites. Fill up your cart. Keep clicking things; get a few different colors. Fill those virtual carts.

BUT, don’t buy anything. Never enter in your credit card information. Never hit that ‘purchase’ button.

During this phase, you are getting the thrill of shopping, but you are not spending a dime. This phase starts out as very fun. You get your dream wardrobe (or dream whatever your addiction is), but it’s not affecting your wallet. You are feeding your psychological need to shop, but your credit cards aren’t whining. Your shopping addition now is only a time-commitment, not a money suck.

Shopping without spending (Phase 1) should last a few months. Eventually, you will stop experiencing the high you used to get from shopping. This phase will train you to not expect to get anything while shopping. You’ll get out of the mindset of buy-buy-buy (I know you did the NSYNC hand motions there). You just won’t experience that same feeling you used to get when shopping.

Phase 2: Shop less, then less, then only shop when you need something

In Phase 1 you shopped and shopped and shopped. Maybe you did it every day for weeks or months. You went to the mall, you walked down main street, you opened a 100 tabs on your browser as you online shopped. In fact, you probably got sick of shopping.

If you are reading this before you attempted Phase 1, you probably won’t believe me. You are probably thinking “I could never get sick of shopping.” But if you do it a lot, to an extreme, you will eventually get bored. Especially if you aren’t coming home with prizes. You just won’t experience the same satisfaction you used to get.

So naturally, Phase 2 will happen when you shop less, and less, and less. Instead of going to the mall every weekend, you go every other weekend. Then once a month. You’ll slowly stop mindlessly clicking on your shopping sites. It’ll just happen.

Eventually shopping will become a chore. You’ve trained and brainwashed yourself into thinking this way. That’s good.

Now, you need to learn to shop the healthy way. Start creating a list of the things that you need. Only when you need something are you allowed to go shopping for it. It’ll seem like a chore.

Will this method really help you stop your shopping addition?

Honestly, I was never a crazy shopoholic. But when I started to aggressively pay off my debt by sticking to a strict budget, I felt a major need to shop. My debt and my budget prevented me from shopping, so of course that’s all I wanted to do. I had this major urge to shop and I gave into that urge. During a time when I had no money to spend, all I wanted to do was spend money. Buying anything, even if it was shampoo, would give me the shopping high we all know and love.

The mile-long credit card bills came. The stress about paying off my debt started to build, and build, and build until I was ready to explode. The useless stuff started cluttering my apartment. One day, I knew I just had to solve this shopping problem. And so I followed this two phase approach, and it worked. While I still like to buy stuff, I no longer have a shopping problem. It’s no longer an addiction or compulsion. I shop when I need something. Or when I really, really want something.

Do you have a shopping addition? What do you love to buy? Do you think you can stop your shopping addition?