Here’s a question I get all the time, and it makes complete sense that you’re asking it: “Imogen, I keep buying things I never wear. What is wrong with me?”
Nothing. Absolutely nothing is wrong with you. But something very interesting is happening in your brain, and once you understand it, you’ll have a much better chance of actually stopping.
Let’s get into it.
Your brain is the problem (not your willpower)
Research has found that your brain releases dopamine, the neurotransmitter associated with reward and motivation, in anticipation of going shopping. Not when you’ve bought the thing. Before.
So the good feeling, the little buzz you get browsing a sale or scrolling through a new collection, that’s dopamine doing its thing. And here’s the tricky bit: FMRI studies show that brain activation begins before the purchase itself. Simply viewing desirable products lights up your reward centres.
What this means in plain English: by the time you’ve decided you want something, your brain has already had its reward. The actual item is almost beside the point. You’ve been outmanoeuvred by your own neurology.
This is not a character flaw. It’s just how brains work.
Knowing this? Treat shopping like visiting a museum. Enjoy the experience, but you don’t have to bring anything home.
You’re shopping for a fantasy version of yourself
Consumer psychologist Kit Yarrow has spent years researching exactly this, and her findings are quietly devastating. She discovered that clothing is often purchased based on a fantasy people have about themselves. Shoppers imagine themselves as the sort of person who goes on cruises, attends black tie events, goes camping, or who is slimmer than they are. They buy for the person they imagine they’re going to be, not the person they actually are.
I want you to sit with that for a moment, because it explains so much wardrobe chaos.
The fancy cruise dress. The “I’ll wear this when I lose a bit of weight” dress. The “I’m definitely a person who does outdoor brunches” dress. These are aspirational purchases, and there’s nothing wrong with aspiration, but they’re not purchases for your actual, current, Tuesday-morning life. And your Tuesday-morning life is the one that needs getting dressed.
Now, if you do love it and you’ll actually wear it, then it’s worth buying.
For many, this fur shrug would be a fantasy life piece if you’re not regularly going to formal events. For me, I pair it with jeans all the time and wear it out to the mall quite happily. This is the value of truly understanding your personal style. Your decision-making process becomes so much easier and clearer.
Maybe you too have something that you’re keeping in your wardrobe for the right event, that maybe you could start incorporating into your style today. Give it a go, that sequin jacket or shrug with your jeans and a tee. What’s the worst thing that will happen if you do wear it?
The “bargain” trap makes it worse
People who buy clothes they don’t wear tend to focus on how much money they saved, rather than what the item actually costs. Something being 70% off feels like winning. It feels irrational to walk away from a bargain.
But here’s the maths: an item that costs you $40 on sale and is worn zero or one times costs you $40 per wear. An item that costs you $120 and you wear forty times costs you $3 per wear. The expensive thing was the cheap thing.
That $5 tee seems like a bargain, but it starts falling apart after 1 wear and a cycle through the wash. That $100 knit top made from higher quality fibres, and with much sturdier construction, lasts for years and costs you next to nothing plus it’s the much more environmentally sustainable option.
So what do you actually do about it?
1. Ask the right question in the shop
Not “do I love this?” (dopamine has already answered yes), and not “is it a good price?” (that’s irrelevant if you don’t wear it). The question is: “What, specifically, am I wearing this to?”
Not “I could wear it to…” A real, specific occasion. A dinner you have coming up, your actual regular schedule, your actual life. If you can’t picture the precise moment, put it back.
How often do I do that kind of activity? If the answer isn’t FREQUENTLY, then do you really need it? Is it a good use of your money?
Does it go with at least 3 items I already own? There is no point in buying a wardrobe orphan that you can’t use in an outfit from clothes you already own.
2. Shop for who you are, not who you’re planning to become
This is one of the most liberating things I tell my clients. Dress the life you’re living. Not the life you’re hoping to live once everything sorts itself out.
Your wardrobe should reflect the person who wakes up on a Wednesday and needs to get dressed. That person is worthy of beautiful, well-considered clothes. She doesn’t need to earn them by becoming someone else first.
3. Know your colours before you shop
This is the practical step that stops more regret purchases than almost anything else. Some people save a piece of clothing for a perfect occasion that never comes, and then it goes out of style. But a much more common reason things hang unworn is that the colour is slightly off. You bought it in the shop under artificial lighting, it looked OK there, but at home in natural light, it makes your skin look tired, and you can’t quite put your finger on why.
When you know your actual colours, you have a filter. You can walk past the beautiful-but-wrong thing without the guilt of walking past something beautiful. Colour analysis is a science; I’ve written heaps about it here if you want to learn more.
4. Sit on it
Mindful shopping is the answer to wardrobe overload, and that means slowing down the process that the retail industry has worked very hard to speed up. The sense of urgency in a sale (“only 2 left!”) is manufactured. If you see something you love, wait 24 hours. If you’re still thinking about it the next day, it probably has some genuine pull. If you’ve forgotten about it, you have your answer.
This denim jacket was one of those items that I saw, thought I loved it, but walked away. I waited a few days before going back and buying it – and I’ve gotten so much wear out of it (and I added the sequin star to the shoulder to add that little extra personal touch to it.
The item you’re still thinking about the next morning is worth buying. The one you had to talk yourself into buying on the spot, almost never is.
Research suggests that 80% of the clothes in the average wardrobe are unworn. Eighty percent. Which means most of us are not dressing from our wardrobes, we’re dressing from about a fifth of them, and feeling vaguely guilty about the rest.
You don’t need more clothes. You need fewer, better-chosen ones, and a clearer picture of who you actually are when you’re standing in a shop. That’s the whole thing. That’s the work.
And it turns out, it’s much more interesting than shopping.
The Solution You’re After
If you’re serious about solving this problem at the root, not just patching it, then the most useful thing you can do is get a proper education in what actually works for you. That’s exactly what my 7 Steps to Style program is built for. When you understand your colours, your body, your personal style, and what your actual life genuinely requires from a wardrobe, something shifts. You stop being at the mercy of a sale rack or a pretty window display, because you already know whether it’s for you or not. You walk past the wrong thing without a second thought. You recognise the right thing immediately. You spend less, wear more, and feel better, not because you’ve developed iron willpower, but because you’ve developed real knowledge. That’s the difference between white-knuckling your way through a shopping centre and shopping like someone who genuinely knows themselves.
