Here are 3 links I enjoyed this week.  For all of us who need encouragement and purpose with the things we own:

1. Read this if you ever plan on buying jeans again. Alden Wicker from EcoCult talks about the ethical costs of manufacturing jeans in great detail. The take away point: if your brand new jeans cost less than $100, it probably killed someone (or is in the process of killing someone).  I’m guilty too, eek.
2. Here’s another one from Alden Wicker entitled “I don’t buy fast fashion, and apparently people don’t like me because of it”; the study she cites re-affirms why I choose to keep what I write about here separate from my personal life.  People don’t like being told how they should behave and don’t want to feel judged.  And if you proselytize your views, even if it’s just about clothes and things, people won’t like you (and everyone wants to be liked).  I’d feel uncomfortable if a friend or relative felt ashamed to tell me about a big shopping haul or talk about the opposite to win my favor.  I’m more comfortable with  the idea that people find this site because they sought out the topics I write about here; my readership has grown slowly, and organically that way.
3. Here’s an interesting article that came out during the economic downturn in 2008, by the APA (American Psychological Association), about the psychology of overconsumption.  Take home point:  “People may have more physical objects and possessions now than they had in previous generations, but many of them are deeply unhappy… Psychologists can be part of a movement to push back some of the influences of commercialism in our lives.” This is the first time I’ve read about mental health clinicians addressing commercialism–all very exciting to me!