I feel like the days of mass consumption are slowly coming to an end. At least in my friendship group and I’m so proud to say that that’s the case. I have lived on both sides of the spectrum where I excessively shopped to the point of having clothes seep out my wardrobes and me living in them.
I lived in a tiny apartment in East London and its still mind-boggling to me how I even managed to fit two wardrobes in my room. My love for fashion made me do it, and I was ok with the clothes that I barely wore overtaking my personal space. If it were another human being trying to take as much space in my life, I would probably say: hey watch it there. It’s my personal space, and I require it so back of.
Well, I probably wouldn’t be so rude about it, but I’m sure I would be demanding for that space to return.
This thought leads me to a question of do I value clothes more than another human being? Did I stop myself from making space for a man in my life because my wardrobes were too full to fit his belongings also?
Judging by the type of man I go for, he would probably come with a lot of clothes so how would we ever happily coexist together in my tiny space. Did I subconsciously manifest lack of a permanent man in my life to make space for clothes.
Ok, perhaps it wasn’t that extreme, but ever since Marie Kondo came out on Netflix, one sentence kept replaying in my mind. Only keep what brings joy to your life, and the rest dispose of with gratitude. And when I say dispose of I mean sell on Depop or donate to the local charity.
I have to admit I should’ve sold more than I did, but the laziness and lack of time stopped me from doing so. That and a fear of letting go of my clothes.
I remember the days back in uni when I couldn’t afford to shop much, and I would spend hours aimlessly scrolling through Asos and mentally putting outfits together. Once I started making money, and my blog grew best to believe I had at least seven new outfits every month.
Does a woman who doesn’t go out as much in London need seven new looks every month? I needed it for the gram, my ego said. You can’t let your followers see you in the same outfit more than twice.
As I slowly started moving away from my ego and the need to find happiness in possessions, I started slowly seeing the damage the need to fill that hole with material things is doing to our beautiful planet. My mother, my therapist, my guide, how could I let my habits hurt something so precious and most importantly how could I let it get this far?
I realised after packing 11 boxes on that cold December day that I as an individual have clothes that I haven’t worn once in 5 years. Yes, sure they brought memories to me, and I could wear it again but, I faced a problem of having way too much to dispose of.
I had to make a choice what to keep and what to give away. As my apartment sold, and I was moving to Bali, this deemed to be a challenging task. Especially as I’ve lived at my place for 15 years and as you can imagine, 15 years can produce quite a few outfits.
I remained strong and created a massive charity donation and a pile for sale via E-bloggers. The rest I put into storage, and I only picked stuff that brought me joy and reminded me of the happiest times in my life. I packed one suitcase of clothes to take to Bali with me to wear for the next few months.
The funny thing is, I don’t feel like I miss the clothes I gave up at all. I don’t need clothes. What I love is that I can move freely and travel without much baggage, literally.
I also feel mentally lighter, and I don’t feel attached to my possessions. I don’t need the stuff to be happy. I’m so glad just in knowing that my changes are helping my mental state and the environment.
I’m so excited to be more creative with the rack of clothes I have available to me and to create more outfits from the items I have available to me. I haven’t bought clothes in over three months and it feels amazing.
Similar outfit to the one I’m wearing:
If you are in the same place and have clothes overtaking your life and most importantly you spend a lot of money on clothes, its time to perhaps look into being more sustainable. I urge you to think about how your consumption is impacting your life and the planet and start making small changes.
Sustainable over trendy, small brand over mass-produced unethical fashion brands. Small changes can genuinely impact the earth most positively, and I believe us as consumers need to start thinking about these changes.
I hope you enjoyed this post and that I have inspired you to think about consuming less, especially as it can help reduce the plastic in our oceans. Get creative, shop vintage, create more looks out of the clothes you already have available to you as even the small changes can have a massive impact on the planet.
Tania xxx
