An overshopper who completed the Stopping Overshopping Program read Mindfulness and Money shortly after she’d finished the work of the program. She recommended it highly. We asked her if she’d consider writing a short review for the newsletter and she’s graciously accepted. Two years ago, I was deeply in debt and fighting the urge to… Continue reading Recommended Reading: Mindfulness and Money: The Buddhist Path of Abundance
Category: Money Behaviors
Face the Facts About Your Credit Card Debt
Credit cards are the ultimate legal drug in a materialist culture, deceptively empowering and beautifully insulated from the feel of spending. They are designed for impulsiveness. And what comes with that impulsiveness is a set of extraordinarily harsh repayment terms. So for overshoppers, the first thing to know about credit cards is: put them away… Continue reading Face the Facts About Your Credit Card Debt
Does Money Make us Independent, Indifferent, or Stingy?
A recently published behavioral study ties together nine experiments, each one designed to test the effect of money consciousness on some aspect of social behavior. Using random samples of students and non-students at three universities in different parts of the country, the experimenters divided their subjects into two groups. One group was “money primed,” subtly… Continue reading Does Money Make us Independent, Indifferent, or Stingy?
Recommended Reading: Secret Keeping: Overcoming Hidden Habits and Addictions John Howard Prin (New World Library, 2006)
Shame and denial about their behavior propels many overshoppers to hide this addiction—from other people and from themselves. While Secret Keeping does not address the compulsive buyer directly, its focus on the keeping of guilt-laden secrets—and on the compromises and consequences that such a life stance mandates—is very pertinent. According to Prin, secret keepers lead… Continue reading Recommended Reading: Secret Keeping: Overcoming Hidden Habits and Addictions John Howard Prin (New World Library, 2006)
Research Reported in the New York Times
Three recent articles in the New York Times attracted our attention. “Money Doesn’t Talk,” by Shivani Vora, looks at the practice among women of disguising some of their purchases by paying cash, a practice that has grown in recent years even though more and more women are themselves wage earners. Why do they do it?… Continue reading Research Reported in the New York Times
Recommended Reading Green with Envy: Why Keeping Up With The Joneses is Keeping Us In Debt
Haven’t we been taught to believe that envy, the only vice warned against in both the Ten Commandments and the Seven Deadly Sins, is a seriously destructive emotion? There are exceptions. Shira Boss’s envy of her neighbors in the apartment next door was the productive seed that grew into this unusual look at an aspect… Continue reading Recommended Reading Green with Envy: Why Keeping Up With The Joneses is Keeping Us In Debt
Shopping: A National Pastime in Asia
Shopping for shopping’s sake has become a “national pastime” for many Asian countries, a global online survey done by AC Nielsen suggests. Of the top ten markets where people shop regularly for recreation, seven are in Asian countries: people in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Thailand rank the highest in the world. On average, they shop… Continue reading Shopping: A National Pastime in Asia
Financial Education in the Workplace
On August 16th, a persuasive online article appeared about the harmful effects that financial stress has in the workplace. Jeffrey Strain, who authors this website, cites research that shows greatly decreased efficiency and effectiveness in financially stressed workers. He argues that companies would do well to promote healthier lifestyles in their employees by offering financial… Continue reading Financial Education in the Workplace
Extreme Overshopping Leads To Legal Troubles
Lisa Walker, 42, of New York City, more commonly known as Antoinette Millard, charged nearly a million dollars of goods on her no-limit American Express card during a three-month period in 2004. The former investment banker, who quit her job and pretended to be a Saudi Princess, tried to buy her way into high society.… Continue reading Extreme Overshopping Leads To Legal Troubles
Recommended Reading: Give It Up! My Year of Learning to Live Better with Less By Mary Carlomagno (New York: Harper Collins, 2006)
Each month, for a year, Carlomagno chose to do without one of her favorite things: alcohol one month, shopping another, cell phones, dining out, elevators, multi-tasking, television, taxis, coffee, chocolate. Her discoveries and observations, which she shares in an easy, anecdotal style, confirm her book’s title: we can indeed live better by living with less.… Continue reading Recommended Reading: Give It Up! My Year of Learning to Live Better with Less By Mary Carlomagno (New York: Harper Collins, 2006)