After speaking at the Annex we got connected with a reporter at the Calgary Herald, named Robin Summerfield, who wanted to do an article on what we are doing. Here is the article:
Some people cut out dairy.
Others abstain from sugar to make them feel better. Some pass on alcohol to cleanse body, mind and soul.
Tom and Malora Mulhern are cutting out the mall.
The Cochrane couple and their three-year-old son Noah are on a year-long shopping detox — an experiment in not spending.
“We wanted to experience what life would be like if we weren’t consumers,” says Tom, 26, a youth pastor at Dalhousie Community Church in northwest Calgary.
“We want to simplify our lives and break our buying habit and enjoy our family, and not be, ‘What else can we get?’, ” adds Malora, 27, a care provider who teaches a hearing and vision-impaired student.
While they weren’t big buyers to begin with and don’t carry huge debt like the majority of modern North Americans, the couple admits they found themselves inside malls killing time and armed with shopping bags far too often.
“We’re addicted. It’s a habit. We don’t know what to do with our time so we go shopping,” he says.
That feeling didn’t sit well.
So on Jan. 1, the day countless North Americans set upon their new year’s resolutions to eat less, exercise more or quit smoking, the family of three stopped buying. (For his part, Noah wasn’t a big spender.)
They’re documenting their annus notshopus on their blog, ourcompactlife.com.
Their motto? Less is more.
They’re not hippies, they’re not extreme environmentalists, they’re just trying to break their buying habit, they both say. The experiment — which will most likely save them thousands of dollars, seriously declutter their home and ultimately downsize their stuff — is meant to be a personal examination of their own lives, not a criticism of others’ spending and consumption, they stress.
“We didn’t want to come off as, ‘Look at us, look at how good we are.’ We didn’t want that at all,” says Tom.
“We didn’t want to be judgmental,” Malora adds. “This is about examining our own choices, not judging people for theirs.”
Their so-called “experiment” of not shopping for a year was inspired by a larger, grassroots, non-consumerism movement that has been happening in the U.S. for the past few years and is slowly spreading to Canada. (The Mulherns read about it in Good magazine, a social issues periodical, late last year.)
The movement, called The Compact, was started in San Francisco by a group of nine environmentalists who banded together and decided to stop buying for a year, starting on Jan. 1, 2006.
The idea was to reduce their impact on the environment by reducing consumption, thereby reducing their contribution to the local landfills.
Instead of buying, they borrowed, bartered or bought only secondhand, excluding food, medicine and safety-related items. Underwear and toilet paper were also exceptions to the rule.
Their blog, sfcompact.blogspot.com now has links to other compact groups across the States, in Mexico, the U.K., Hong Kong and in Canada. In the States, a Yahoo compact group (groups.yahoo.com/group/thecompact) has almost 9,000 members. In Canada, a similar group (groups.yahoo.com/group/compactcanada) has only 95 members.
It’s about going beyond recycling, the San Francisco group proclaims on their website, and trying “to counteract the negative global environmental and socioeconomic impacts of U.S. consumer culture.”
It’s ultimately about simplifying their lives too or, as they call it, to “calm-pact” their lives.
This commitment to not consume, even on the small scale of one family, can make a tremendous impact on the environment, says Natalie Odd, executive director of the Clean Calgary Association.
Not buying means not extracting resources, means not wasting and polluting in production, means not using resources in distribution, all the steps all the way down the line, Odd says.
But more than just that, not consuming is “about simplifying and enriching your life,” she says.
Reducing clutter and not buying, Odd says, removes the distraction of stuff, brings sanity and better mental health to your life, makes you more creative as you learn to make things or re-tap into hobbies, and it helps you re-connect with your family.
It can also inspire others, she adds.
“Ideas and concepts like this can catch fire,” Odd says. “People get interested and start asking questions and it can spread to family and friends.”
If you do decide to take on a prescribed period of not buying, Odd suggests talking to family and friends about it before starting to explain your reasons, discuss your motivation and hopefully get those around you to support your efforts. She also suggests seeking out others doing the same thing to help create a community of support.
But starting today, anybody can do this on a much smaller scale than complete abstinence, she says.
Odd says people should ask themselves these three questions before making any and every purchase: Do I really need this? Do I really need to buy this new? Where does this product come from?
Meanwhile, in the Mulherns’ case, abstinence from buying precludes those questions.
But they have mapped out a list of ground rules and parameters to help them navigate their year of living frugally.
“We thought, ‘If we do this, we have to do it so it’s attainable,’ ” Tom says.
To that end, the family (obviously) can buy groceries and medicine, and anything for safety purposes (like new lightbulbs). They will buy only necessary second-hand clothing for themselves or their son. Underwear and socks are the exception to the no-new-clothing rule.
They will also allow themselves to eat out occasionally at restaurants to mark a holiday, anniversary or a special event with friends.
They will only buy, second-hand mind you, when things break down or must be replaced. They’re encountering minor challenges — like when their computer screen died — to overcome. In that case, friends gave them their old computer screen to use.
Since Jan. 1, they’ve spent more time outdoors in the mountains and together as a family, Tom says. Malora can also be found regularly at her sewing machine, making clothes from vintage fabrics sourced from second-hand stores.
Yet, they still have nine and half months to go.
But so far, the experiment seems to be working.
“I’m really liking it a lot,” Malora says. “I feel like I’m so much more content with what we’ve got.”
“We have so much excess and we’re learning to share that excess,” Tom adds.
And then Malora offers up some evidence that their year-long experiment in breaking the buying habit might just be taking root.
As she says: “The less you buy, the less you want to buy.”
Robin Summerfield, Calgary Hearld
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© The Calgary Herald 2008
Link to article
Our blender broke last week… so we are in search for another one. It is dangerous to go into thrift stores though- DANGER. So, I bought somethings I didn’t need. I am a bit of a cheater.