The Secret Reason Having Less Makes You Feel Rich

If I had to describe my 2025 in one word it would be less. Less time on screens, less shopping, less comparison, and just less stuff. But the surprising part is I don't feel like I have less. And it turns out there's a real psychology behind why owning less signals your brain to feel abundance. And in this video I'm going to show you three reasons why less actually feels like more. The science behind it and how to use that information in your home So as I said this year I have really been focusing on stripping away excess. Using no buy months, time off from social media, spending with purpose and intention. And I realized why contentment feels so hard. We are trained to believe that we're just one purchase away from fixing something, right? There's an app that's going to fix your productivity, a serum to fix your face, a gadget to fix your god-awful cooking. Just kidding, I love your cooking and your face. I just don't love your 12-piece air fryer attachment kit. But as I have been retraining my brain to kind of stop chasing fixes, I've actually seen that I was often not buying fixes but buying problems. Everything costs more than just money, right? Things that you buy take up space and time and attention. As you know I love giving the example of my wet dry vac. It was sold as a time saver but in reality it took up space and it needed its own personal cleaning routine. I thought I was buying ease but really I was just buying maintenance wrapped up in the promise of ease. My floors were not any cleaner but my purchase regret was sparkling. We have been conditioned to believe that more will make life easier and better but as I've worked to kind of slow my own consumerism and I've started repeating outfits and using what I own and buying with more intention, I haven't felt deprived. I felt satisfied and in control and I think this is for a few key reasons. So let's dive into those right now. I'm going to follow each one up with actionable steps that you can take to use in your life starting today. When you buy less you end up using what you already own more fully. Your favorite mug that you use every morning or the jeans that fit just right. That one pan that you always reach to it because it just works, right? It gets the job done. You get repeated value from the old. There's a simple psychology behind this and it's called the hedonic treadmill. That is the way that our brain adapts to upgrades in our life. You get a new thing, there's a spike of novelty and then your baseline resets. So in order to feel the same excitement you need to start all over again. Really it should be called like the hedonic hamster wheel but whatever. It causes the appreciation for new stuff to fade but when you allow yourself to buy less you can sort of slow that treadmill. The hamster wheel. Tomato tomato. When you use something again and again like sharpening the same knife, fixing the zipper to wear the same jacket, mending the broken chair, you're not just using it you are investing attention in it. That investment is what we could consider savoring, right? Savoring is like the deliberate noticing and the deliberate appreciating of good things. Science tells us that when people score higher in savoring capacity, which I just have to stop and say I love that. I would like to be a fly on the wall for the study on savoring capacity. Anyways people who have a higher savoring capacity report more lasting happiness from their purchases. So the more that you use something the more it feels like yours. That everyday mug or the boots that you have broken in or the pan that just cooks everything just right. They stop kind of becoming stuff and they start feeling like companions and when your things become companions because you have used them over and over and over again, the buzzing to upgrade them gets a lot quieter. So some actionable steps you can take to savor what you already own to increase your savor capacity. One, pause before you buy. Many people will tell you wait 24 hours before you make a purchase. I personally always suggest the one week rule. Most of the urge to buy will fade as our impulse cools. Number two, use your favorites every day instead of saving them for a special occasion. Every day it's a special occasion. Three, repair before you replace. Every small act of maintenance increases the emotional value of that item and it makes the object feel more like yours. Another reason less actually equals more is because of something called contrast effect. We think more means better but ironically when you see less what's left looks greater. Let me explain what that means. Psychologists have found that our judgments depend very heavily on context and comparison. So your brain does not judge things in isolation. It judges things relative to what is around it. In one famous study from Columbia University, shoppers were shown a display of 24 flavors of jam. Seems like a lot of jams. Almost nobody bought any but when they were shown only six flavors of jams, the sales shot up by 10 percent. That's because analysis paralysis is real. I mean have you ever read the cheesecake factory menu? So if your life is full of new, new clothes, new tools, new gadgets, nothing really feels special in comparison. But when you remove the excess alternatives, what you have left to compare against is less and it feels more special and it really allows your favorites to shine. And that shift helps you feel richer in what you already own. So some actionable steps to use the One, consider cutting your wardrobe down to just your favorites. I'm not saying throw away everything else. Just pack it away in a box somewhere out of sight. When you're left with just your favorites, just your must-haves, fewer options will lead to quicker picks and it will also make the pieces that are left feel more like signature pieces. More special in their own right. And you can repeat the same thing in other categories like your makeup or your kids toys. I recently shared a video where I tried the four toy rule with my kids where each of my kids only got four toys and it was life-changing. And yes, I will link it in the description. Number two, have themed days for meals. I love this because meal ideas are endless, endless options to compare against. And so I like having themes for each day of the week like Meatless Monday and Sheet Pan Tuesday and One Pot Wednesday or whatever. Fewer choices can help make the meals feel a little more intentional. Agency can be defined as your own personal sense of control. By choosing enough on purpose, it reinforces that you are in control. Not the algorithm, not the sales, not the advertisements. You know like when your phone suggests buying the exact thing that you just thought about buying. Not creepy at all. A study of over 1,000 people found that those who practice minimalist consumption reported greater psychological well-being, more free time, fewer distractions, and a stronger sense of control. So by choosing less, you're not just depriving yourself, you're just selecting what matters. You're positioning yourself as the decision maker. What this does is it allows you to start appreciating things that are right in front of you. You allow yourself to move from like what else can I get to what do I have that really matters. Here are some actionable ways to practice agency in your life. One, remove the distractions that can impact your agency. So this would be like emails from advertisers, accounts you follow that are all about products or wanting you to spend or get more or do more or just make you feel less for whatever it is in your life, or shopping apps that send you notifications. Two, declutter. Picking an area in your house that is cluttered and decluttering it down to just the absolute necessities gives one of the hugest feelings of control and satisfaction. Three, consider having an allowance envelope. This is your money for fun that week or month. What it does is it allows you to be a little more strict with your fun money and the constraints of a certain amount sets you up for success. And four, once again the 24 hour or the one week rule really works well here. You'll be surprised how much you don't buy when you use a shopping pause and that will feel super empowering. So there you have it friends my three key reasons that I think less actually equals more and some actionable steps you can take in your life to make these work for you literally starting today. As always thank you so much for stopping by and watching. I hope you're having a fantastic day. Remember to be kind to yourself and to others and I will see you all in my next video.