Tried replacing my usual response to stress by not shopping

I had a stressful day yesterday - my friend group had a blow up argument, and a billion little things went wrong. Nothing traumatic but it was a very frustrating and an out of control day, on top of some things I've been dealing with for the last month. I started browsing makeup sites before I knew it, but I managed to stop myself and I decided to try a bit of an experiment to see if I can replace the rush of ordering makeup. For me, ordering makeup is giving myself a pretty + uplifting treat that I can look forward to, so I tried to replace the experience. I also noticed that I tend to buy makeup instead of dealing with my feelings about various things so things would fester until they blew up for me and then I had a mountain of makeup and skincare that I felt guilty about and regret for my life choices. So...not great.

To lift my mood I briefly talked about the situation to a friend, and wrote about it in-depth in my journal, then I made myself a cup of tea from my special occasion tea stash. To get that pretty rush I used a badass berry blush I was saving for special events, and to give myself a gift to look forward to in the future I set an appointment time to go to my favourite cafe. (I figure occasionally treating myself to fancy coffee and developing a better relationship with my local cafe is less expensive than buying lots of makeup I won't use and don't have space for, and probably a better relaxation technique in the long run??)

I have to admit, I still feel a bit like buying makeup. It's not perfect. And it feels like a lot more effort than just browsing various makeup sites for a while and buying something impulsively. But I do feel much better about my friend group blow-up and how I'm going to respond to it, I felt much better about the little dumb things that went wrong after a good sleep, and I didn't add more makeup to my collection, so I'm counting it as a win.