6 Things I No Longer Need to Buy Since Moving to Europe

‘I just can’t take New York anymore. I have my reasons. Mostly financial. Mostly.’

That’s what my friend Diane told me when she packed her stuff and moved to Europe.

She sold her car right before she left. She had no idea she won’t be using it in Berlin. She just thought she’d buy a new one once she got there. Wrong. She’s been in Berlin for almost two years and hasn’t bought a new car since.

The culture shock when she realized that she had no problem going without several things that were absolutely vital to her in the U.S.

It took her a year to figure out there was not even one instance when she would have needed her car. Not once. That says a lot.

I visited Diane some time ago. I went to a Metallica concert in Berlin, she came with. 94,000 people showed up to see the gods of rock. It was spectacular. Berlin was just as vibrant. So was Diane’s state of mind.

Truth is feeling safe, financially and otherwise, does a number on you. The good kind of number, where you have time to realize that some of your problems have nothing to do with you and everything to do with geography.

Some of the purchases that felt non-negotiable to Diane and to most Americans turned out to be responses to American problems, not universal ones. Once those problems disappear, so does the spending.

Here’s what she stopped buying since she moved to Europe:

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