More about simplification

Simplification seems to be a recurring theme in my life. Take this post from January 2010 as an example where I'm writing about wandering around the apartment (early in the new year after Christmas) looking for stuff I don't need to donate or give away to family and friends.

We're in a different apartment in the same apartment complex than we were 7 years ago, but this past week (as I've done on numerous occasions since that post from 2010) I wandered around the apartment and took some time to put stuff in a pile to donate to charity (tea kettle, blanket, fanny pack from my childhood that I'll never use again, etc.) and added some stuff to the recycle bin (saved packaging materials and papers, mostly) and I still have a few things to give family members.

The things I feel like I struggle with are the "collector" mentality and "sentimentality". Things that I collect (CDs mostly) are hard for me to weed out and I have things from my childhood that I'll never use (and some that I don't remember ever using) but for many years, I couldn't seem to part with them.

It seems like the more I move stuff from place to place and have to find new homes for the random stuff I've kept, I wonder more and more why I've actually been keeping things. The more I actually think about it, the less inexplicably attached to things I feel. That makes letting go of things that I don't actually use a little easier.

I've gone through my CD collection and put all of the CDs in sleeves and sold off the jewel cases. I actually took it a step further and donated a small pile of CDs to charity. They take up a lot less room now without the cases and should be easier to move and store. I've sold off all of my guitars except my first one. I sold off or donated most of my computers and accumulated computer stuff. I gave away a few things that I'd been trying to sell on craigslist for quite some time.

I still have to decide what to do with my (>15 year old) snowboard and a box of golf stuff that I may use again someday... ;)