A tulip bulb's price came from the crowd, not the flower.

When everyone around us wants something, its value can feel real even when nothing about the thing itself has changed. Crowd excitement inflates prices and desire, and asking whether you'd still want something with no one watching helps separate your own wants from the crowd's.

Try today: Before you buy something you badly want, ask yourself whether you'd still want it if nobody would ever know you had it.