Shopping is a motorway in my head.

If I get through today, that is one whole week where I haven't shopped. My Milky Way is sitting at home waiting to reward me.

Firstly, it seems I have replaced shopping with eating out. Three restaurants in two days. It's not just clothing shops where I throw my money away it seems. I cannot afford the lifestyle I am living. The lifestyle I desire and feel I deserve but have not earned. 

Also, I have realised, I walk in shops out of habit. They have a pull over me, it's almost totally outside my consciousness, like a magnet. 

Everyday as I walk past River Island I end up walking in some bizarre diagonal line toward the shop and then, in a fit of self control, away. I must look extremely odd to anyone watching me. 

I used to do this as a little girl with the fridge. Sometimes I would just open the fridge door and look in. Not because I was hungry or because I was going to eat anything, just because looking at food made me feel more content. Used to drive my mum batty, it made the kitchen cold.

Fast forward 15 years, replace food with shoes and it's my bank manager going batty... Possibly with joy due to the amount of interest I'm paying on that fucking overdraft.

Also, sub-consciously I have made shopping part of my routine. I am a woman who is slave to routine, it gives me control and purpose in an otherwise messy life. That is why I need shopping so much, every thursday evening, my body is geared for shopping. If I'm waiting to meet someone after work and am left hanging around Oxford Circus, what is there for me to do while I'm waiting? Go in shops! My body is geared up for the pretty lights and the thrill of the purchase. The want, want, want. The more, more, more. 

A friend and I were discussing mind roads at lunch yesterday in restaurant number two, the Natural Kitchen http://www.thenaturalkitchen.com/ on Marylebone High street. I had Crayfish tart with Hollandaise sauce, veeeery nice. 

Anyway, I digress. The mind is like a road map, and if you go down a particular avenue often enough, it becomes a bigger road. Whereas other aspects of the mind, which you don't go down often, remain little country roads. Thus, shopping is a motorway in my head. 

I need to leave the big comfortable, convenient motorway to happiness. I cannot afford the motorway. I need to change my routine, go down the budgeting country road. Turn myself back into that thrifty student who thought spending £35 on an item wasn't throwaway, it was an investment purchase. Turn myself back into that thrifty student who was really very disciplined with money. 

Sadly, that thrifty student wasn't very well dressed.