By Robert Pagliarini,
Tribune Media Services
Tribune Media Services
Alcohol? Crack? Heroin? These drugs are known to be highly addictive, but can something as innocuous as shopping be addictive? Having worked with more than one so-called “shopaholic” at my Orange County financial planning firm, I have no doubt that shopping can become addictive and destructive. I’ve worked with people from vastly different backgrounds who have become shopaholics, from sudden wealth recipients who’ve come into millions of dollars, to the unemployed and destitute who cannot control their addiction. Most recently, Dr. Drew and I recently taped an episode on the “The Ricki Lake Show” where we spoke to a young woman who was a self-diagnosed shopaholic. Her shopping addiction provides valuable lessons for all of us.
First, it’s important to understand what doesn’t work. A shopping addiction is not a disease of intellect; it’s a disease of emotion. Unfortunately, most family members, and even mental health and financial “experts,” make things worse by focusing on the two areas that usually lead to even more shopping: shame and logic. What’s wrong with you? Don’t you know better? How can you be so self-centered and selfish? Trying to use logic is just as ineffective. If you spend too much, you won’t have money to make the car payment, so let’s just budget.
Blah, blah, blah. Shame and logic just don’t work. Shopaholics already feel badly about themselves, and they already know they can’t afford it. Criticism will just lead to more isolation and shopping. So what does work?
1. Identify the shopping trigger. What’s the trigger? What precedes the urge to shop? Boredom? Guilt? Shame? Anger? Is it a particular type of thought? Keep a written journal or electronic (email yourself, record a voice memo, etc.) and document what leads to the shopping.
2. Discover the need shopping fills. Excessive shopping doesn’t serve a functional purpose (i.e., you don’t NEED yet another purse), it serves a psychological purpose — it fills an unfilled or under-filled need. For the non-shopaholic, it looks like “crazy” or irrational behavior. It’s not. The shopaholic is entirely rational. They shop for a reason. It fulfills a need at such a high and satisfying level that they keep doing it. If they don’t find an alternative and healthier way to fill that need, the shopping won’t stop.
Does the shopping provide pleasure, or does it help you avoid pain? In other words, do you shop to feel something you don’t feel anywhere else throughout the day (i.e., a rush, excitement, variety, stimulation, being in control, feeling naughty), or do you shop to avoid feeling something negative (i.e., anxiety, loneliness, fear)? Determine what part of the shopping provides the reward. Is it going with friends (social)? Is it being around others (community)? Is it searching for things? Is it feeling significant? Does the shopping create relationship conflict so you get attention or a sense of connection (albeit negative)? It takes guts and an open mind to analyze yourself like this, but it provides the answer.
3. Replace shopping with something healthier. The shopaholic needs to find a healthier alternative to filling that need. Brainstorm other options. Often you’ll find that someone with one addiction will trade it for another. This is not a positive long-term solution. The goal is to trade in a negative and destructive addiction for one that is positive and healthy, or at the very least neutral. Sometimes it’s just not enough to replace shopping with a healthier habit. In this case, figure out what’s more important than shopping. What do you value more in life? Your children? Spouse? Security? Prestige? Whatever it is, you must link how continuing to shop will destroy what you value most. If you value the love from your family and friends, it’s easy to see that you will ruin these relationships if you keep borrowing and spending.
4. Change your environment. Our environment plays a huge role in our behavior. If you keep a bowl of jellybeans on your desk, it’s clear what you will snack on throughout the day. Use your environment to your advantage. It makes no sense for the alcoholic to “test” their willpower by having a snack at their local bar, and it makes no sense for the shopaholic to be in shopping malls. Create “no-fly zones” — places you cannot go such as malls, stores, etc. You want to remove any ambiguity in your rules. If you don’t, then in the heat of the moment, the shopaholic will rationalize a way to shop. Make a list of the places you can and cannot go. Eliminate any TV watching (at least in the beginning), magazines, newspapers, etc. You basically want to remove any and all cues from your environment.
5. Get support. Kicking an addiction is hard to do alone. Get some help from friends, family or strangers. Debtors Anonymous is a great resource, and they have groups in cities across the country.
Whether you are a sudden wealth recipient or simply struggling to make ends meet, follow these steps to break your shopaholic spending addiction before it is too late.
Robert Pagliarini is a CBS MoneyWatch columnist and the author of “The Other 8 Hours: Maximize Your Free Time to Create New Wealth & Purpose” and the national best-seller “The Six Day Financial Makeover.” Visit YourOther8Hours.com.
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This was printed in the November 18, 2012 – December 1, 2012 Edition
