Stop Buying Stuff (It’s Making You Miserable)

0:01 By and large, people love buying stuff.

0:04 From old-fashioned marketplaces to shopping centers,

0:07 we’ve always spent time browsing for things to purchase.

0:10 And today, we scour Amazon and Temu from the comfort of our homes,

0:16 with packages arriving at our doorstep.

0:19 But not every purchase is the same.

0:21 In many cases, we buy something we truly need.

0:25 In other cases, we buy something we don’t need, but may be useful someday.

0:30 And sometimes, we buy things for the sake of buying,

0:34 until our homes fill up with useless junk.

0:38 The act of buying isn’t bad in itself.

0:42 Often, it’s necessary.

0:43 But when shopping becomes excessive, it comes with real consequences.

0:48 Philosophers of old, particularly those from ancient Greece,

0:52 were already critical of the human tendency to accumulate material possessions.

0:57 They had insights we can still apply today,

1:00 helping us understand why buying things we don’t need can become problematic.

1:06 This video explores why buying more stuff doesn’t make us happy in the long run,

1:12 and how buying less can lead to more freedom and contentment.

1:16 My name is Stefan.

1:17 This is not an AI voice, I’m a real person.

1:20 Subscribe to my newsletter on Substack to stay updated on all my content.

1:24 You can also support my work on Patreon and find my books on Amazon.

1:29 Thank you.

1:30 And I hope you’ll enjoy this video.

1:38 Shopping isn’t always necessary… or harmless.

1:41 Often, we buy unnecessary items:

1:44 impulse purchases, gadgets we saw advertised somewhere,

1:47 or fancier cars just to keep up with the Joneses.

1:52 More people fall for the ‘will-to-buy’ than they want to admit.

1:56 Buying stuff is directly connected to concerns beyond survival;

2:01 think status, prestige, and social recognition.

2:05 Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer was very aware of people’s perceived

2:09 “place in the estimation of others,” as he called it.

2:13 To his astonishment and disdain,

2:14 people are often more concerned with how they look

2:18 in the eyes of others than with their own happiness and well-being.

2:21 (I recently made a video about his views on external validation,

2:25 if you want to know more.) But the will-to-buy comes with sacrifice.

2:31 Shopping requires money, money requires labor, labor requires time and energy.

2:37 Some people look to bypass this mechanism

2:41 by taking loans or buying on installment plans,

2:44 so they can have what they cannot afford.

2:47 Yet now they have taken on the burden of debt,

2:52 which still requires sacrifice to resolve.

2:55 And what to do with all the stuff?

2:58 Material possessions need maintenance,

3:00 which often costs money, time, and energy;

3:03 the same resources we needed to buy what now demands our care.

3:07 Also, we often get attached to our stuff,

3:11 even the inessential things, loathing the idea of losing what we own.

3:16 And often, quite subtly, we let our possessions decide our lives.

3:20 For example, why adopt the healthy habit

3:23 of walking to work if we have an expensive, fancy car to drive us there?

3:29 But at least owning stuff makes us happy… right?

3:33 Not really.

3:34 In one of my older videos on the question of whether money can buy happiness,

3:39 I mentioned psychology professor Dr.

3:41 Thomas Gilovich, who conducted a 20-year study on the subject

3:45 and concluded that buying stuff could make you happy, but only for a while.

3:51 The thing is: We quickly get used to new possessions,

3:54 then look for something better.

3:56 And when we get that, we get used to it too,

3:59 and start looking for something even better.

4:02 The will-to-buy is an insatiable need that promises much but delivers little,

4:08 always demanding more, and never really ending.

4:11 So, what happens when we stop buying stuff we don’t really need?

4:19 Many centuries ago, there was a philosopher we could easily

4:23 call one of the purest anti-consumerists humanity has ever known.

4:28 He didn’t just talk the talk; he lived his philosophy… to the extreme.

4:33 His name was Diogenes, and he lived in a barrel on the streets.

4:38 He owned almost nothing and rejected social norms, luxury, and status.

4:42 Diogenes was a pain in the butt for the people around

4:46 him because he just didn’t care what they thought of him.

4:50 He once urinated on a man who called him a dog.

4:53 He also spat in a rich man’s face,

4:55 saying that in a rich man’s house, there was nowhere else to spit.

4:59 And when Alexander the Great (who actually admired him)

5:02 asked if there was anything he could do for him, Diogenes simply replied,

5:07 “Yes, step aside, you’re blocking the sun.”

5:10 Diogenes did and said whatever he wanted, because he had nothing to lose.

5:17 And because he had no attachments, nobody could truly harm him.

5:21 Sure, I admit, Diogenes’ example is extreme.

5:24 But the essence of his ‘lived philosophy’ is that the less you have to lose,

5:30 the more freedom you experience.

5:32 When we own a lot of stuff,

5:35 we also have much to lose, thus, much to worry about.

5:38 And when our identity is tied to status and wealth,

5:42 we’re always afraid of not having it.

5:45 And so, we always feel pressure to maintain and upgrade our lifestyles,

5:49 especially when those around us do the same.

5:53 We feel the need to wear certain brands to belong.

5:57 We need German cars because our neighbours have German cars.

6:01 We need the latest iPhone because all our friends have one.

6:06 But Diogenes would say: screw it.

6:08 Let it all go.

6:10 Stop needing stuff, stop needing validation, stop needing approval.

6:15 Not needing all these things sets you free in ways many others are not.

6:21 So, how can we decide what to buy and what not to buy?

6:29 Around twenty years after Diogenes’ death,

6:32 a man was born on the Greek island of Samos who

6:35 would become one of the most influential philosophers of all time: Epicurus.

6:40 Epicurus took a more moderate approach.

6:44 He developed a hedonistic philosophy grounded in reason,

6:47 a practical path to happiness that remains popular today.

6:51 And his path is more than relevant when

6:54 it comes to combating what I’d call ‘toxic consumerism’.

6:58 Consumerism rests on a simple delusion: that buying things makes us happy.

7:05 But the evidence suggests otherwise.

7:08 As mentioned before,

7:09 the happiness that comes with purchases is not only short-lived;

7:14 buying stuff also creates the desire to buy more things we don’t need.

7:20 It’s a double whammy of insatiability and nonessentiality.

7:25 And so, Epicurus was insightful

7:27 in distinguishing between natural and vain desires,

7:30 and in making another distinction

7:33 between necessary and unnecessary natural desires.

7:37 Epicurus argued that following natural,

7:40 necessary desires is sufficient for happiness.

7:43 These desires are easily satisfied, widely available,

7:47 have a natural limit… and we experience pain when they are not met.

7:53 They include the desire for food,

7:55 water, shelter, clothing, social connection, and wisdom.

7:59 Unnecessary natural desires include things like luxurious food,

8:04 fine drinks, or an expensive house.

8:06 They may add to our pleasure, sure,

8:09 but they are not required to relieve pain or to live contentedly.

8:14 They’re okay to follow, as long as doing so doesn’t generate pain.

8:18 “He who is not satisfied with a little

8:21 is satisfied with nothing,” said Epicurus.

8:24 And here’s where the vain desires come in.

8:28 Vain desires usually bring more pain than happiness,

8:31 such as a strong urge for wealth, power, fame, or prestige.

8:36 What characterizes these desires is that they are insatiable;

8:41 it’s never enough, we always need more.

8:44 So, they never really fulfill.

8:46 (To go deeper into this, I made

8:48 a couple of in-depth videos on Epicurean philosophy,

8:52 which you’ll find in my Epicurus playlist.) Now,

8:56 here’s the kicker: Most, if not all,

8:59 of our purchases fit in one of these categories.

9:03 And from an Epicurean viewpoint,

9:05 we should focus on the first category for contentment and pain relief.

9:09 We could dwell in the second one too, but with caution.

9:14 And we must avoid the third one.

9:17 If we look closely and honestly at our purchases,

9:20 we might conclude that many of them may

9:23 add to our pleasure but aren’t really necessary.

9:26 We might not need a better car, fine dining every week, or branded clothes.

9:32 Many purchases are driven by vain desires for prestige,

9:36 wealth, or the need to show off.

9:39 We don’t need these things; we want to be seen, admired, to feel like we matter.

9:46 And that’s a slippery slope, because desires like these have no limit;

9:52 they can never truly be satisfied and often depend on the opinions of others.

9:57 Moreover, when we look closely,

9:59 we see that these purchases add little to our actual well-being,

10:04 while costing us significant sacrifice, and may even lead us into debt.

10:09 So when it comes to status, prestige,

10:12 and excessive wealth… is the juice really worth the squeeze?

10:20 What these ancient Greek philosophers got

10:22 right is that they ‘managed’ their desires.

10:25 They discovered that we don’t need much to be happy.

10:29 And so, many desires are unnecessary, and some may even do more harm than good.

10:35 We can apply this simple philosophy to consumption as well.

10:38 Many, if not most, of the stuff we buy is not needed for contentment.

10:44 And those who buy compulsively are more likely

10:47 to get into trouble than to get satisfied.

10:50 The ancient philosophers were clear.

10:53 The less you need, the freer you are.

10:56 Needing little alleviates the burden of having to buy

10:59 more and all the sacrifices that come with it.

11:03 It reduces the anxiety of losing what we have,

11:06 of not being able to acquire more, and of keeping up with the neighbors.

11:12 And it frees up time, space, and energy for the things that actually fulfill us.

11:21 Thank you for watching.