Try This: Keep the Boxes

Some people genuinely enjoy every piece of their makeup's packaging, including the cardboard box it arrives in. I used to be one of them, especially with special boxes for limited edition products. I'd keep every tube and compact inside its beautiful sleeve, even though it took up a ton of space in my organizers. Initially, forcing myself to recycle these pretty boxes to free up space in my suitcases post-grad-school-move was a challenge. Now, though, tossing the packaging is just something I do reflexively. The card catalogue is the true beauty. Why clog it up?

So after doing some major damage during Black Friday 2018, I decided I'd curb that impulse and hold on to my boxes for a while. Every time I received a new product from December to today, I stashed its box, planning to create a helpful No Buy 2019 visual by arranging everything Tetris-style as above. But even before I pulled out the boxes and lined them up, the trick was working: the envelope I was keeping all of the boxes in kept overflowing and spilling all over my office floor. It was frustrating, and that frustration reminded me that I don't need more stuff. Hell, between the start of the year insanity at my jobs and several personal crises, I haven't even had a chance to test everything you see in this photo!

Hence, if you're like me and you're attempting a No Buy, or you want to curb your spending and you benefit from visual arguments, keeping the boxes for a while might be helpful. If nothing else, they make for an interesting photograph.