The Pursuit of Having Less and Doing More

The more we have, the more we fear to lose

Here are some things I inherited from my mother:

• Large hazel eyes with long eyelashes

• Love of literature and ability to read 2 full books in a day

• Road rage

• Undiagnosed hoarder

She’s had 37 years and much more money on me, but for most of my life I remember the majority of her bedroom floor being covered in clothes and bin bags full of more clothes and miscellaneous items. I’ve cleared her vanity and thrown out notebooks dated before Brexit, receipts, parking tickets, mascaras that had gone brittle, only to have it all respawn months later with interest.

My minimalist, type-A dad long gave up trying to cajole her into clearing out. I once made a valiant effort to sell some on eBay and she successfully antagonised me into never attempting that feat again. We acquiesced and accepted she was a law unto herself. He once joked that had they lived together before being married he might have had second thoughts and I’m not entirely convinced there wasn’t some truth to that.

I thought I leaned more toward my dad, I wasn’t like friends I’d known at school and university who were always lugging in large ASOS sacks. Most of my clothes come from charity shops and Vinted. Even if I had her hoarding tendencies, it’s not like I could afford to actualise them.

It was when my dad moved my things from my flat back to my childhood room I was faced with how much tat I had accumulated over the past years. I haven’t had all of my things in one place since 2021, for the past four years my possessions have been split between my childhood room and wherever I was living in London. Now I have to figure out a way to get all of it in two wardrobes and a chest of drawers and it turns out I am not nearly as frugal as I credited myself.

Overconsumption is so grossly normalised that we’ve become unaware of how much we consume — and how far beyond necessary it is.

Morgan Stanley did a study on annual clothes consumption and found that on average, people purchased 20 new items of clothing per year in 1990, today it around 68 items. I don’t think I came too close to this figure but still, in four years I probably attained around 200 new items of clothing.

In the UK, clothes are worn on average just seven times before being discarded. On a regular day-to-day basis, we only use 10% of our entire wardrobe.
Consequently, 18.6 million tonnes of clothing end up in landfill every year. 60% of the clothes we buy are worn for less than a year.

Why on earth are we buying so many clothes that collect dust in our wardrobe?

There are a myriad of reasons: clothes are cheaper and more accessible, with a few taps you can have a whole new wardrobe delivered to your door tomorrow. They are made cheaper and need replacing more. They are also marketed far more aggressively and cause people to buy clothes not out of necessity but for a quick dopamine hit or to fulfil the latest micro trend.

Clothing has long stopped being about practicality or even self expression, but an indicator of identity. Are you old money in well tailored neutrals, coquette adorned in bows and lace, or cottagecore in a milkmaid dress? Every aesthetic carries its own quiet declaration of socioeconomic status, values, and lifestyle, a visual dialect of belonging.

How many times have I bought a new dress for an event knowing full well I already had one that would have worked, or indulged in a Shein order before a holiday to add to my collection of strappy tops that pill in the wash? I’ve spent hundreds of pounds on an online order because of an impulsive whim to reinvent myself, marking my Renaissance with H&M.

Many of the clothes I held onto were time capsules. The fluffy jacket I got from a charity shop when I first moved to London that is incredibly naff and I never wore again. The jumper my friend gave to me at school that makes my boobs look like a tube. A broderie top I bought in Budapest tinged pink after being washed with my dad’s red socks. The endless tops and bodysuits that resemble lingerie I wore on nights out at university. Why was everything so cropped?

A large number of clothes I got rid of were my “when I’m skinny again” clothes. I weigh about 8 kilos more than I did when I was 19. I’ve filled out, but there’s also muscle and I now run half marathons when back then I could barely run a kilometre. Those clothes aren’t for my body anymore and serve no purpose other than making me nostalgic for a time most of my calories came from alcohol.

I’ll never be a minimalist or a capsule-wardrobe devotee. I’m keeping my school prom dress, the brown fur coat my mum gave me that sheds, and the dress my friend gave me that I hardly wear.

But I feel more untethered now, I had no idea how much anxiety living in my own mausoleum was causing me, wardrobes packed so tightly I couldn’t move the hangers over, belongings I hadn’t seen in months because they’d been squashed into whatever crevice I could find.

I’m at a strange chapter right now, between a flat I share with my ex and my parents house. Many weekends are spent hauling my belongings on trains and public transport.

I want to embrace letting things go, and learning that amassing possessions can’t bring me a happier, more fulfilled life. The person I was in those skimpy bodysuits at university, the bomber jacket I bought when I was 15 with my first ever paycheque, the dress I wore the night he loved me for the first time is still right here, I don’t have to keep those souvenirs to prove she existed.

The money I’ve frittered away on clothes I wore less than a handful of times could have gone into a trip to make lifelong memories, a qualification to boost my career, a hobby or some classes to learn something new.

I’m not going to stamp this phase of moving on with a new wardrobe, accessories or perfume. I want to know that wherever I go next, I won’t be bogged down by having to move mountains of stuff I don’t use or worrying about storage.

On the “having less” leg, I will continue getting rid of clothes either by selling, donating¹ or giving away to my friends. I want to get to a point almost everything I have is regularly utilised and loved. I’ve deleted all shopping apps and I’m not buying anymore clothes unless it’s too replaced those that are damaged or worn out.

I’m not entirely clear on what the “doing more” component will look like as I find myself overwhelmed by how much there is I want to do, and I know I’ll have to make concessions somewhere.

Marathon training will dominate a lot of my spare time, running is therapeutic and I’d like to write a piece about what taking up running has done for me. I want to get back into a consistent writing and posting schedule on SubStack and my book. There’s a qualification I’ve enrolled onto that will significantly boost my career but will take up a lot of time. I want to continue reading, learning, expanding and sharing some of my findings here.

How will you be having less and doing more?

1. I know a large proportion of donated clothes end up in landfill. Everything I donate is in great condition and goes to a small charity shop in my hometown rather than one a city that is inundated with donations. Anything stained/in bad condition gets demoted to cleaning rag.