When Labubus first came on the scene, I didn’t get the hype. You want me to spend $20, sometimes even more depending on the kind you get, for a little gremlin that just hangs on your bag? It’s giving mass psychosis. Then, Pop Mart decided to release this Wacky Mart collection, which were a bunch of food-themed Labubus, and I’m not going to lie…there were around eight of them that I thought were really cute and wanted to purchase immediately.

Did I need to buy any Labubus? Of course not. Especially since I previously bought two Louvre exclusive ones in Paris, and they’ve done nothing but collect dust on my shelf ever since I bought them. I actually didn’t even remember I had them until I started typing this out. It’s wasteful, and I already knew what was going to happen if I did buy more. The rush of the purchase would last about a day, and I’d excitedly hold it in my hand for a couple seconds as I open the packaging. I’d carefully place it somewhere in my house, only to never look at it again, because there’s nothing that I can actually do with it.

Even so, I’ve caught myself lingering at a Pop Mart store just a little too long, holding up blind boxes, looking at the price, wondering if I should get something. I always end up convincing myself not to get anything, but part of me wonders if I should just give myself the quick dopamine hit every now and then, even though I’ll never have any use for it. If my hobby was collecting figurines then maybe I might have a more valid excuse to buy something, but I’ve never really been a collector like that, and I certainly don’t have the space in my apartment to be keeping things around if I don’t need them.

As politically conscious and intentional as I think I am when it comes to shopping, I still get swept up in that consumerism rip current every now and then after scrolling through TikTok and Instagram for just a little bit too long. You know when they play a mediocre song on the radio for the first time and you absolutely hate it, but they then play it so many times that it eventually gets stuck in your head and makes its way on to your playlist? I go through a similar experience on TikTok sometimes. I’ll be scrolling through my FYP, and I’ll get one too many videos talking about the benefits of using mouth tape when you go to sleep, and then all of a sudden I have a 60 pack of mouth tape in my shopping cart and I’m agonizing over whether or not I should press that check-out button.

I always feel good when I end up closing a tab on my computer for a potential purchase, but sometimes I wonder if I should just say “Fuck it” every once in a while and buy whatever the hell I want. Who knows? The world could always end tomorrow.