Shopping & Loneliness: A Perfect Match

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Shopping and loneliness go together like a perfectly matched pair of shoes. I was having lunch with two business women friends yesterday and I asked them what they saw as money challenges women face. "When I'm stressed I shop. It makes me happy, sort of." My other friend said, "I eat and it's comforting, but then I feel guilty." Shopping, food - Bingo. Quick Relief - then guilt!
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More Money Will Make You Happier?

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More Money Will Make You How Much Happier?  There is so much pressure in our society to always go after MORE, more, more money. Addictive, anyone?  

But, research shows that after someone’s earning $75,000 a year, more money, even a lot more, doesn’t make them any happier. Well, a little bit happier – about 9% happier.

So, if it’s not true that MORE money will make you happier, what is the truth? According to Happy Money authors Elizabeth Dunn & Michael Norton, (two Harvard professors), there are 3 keys to being happier with your money: 

1) Buy experiences vs. stuff. When students were asked to think about 4 material purchases and 4 experiential purchases and to draw circles and place those circles around a larger circle called SELF - depending on how closely linked each purchase was to their sense of self, the experiential purchases won hands down as being more important.

2)  Make it a treat & SAVE money. If you go to Starbucks every day and spend $5.00 it’s expensive and it’s less of a treat than 1x a week. Try this:  Try limiting your visits to 3x a week or 1x a week for that special latte. and drink regular coffee the other days.  I tell my 5 year old granddaughter Shelby that she can have 2 Hershey kisses after her nap – she looks forward to those and enjoys them thoroughly and rarely asks for more.  Treats have Value. Bonus: How much $$ can you SAVE a week with just that simple adjustment?

3) Buy Time:  One stressed, over-working mother of two children, hamsters and hubby bought a Roomba to help with housework. The $300.00 purchase saved this household time in cleaning and stress. 

Time Affluence: Everyone feels overly busy and you may be shocked, as I was, to hear this bit of research, but the time crunch is due in good part to financial prosperity. In general America is wealthier now than 50 years ago. “Wealthier individuals spend more of their time on higher stress activities shopping, working and commuting." 

”TIME SCARCITY”: increases the value of what’s perceived as scarce: As incomes rise, time seems more valuable!!

The authors recommend not using money to get more time, but to value happier time as an end in itself. Switch the focus from making more money to having more time. Ah...feel better?