Buy only what you need

The problem for our contemporary generations is buying without thinking.

I am the first to do it!

Or at least I was the first to do it. Today, before each purchase, I take 15 minutes to reflect and ask myself 3 questions:

1. How can I do without this purchase?
2. Can I make it by hand or get it second-hand?
3. Will my life be enriched by this purchase?

A friend was telling me only yesterday that you make money when you buy, not when you resell. The same goes for restricting purchases. Why not simply do without things that will end up in a drawer?

With D.I.Y., I have also learnt that more or less everything sold has had a prototype, made by hand before industrialisation. So why not make your own?

I have also learnt that we take greater care of what is reusable, and even more of what we have created. So why not try the D.I.Y. adventure?

But that is not the main subject. Let us return to our wallets.

By trying barter, second-hand goods and handmade things, but also giving away or selling what we no longer need, we also do some housework in our heads and simplify our lives.

How many of you have spent hours searching for an object buried beneath other unused objects?

This treasure hunt is one of the biggest sources of stress in our homes. Our unconscious knows very well that these objects exist, even when we are not looking for them.

If everything had a place and we gave away or exchanged the useless objects in our homes, our lives would become twice as simple.

Let us take an example together of a purchase made on the impulse of emotion rather than reflection, most of the time, at least in my case initially:

The printer!

I am touching a sensitive point in our frenzy of uncontrolled buying. We live in societies that keep asking us for more and more paper, while the planet’s current state would encourage the opposite.

No matter, “Business is Business”. Words are not actions.

Do we need a printer at home, a scanner or even a fax? Are we so important in bureaucratic terms that we can afford to enrich an economic model working against the planet and our wallets?

You will have understood that I am not closing the door on this often useful industry. I just want to ask myself the questions for my own case: do I need to print at home?

Minimalism also means getting rid of electronic objects that are used very little and can be replaced.

A short list of “questions against questions” to make us think:

1. Can I do without the scanner? Why not use the phone’s camera and some good dedicated apps? GOOGLE / APPLE Let us try and see the result. A digital camera works very well too. Most of our scanned documents are destined for a bureaucracy demanding ever more proof to discourage you. If governments in several countries accept scans made from photos, even for sensitive files such as immigration, why would your insurance company refuse them? Use technology to make those big devices obsolete, the ones working against your wallet and the space in your home.
2. Can I do without the printer and its ridiculously expensive ink cartridges? Do I really need to print this document, and if so, how many times a year do I have that same obligation? We no longer talk to our local shopkeepers as our elders once did, but let us be pragmatic rather than nostalgic. Let us simply search for printing places in our neighbourhood! For administrative documents, go to the town hall, your elected representatives’ offices or the post office and ask them to print the documents you have put on a USB stick, free of charge. Fortunately, many can now be sent by email. But do not buy ink and a printer for administrative papers to send. They do not deserve it and should instead give us the opportunity to respect the environment through strong commitments such as going paperless.
3. How are my ink cartridges recycled? In which bin or container should they go? I went to the recycling centre two months ago, before parting with my printer, offered to the centre to find another owner; an association might need it too, so ask around. Anyway, I asked the staff where I could leave my cartridges. The answer: in the rubbish! So I took my cartridges back and searched the internet. Locally, in Whistler, where I currently live, I found this link. I therefore invite those deciding to keep their printers to contact Think-food, which recycles ink cartridges and donates the profits to the food bank. You will find their contact details through this link here. If you do not live near Vancouver, I invite you to search the internet for how to recycle your ink cartridges.

Of course, minimalism does not mean rejecting technology or progress, but using it pragmatically. Most objects intruding into our homes are more dust traps and sources of stress than anything else.

How much money could you save by printing only when you have no choice, locally at a nearby business or institution?

If you want to take stock today as I did, you will have the opportunity to remove a big thorn from your foot. Let us not even mention printers that forbid black-and-white printing unless you replace a colour ink cartridge. Could it all be organised to take our money? Let us be more cunning than them and do things differently.

This example is mine. I do not want to target or judge anyone. Everyone must decide how to manage their own life. This reflection is based on the steps I have taken to become a minimalist and simplify my life.

I apply the same thinking to all my purchases and the things I own, to organise my life better and use my money differently.

So, will you buy a new printer tomorrow for only $45, with more than $200 a year spent on ink cartridges that are difficult to recycle?

The theory of the cheap razor and its overpriced blades… The printing world has organised it for us without the slightest shame.

As for me, I shave the old-fashioned way with easily recyclable blades, and print only when I need to, giving work to the local shopkeeper. I refuse paper as much as possible and use progress to send everything I can digitally.

The benefits I have noticed from my considered purchases:

1. More money to use for travelling, in my case
2. Less stress and no headaches
3. More simplicity
4. Better socialisation through supporting local businesses
5. Less paper, less dust and more time
6. More space in my home
7. Better organisation of things
8. No more treasure hunts of horror
9. Fewer waves and electronic devices around me
10. The pride of serving future generations and the planet, humbly of course

BONUS: Also write beautiful letters with your own ink and a glass dip pen. Stop printing and be creative.