diff --git a/.exports b/.exports
index eec99e4..bcc917e 100644
--- a/.exports
+++ b/.exports
@@ -12,7 +12,6 @@ export LANG="en_US"
 # ---------------------------------------------------
 
 export NPM_PACKAGES=$HOME/.npm-packages
-export NODE_PATH="$NPM_PACKAGES/lib/node_modules${NODE_PATH:+:$NODE_PATH}"
 export PATH=$HOME/bin:/usr/local/bin:$NPM_PACKAGES/bin:$PATH
 
 # define CDPATHs which are autocompleted from when doing cd
diff --git a/.npmrc b/.npmrc
index fb087e1..3941bfd 100644
--- a/.npmrc
+++ b/.npmrc
@@ -1 +1 @@
-prefix=$HOME/.npm-packages
+prefix=~/.npm-packages