How to develop a healthy consumption concept? Maybe you can think of the following:
1) Define your own consumption-book and plan in advance (many apps on the market can do this).
2) moderate consumption, living within our means-commonly known as "how much money, how much to do."
3) torture the real needs-ask yourself before buying something: do I really need it?
Note that these three "master keys" are actually methodology. But regarding the "consumption view", I want to tell my own story first.
When I entered the university on the first New Year's Eve, I decided to give myself a sense of ceremony-I went to Huangshan alone to watch the New Year sunrise. This is the first time in my life that I have traveled alone. I just went to college, and my monthly living expenses are only 1000 yuan. I haven't found the skills to make money yet. Travel expenses are usually saved by me through my teeth. Not much, of course.
There is no need to repeat the journey. I remember very clearly that when I finished my journey and prepared to go back to school from the railway station, there were only a few coins left in my pocket. At that time, Alipay was not popular, and WeChat wallet did not participate in the competition of electronic payment. Those coins were really all my assets at that time. It's getting late, the subway hasn't arrived at school, and the bus has stopped. I sent a message to my roommate with the remaining 1% power of my mobile phone: wait for me downstairs with 50 yuan in 20 minutes.
It sounds like a humiliating and embarrassing experience. In the face of poverty, you have to put down the noble qualities of "being a man" such as self-esteem and face, and humbly seek a solution.
But strangely, poverty seems to be the last thing that young people are afraid of. At that time, friendship was pure. My roommate didn't think there was anything wrong at all. I scrimped and saved for a while, and after I got the living expenses for next month, I also paid her the money. I still laugh and laugh every day, and I don't feel too bitter.
Later, I went to more places and gained more life experience in the same "poor" way (not as bad as the first time, of course).
This early experience actually involves the embryonic form of many phenomena: ahead of consumption-borrowing money from roommates; Invisible poor-at that time, no one thought I was poor; Exquisite and poor-travel one second, eat chaff and swallow vegetables the next.
With the growth of age, these phenomena gradually become more obvious and run through our daily life. For example, you buy clothes you like when you are obviously nervous. And "ahead of consumption" also has more specific ways of existence: flowers and various credit cards. To make matters worse, I don't seem to be as happy as I was in earlier years.
Why is this?
Let's go back to the concept of healthy consumption. There is a word "view" in it, which proves that it is as grand, complex and even changeable as "outlook on life" and "values" And the word "health" is not a mathematical problem. It doesn't have a clear standard. Why else did Qipa say there was still debate?
So when discussing the concept of consumption, I summed up the following three deep-seated problems according to my personal experience:
1) Measure the possibility of your relationship with poverty.
When I was in college, I enjoyed the poor life after every poor trip because I had a lot of room for poverty. At that time, I didn't have any debts to bear, such as rent, credit card repayment, and I didn't need to pay for "face" and "taste". Even if I am too poor to open the pot, I still have a backer-just go home and wipe my face.
As buckwheat said in an article: "Poverty is the privilege of young people. Poverty can be forgiven when you are young, and poverty will become a disaster when you are middle-aged and old. "
Before judging whether your consumption concept is "healthy", ask yourself how much poverty you can tolerate and how much cost you can bear.
If you can't pay the rent, you will put down your self-esteem if you borrow money, and you will be afraid when you see a credit card waiting ... These are all the costs of poverty.
Within the elastic range of poverty, consumption will bring some happiness. Beyond this range, or to the critical value of the range, pain will follow. It may be delayed, but believe me, how happy you are when you spend it, and how painful you are when you are poor.
It is the first principle of "healthy consumption view" to control consumption within the acceptable "poverty" range.
2) Measure the "happiness index" brought by each consumption and its relationship with time.
There are two kinds of satisfaction brought by consumption: immediate satisfaction and delayed satisfaction.
In most cases, in the consumption of "instant satisfaction", the psychological curve of consumers is:
"Consumption occurs-inner short-term satisfaction-satisfaction fades to feel empty (and poor)-desire reappears due to stimulation-secondary consumption-short-term satisfaction ..."
In fact, if you think about it carefully, it is too easy to be satisfied in a short time. Even no matter what you consume, as long as you consume, you can bring some satisfaction. So in this "gray zone" of consumption, you may buy a lot of things that are not needed in life and you don't like after buying them for a few days. But can they really bring us happiness?
I'm sure you've also experienced the feeling of being still in high spirits in the shopping mall, but when you get home, you feel very sorry and empty when you see the balance. Healthy consumption serves "people" and should help us improve our happiness in life. Any consumption that makes us feel empty, anxious and regretful can't be called "health".
Therefore, spending more time "delaying satisfaction" is the second principle of "healthy consumption view".
How to do it specifically? It's actually quite simple. Wait a minute, wait a minute and then make impulse consumption. All the time you spend on a product, the time you save for a trip, will be converted into the time you feel happy after consumption.
They are in direct proportion.
3) More "value-added consumption"
Consumer goods can be roughly divided into value-added consumption and impairment consumption.
I don't wear the clothes I bought in college anymore, but the places I went to and the books I read in college have become bricks to build the wall of my life, which jumped out at a certain moment and brought me memories and help. This is probably the difference between "consumption" and "investment".
Consumption with increasing value and consumption with decreasing value are not the relationship between abandonment and non-abandonment. In the concept of "healthy consumption", their proportion needs to be adjusted: the greater the proportion of the former, the more benefits you can enjoy, and your self, life and consumption will enter a virtuous circle.
This part needs different opinions, and the value of consumer goods needs to be measured by yourself. If a book is bought and shelved, its value will also decrease; A luxury, even if expensive, you think your taste and quality of life will improve, and it has the possibility of value-added; Seeing an exhibition can only increase the value of your circle of friends, but serious thinking may become part of your aesthetic and intellectual knowledge.
To sum up, it is actually very simple to develop a "healthy consumption concept": within the tolerable poverty range, spend more on "delayed satisfaction" and try to increase the proportion of "incremental consumption". These three points are connected by a ring, and each point can only be based on the previous one.
As for methodology, based on the concept of consumption, there is always a set of methods suitable for you that extend from the first three items.