How To Resist Online Shopping When You’re Stuck At Home
Now that everyone is stuck at home, the temptation to online shop is almost irresistible. If you find yourself struggling to avoid hitting the “submit order” button, you may need some assistance. Here are some tips for how to resist online shopping when you’re stuck at home!
Create A Monthly Budget
It is important to keep track of your finances, especially when you may have less income than normal. Creating a monthly budget is one of the most important things you can due while stuck at home. You have to take care of all of your bills and make all of your essential purchases on a monthly basis. Budgeting your finances is a great way to put all of this into perspective. You may find that you do not have the extra funds to order those speakers or that dress.
Creating a monthly budget is something that you should be doing anyway, regardless of being quarantined. You might be surprised at how you have been spending your money. It is entirely possible that you have been spending more money on your online shopping than you have on food.
Create A 30 Day Plan
Similar to your monthly budget, creating a 30 day plan can be helpful in your attempts to avoid online shopping. While your monthly budget is intended to help control your spending, your 30 day plan is intended to keep you busy. Plan out your days in advance. For instance, you could plan to cook a challenging meal every Friday for a month. Similarly, you could plan out date nights with your significant other. The important thing is to keep yourself occupied, so that you’re not staring at your Amazon wishlist.
You could also have your 3o day plan consist of personal goals. For instance, you could set health goals for each day. Now is a great time to begin adopting healthy habits. Whether it is healthy eating or working out, you can plot it out with your 30 day plan. If your need to shop is that drastic, you can use online shopping as a reward for completing your goals. Just remember to keep your online shopping to a responsible minimum.
Start A Quarantine Journal
Hopefully you’re starting to notice a familiar thread between these suggestions. It is important to stay organized and keep track of your activities, especially when you’re stuck at home. Days tend to blend together when you’re quarantined, so why not keep track of them in a journal?
Writing in a journal is a great way to take stock of your situation. What have you been doing well? What could you do better? How long have you been stuck in your apartment? These are all questions you could address in your quarantine journal. Another beneficial aspect of journaling is that it requires you to write. Writing is a fantastic way to exercise your mind. It is also worth noting that there are no rules or guidelines to journaling. You can include a poem or a short story in your journal. You can add illustrations to your entries. Your journal is what you make it!
Unsubscribe From Mailing Lists
Mailing lists are the telltale sign of a true shopaholic. If you’re signed up to multiple mailing lists on purpose, you may need to reevaluate your online shopping habits. Think of your email inbox like a messy room. You want a clean room, right? Well, your email should receive the same treatment.
Unsubscribing from mailing lists a great way to reduce clutter in your email inbox. If you are constantly inundated with spam mail, you can focus on more important emails. Mailing lists exist to get you to online shop. If companies don’t have a way to advertise to you directly, then the temptation to shop might disappear. Unsubscribing from mailing lists is possibly the easiest way to reduce your online shopping.
Pick Up A New Hobby
Since you’re stuck at home, you might as well find a new hobby or interest. If you’re addicted to online shopping, then you need to find a way to reduce your screen time. The less time you spend staring at your computer screen, the less likely you are to fill your online cart. Now is the time to rekindle your old interests or acquire new ones. Maybe it’s time to go back to that book you never finished and give it another go. If you have a list of films you’ve been meaning to watch, now is the time to catch up.
Think of your newly found free time as a positive. You have so much time to better yourself and learn new skills. If you’ve ever wanted to learn to play an instrument or if you haven’t practiced in a while, now is the time to pick it up. You can also take this time and use it to learn skills that will make you more employable when this quarantine inevitably ends. For instance, you could start taking online Spanish lessons. The most important thing is that you’re using your newly acquired free time effectively. Surely, by the time this quarantine ends, you’d rather have accomplished your personal goals than racked up credit card debt.
Save Money For A Bigger Purchase
If you’ve tried everything on this list and still find yourself compulsively browsing your favorite online retailer’s site, then it might be time to try saving money for a bigger purchase. Normally you don’t want to combat your shopping problem with more shopping, but it can be effective. Essentially you’re giving yourself a more appealing reason to save money.
Online shopping adds up quick. If you were to save the money that you would normally spend shopping online, you would more than likely have a sizable sum. Is there a big purchase you’ve been waiting to make? Now you have that extra cash for whatever that purchase might be. Eventually, this pandemic will pass and you won’t be stuck at home. The travel industry is going to hopefully see a major resurgence. If you start setting aside money now, when you’re stuck at home anyway, then you should have a sizable travel fund when this is all over.
