The Mindful Consumer

Welcome to The Mindful Consumer—a community-funded newsletter read by thousands of thoughtful humans in 100+ countries around the world.

And chosen as a Substack featured publication twice in 2023! ✨

Hi friend,

My name is Cait. I’m the author of two books: THE YEAR OF LESS (a Wall Street Journal bestseller, translated in 11 languages, sold 300,000+ copies worldwide) and ADVENTURES IN OPTING OUT. For 8 years, I wrote a popular personal finance blog (originally titled Blonde on a Budget) with 50,000+ monthly readers. And since 2010, I’ve been a freelance writer and editor, having largely worked with banks and fintech companies in Canada and the US.

Personally, I’ve written about everything from paying off $30,000 CAD ($23,000 USD, £18,000) of consumer debt, to quitting drinking at age 27, to being nomadic and then ultimately leaving Canada and immigrating to the UK.

I’m perhaps most well-known for doing a self-imposed two-year shopping ban (2014-2016) and decluttering 80% of my belongings in that time (outlined in my first book). That’s when I first started using the phrase “mindful consumer.” While completing the experiment, I realized I had once been a binge consumer of most things (incl. alcohol, food, TV.). I wanted to be more mindful about how I consumed everything. That’s how I’ve been trying to live ever since.

The Mindful Consumer is a newsletter about paying attention, asking yourself questions, and making thoughtful and meaningful adjustments to your thoughts/feelings/behaviours.

The content you find here will be part personal, part observational—both written through the lens of how I think and feel and try to live, but also what I see all around me. The topics I’m most interested in writing about:

• 💰 Being mindful with your money - paying attention to your spending/money management decisions, and wanting to understand how your relationship with money impacts your life and well-being.

• 🧠 Being a mindful consumer - paying attention to what you consume (buy, eat/drink, the content you read/watch/listen to, conversations you have, etc.) and why, and trying to make more intentional choices.

• 🎨 Being a mindful creator - paying attention to what you are putting out into the world, not just what you are taking in. This applies to everything from creative work, to the creative ways you choose to live your life.

• 🥾 Being mindful as you move through the world - paying attention to how you connect with new people and places, and taking care of your local community and the spaces/environments you visit.

Your support makes it possible for me to do this work.

There are a lot of different ways to earn a living as a writer/creator (though it’s feeling more and more challenging, these days). If you know me well, you won’t be surprised when I tell you: most of them have never felt aligned for me. In the 14 years I’ve been doing this, I’ve never put ads on my websites or done any form of sponsored content. Your time and attention is valuable, and I didn’t want to manipulate or profit off of that. So I’ve always focused on making sure you have a good experience as a reader and we have a safe space to connect.

Substack is a platform that makes it possible for me to continue doing this and get paid. The more support I get here, the more time I can spend supporting this community (and then… maybe start writing my next book!?).

Writing isn’t a hobby, it’s my job. And it’s my job to write/edit/publish good content on TMC. If you find enough value in this work that you’d like to support me, you can become a paying subscriber anytime. For £5/month or £30/year, you will get access to everything I share here (all new posts, a monthly newsletter with curated links/resources, book giveaways, and the ability to comment and connect with our community). You can also reply to my emails, ask questions, and suggest topics that could help shape this space.

Support this project

Every time someone becomes a paying subscriber, it feels like a hopeful reminder that people do value the work that goes into writing. It also feels like a sign for me to keep going. Whether you pay and stay for a month, six months, a year, or many years… it’s all appreciated. ❤️

Fun fact: 3 paying subscribers also makes it possible for me to buy a month’s food supply for the wild hedgehogs that live in my garden. They’ll be coming out of hibernation soon and will be ready to eat! (If they have more babies this spring, we might need to buy more hedgehog houses too! Eeek little hoglets! 🦔🦔🦔)