I am not your financial advisor. I am your financial bully.

I hope to persuade you to discard, delete, cancel, and ignore the junk corporate oligarchs are trying to sell you. I hope to fear-monger a little. I hope you feel a bit shamed.

Mostly, I pray I convince you.

This is propaganda for a life-long strike from corporations that want your money for cheaply made items from god-knows-where and drop-shipped straight to your front door.

You do not need those things. Your children don’t, your parents don’t, your pets don’t.

The problem is that we keep participating in a system that only works if we keep buying. But everything falls apart when you stop participating, because no one can play a game by themselves.

So stop playing! Because you are LOSING!

01. the trash in question

Everything.

The endless stream of products, subscriptions, upgrades, and services exist to keep your thumb on the “Checkout” button. Online shopping, fast fashion, food delivery, etc. — all touted as necessary parts of a good life.

But most of this s**t is not necessary, it is just convenient.

Convenience has become the most profitable product ever sold. In a couple of clicks you can have virtually anything shipped to your front door within days, even hours. The friction of acquiring goods has disappeared.

And with it, the question of whether or not we needed those goods in the first place.

02. refusal

The first step is to stop spending.

No subscriptions.

No food delivery.

No unnecessary tech or car upgrades.

No impulse shopping. No more Amazon, no more TikTok Shop, Temu, Shein, or Zara.

Cut up your debit card and order a new one so online stores no longer have your payment information saved. Purchasing shouldn’t be this simple— friction is your friend.

If you have to buy something online, make sure you at least have to find your debit card and manually enter the information, so there’s enough friction to discourage repeating the process.

03. the mindful practice of money

Now you need to know exactly how much money you have.

Budget everything. You should know precisely how much money you have at all times. No approximately. Exactly.

My biggest tip: use cash whenever you can.

Cash forces awareness. When the money leaves your hands, it is gone. There is no swipe, no delayed realization, no vague sense that you spent too much.

Digital clutter matters, too. It hides the signals that help you control your spending and amplifies the ones that encourage you to spend more. Most digital clutter is advertising, and it distracts us from important financial messages. When those signals are harder to see, it becomes harder to track where your money is going.

If you actually use your personal email, clear it out. The only emails you should be receiving are from your doctor, the bank, and your job.

Declutter your digital space. Declutter your physical space.

The fewer messages trying to sell you something, the easier it becomes to ignore them.

04. change! NOW

There are two things you must prioritize this year, and for the rest of your life.

* Become radically anti-consumerist.

* Acquire life skills that offset consumer pitfalls.

That means learning how to mend things instead of replacing them. Fix the belt loops on your pants. Learn how to replace the A/C blower motor behind your glove box that’s making that weird clicking noise.

You should know how to repair small problems before they turn into large purchases, and you should know how to maintain the things you already own.

No more buying s**t!

05. e.g.

I have spent an incredible amount of money on my hair.

From birth to adulthood, my hair has been the single highest price tag in my life. Oils, serums, mousses, new styles, new products, wigs, weaves, you name it— over and over again.

One day I realized that I was giving money to companies and businesses with histories I did not know, and with products whose origins are as unknown to me as the bottom of the ocean. All of this spending.

Two years ago I loc’d my hair.

Since then I’ve been using up the products I bought years ago. I still haven’t reached the end, and I’ve given many away.

And I know I made the right decision because I’m still the hottest b***h in the room.

06. what we’ve lost

We’ve stopped asking our neighbor for sugar.

In our race for the best and most valued products and services, we have lost the need for mutual obligation within our local communities.

Instead of relying on neighbors, friends, or family, we now try to own everything ourselves. We want every tool, every service, every product available at the push of a button so that we never have to rely on another human being ever again.

When we stopped relying on each other, we started outsourcing our money to third-party sellers who send us soulless products from warehouses full of underpaid workers.

Economic frameworks are also social frameworks.

Our relationships, power dynamics, and long-term obligations are shaped by how we exchange goods and services, regardless of how the exchange happens.

07. conclusion

A major reason the economy stays afloat is consumer purchasing. When people stop purchasing, things change. Entire industries depend on the assumption that we will continue buying things we do not need. The system depends on participation.

And the moment participation stops, the system becomes unstable.

There must be a change in the way we acquire goods. We must start bartering, mending, and making things again. Immediately.

No one in the world is more important than the next.

We are the currency. Move accordingly.

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