Comments on: Cleaning House–Saving Memories, Losing Junk http://workingwithinsight.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/cleaning-house-saving-memories-losing-junk/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Idea Shards, Applied Common Sense, Experience, because Thinking Helps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Interpretive Stories to Stretch the Mind Sat, 17 May 2008 08:55:28 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=MU By: Joe Kukura http://workingwithinsight.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/cleaning-house-saving-memories-losing-junk/#comment-309 Joe Kukura Wed, 21 Mar 2007 18:57:23 +0000 http://workingwithinsight.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/cleaning-house-saving-memories-losing-junk/#comment-309 A rule that I have lived by since my last move is that I am keeping the amount of things I own to a fixed number. For every new object that I acquire, an older less useful item either gets discarded or donated. Pictures and photo albums are my sole exceptions. If a new object is less valuable than every single thing I already have, I simply don't need it and try to get it to someone who would benefit from it more. Over the past three years, I've never had to perform a major clean-up of my home and I have not missed anything that I discarded or donated. Along those lines, I've rediscovered joining a library rather than being a conduit between Barnes & Noble and a used book store. When a library loan is unavailable or not appropriate, such as getting some beach reading material for an extended vacation, I still take my purchased book to the library when I'm done so they can hold it until I want to read it again and perhaps someone else can enjoy the pages. A rule that I have lived by since my last move is that I am keeping the amount of things I own to a fixed number. For every new object that I acquire, an older less useful item either gets discarded or donated. Pictures and photo albums are my sole exceptions. If a new object is less valuable than every single thing I already have, I simply don’t need it and try to get it to someone who would benefit from it more. Over the past three years, I’ve never had to perform a major clean-up of my home and I have not missed anything that I discarded or donated.

Along those lines, I’ve rediscovered joining a library rather than being a conduit between Barnes & Noble and a used book store. When a library loan is unavailable or not appropriate, such as getting some beach reading material for an extended vacation, I still take my purchased book to the library when I’m done so they can hold it until I want to read it again and perhaps someone else can enjoy the pages.

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