There comes a moment in your 30s when you suddenly catch yourself rinsing old plastic dabbas, folding cardboards, saving gift bags, stockpiling containers or switching off lights like your mother and father did. Why is that happening? Is it a conscious act, or is your mind subconsciously acting out what you may have seen all your life?

Gaurav Solanki, 33, a consultant, expressed how as children, we used to laugh at our parents and now we are doing the “exact same thing”. “Why do they keep every single plastic dabba? Why are there old bottles, gift wrappers, even broken chairs still lying around? Every time we questioned them, they would say, “It will come in handy someday.” Now I’m in my 30s, and guess what? I’m doing the same thing. Only the stuff looks a bit different. Today, I’m saving all the Amazon boxes because they are “good quality” and might be useful,” said Solanki.

His child has outgrown half her clothes, “but I keep them safely in a bag”. “Maybe for the next baby, maybe just because they are too cute to give away. Toys, random cables, empty jars from fancy products, even the paper bag from a store that looks premium, it’s all sitting somewhere in my house,” he candidly admitted.

And it is not just physical stuff. “My phone is full of baby photos, screenshots of parenting tips, shopping carts I never checked out, and videos I plan to watch when I get time (but I never do). This digital clutter is the new version of what our parents did with actual stuff,” Solanki shared.

So yeah, our parents hoarded plastic dabbas. We hoard cardboard boxes and cloud storage. They were not wrong. Somewhere deep down, it is about holding on to things that feel useful or special. “I used to joke about it. Now I get it. And I think my kid will too, one day,” said Solanki.

People laugh about it, but psychologically, there is something much deeper happening, according to psychotherapist and life coach Delnna Rrajesh.

In this phase of life, many people unconsciously return to the behaviours they saw in childhood because this is the decade when responsibility peaks, shared Delnna. “Careers intensify, parents age, children depend on you, and financial pressure rises. The brain instinctively reaches for the earliest templates it has for stability and survival. These small habits were the blueprint of security while growing up, so the mind replays them when adult life becomes overwhelming,” said Delnna.

PR professional Prama Roy Chowdhury, 31, is guilty of becoming “a full-fledged replica of my mother”. “It all starts innocently, with the empty containers. I once rolled my eyes at how she treated every jam bottle, disposable box, or achaar (pickle) jar like a national treasure. Today, I guard them with the same intensity because containers are the secret saviour of that extra bit of achaar or sabzi. My kitchen shelves now resemble a curated museum of repurposed packaging, each box silently judging anyone who thinks it is acceptable to discard something so useful,” she said.

Chowdhury added that she follows her mother’s “legendary household discipline system, which is the laundry ritual”. “Just like her, I have divided my wardrobe into neat categories of clothes strictly meant for home, clothes for quick market runs, clothes for occasions that require a socially acceptable version of myself, and of course, the used-but-not-dirty-enough ones that must be worn once more before being put into the washing machine. And yes, everything cannot be washed in the machine, even though it has “delicate mode.” Certain clothes require the respect of being washed manually.”

She also switches off fans and lights, sometimes “making dramatic comments like, ‘The electricity board is not charging us, it seems’”.

And then come the newspapers. Newspapers are not just for reading, but multipurpose lifesavers. “They line bags while travelling, wrap breakables, absorb oil, dry vegetables, and fix most emergencies. Even today, I don’t throw newspapers casually. I store and carry it while travelling, like a resource the world may someday compete for. My mother would be proud,” said Chowdhury.

The habits once seen as “funny” or “old-fashioned” suddenly make sense. “You feel more compassion for them and more pride in the values they lived by. In your 30s and 40s, you develop the emotional maturity to see these habits not as quirks but as survival wisdom,” said Delnna.

These patterns also bring out emotional nostalgia. “When you save an empty bottle or reuse an old box, you are not just copying your parents. You are recreating the sense of order, familiarity and groundedness you felt as a child. These behaviours become a comforting ritual that anchors you back into something that felt safe,” Delnna said.

Food habits, too, are deeply inherited. “In a Bengali household, even peels are not spared. Potato peel fry and bottle gourd peel fry are delicacies, and if something does not go into the kadhai, it surely goes into the roof garden as fertiliser. I refuse to waste anything, especially cooked vegetables from two or three days ago. And yes, the holy grail of Bong kitchen, the rasgulla sugar syrup, is never discarded. It becomes the base for sweet chutney, a staple for us,” she described.

Delnna also noted how such behaviours could stem from a scarcity memory. “Parents who lived with less passed on habits rooted in conservation. Their children, even if financially comfortable today, continue the pattern because the nervous system is wired to avoid waste. It is both emotional and cultural conditioning,” said Delnna.

Ultimately, these small acts reflect a deeper truth. Delnna described that we become our parents in the moments when life demands more from us. “It is the mind’s way of saying, ‘Go back to what kept you stable. Go back to the values that shaped you. Go back to habits that created a sense of emotional safety’.”