Originally Posted by calexxia /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Separate post because it's my turn "at the confessional", even though (as stated), I'm technically not on a "no buy". I was, however, proud of the streak I had of 11 days, which ended tonight. It's not huge purchases, but I want accountability here, because I'm trying to stay off the slippery slope. Surprisingly, it wasn't my "freebie run" (which I've still not done) that did me in (Hell, I even missed out on the Nordstrom Philosophy samples because I haven't done it yet). What happened was this: My mom said she's never seen a matte nail polish in her life and was curious about how they'd look. Because most of the mattes I have are kind of...unusual....colors and I was out of matte topcoat, I picked that up. Then I saw a bottle of her favorite polish brand (Sally Hansen) in a color I know she'll love (and she has asked me to make her a goodie box--this, being a gift, doesn't count, but.....it led to the next items). While I was glancing over the clearance rack, I saw the denim Nail Effects strips. Now, I already have the acidwashed ones, but these were the regular denim. I have an event coming up where I want to do a denim manicure, but since these were on clearance, I wasn't going to pass up the bargain price (and they may not be in production anymore!) Finally, I saw that the chubby eye crayons from Wet n Wild (which are wonderful to keep in my desk at work, but which I keep losing--thus why the only makeup I leave in my desk is the cheap stuff) were only .99, so I got the three most important shades--purple, green, and black. All told, I spent a total of $11 if you count tax.
I'm not beating myself up over it. Some folks would be impressed that I got some good bargains, but bargains are what I DO, so that's not a good way to make myself feel better. However, the fact is that NONE of the items were impulses, all of them were purchases that would have had to be made eventually, and if I amortize it over the length of the streak, it's $1/day. I should probably make a point of getting up early enough tomorrow/today so that I have time before work for the Sephora/Ulta run so that I can sort of "get it over with", since I know it's very likely I'll buy more than my free stuff and the one planned purchase (to obtain free stuff). That way, it won't be "here was a long streak, and now, here I am falling off the wagon a few days later". Basically, get what's got to be gotten, try not to do much extra damage, and then start a new streak. *sigh*
The whole thing for me, with the no-buy/reduced buy is that it's really making me much more AWARE of how much I had been spending and of how much surplus I had. If me posting this triggers anyone, I'm sorry, but I genuinely believe that for those of us who ARE compulsive shoppers (not all of us in this thread are, but I know I"m not the only one), sometimes the process of working it through with accountability makes the lessons learned stick longer.
/emoticons/
