How to avoid compulsive buying

No, you don't need this new thing.

Have you ever bought something, a piece of furniture, a piece of clothing and all of a sudden, you felt the need to upgrade everything?
You want things that you didn't need before this first purchase.
If this has already happened to you, you are a victim of the Diderot effect.

Denis Diderot was a writer.
Even if he was successful, he lived quite frugally. But the day his daughter decided to get married...
He had to sell his library to pay the dowry.

It was the empress of Russia herself who bought his library for a large sum of money. And Denis Diderot was now a man... very rich. He bought a scarlet robe ... and his robe was so beautiful that everything else in his house seemed bland.
So he began to buy compulsively a lot of other things.
Furniture, carpets, sculptures, everything in his house had to be up to his new acquisition and this first purchase led him to ruin.

Diderot tells this story in "Regrets on Parting with My Old Dressing Gown".

He wrote :
"I was absolute master of my old dressing gown but I have become a slave to my new one ..."

Anthropologists have continued Diderot's work and found that our purchases reflect our identity and personality.
I have been a victim of this effect myself. When I changed my wardrobe after my divorce, I was caught in a spiral where I needed to upgrade EVERYTHING.
I bought watches when I wasn't wearing any.
New styles of shoes, belts... Everything had to be better.
And this effect doesn't only apply to our material goods.
It can affect the places or people we frequent.
That's why we see dramatic changes when a person changes social class, job, gets a promotion...

We have to be careful, especially in a world where we are subject to advertising all the time.
Possessions, even the most trivial ones, have the power to corrupt your judgment.
Reason is your best ally in fighting these behavioral traps.