Monday, October 11, 2010

The War on clutter, Part 2

A fantastic weekend! So much gone. Though so much remains. It’s astonishing how much of a mess is created by cleaning out all of the junk in your life. But to get rid of it, it must first be exposed.

We got rid of our filing cabinet.

The paperless effort has made progress over the course of the last year, but it can be hard to find the time and motivation to pull a file folder out of the drawer and proceed to scan and shred. So, last weekend, I realized that to get rid of the paper, we must first get rid of the container that holds it. Just like getting rid of the coffee table eliminated the junk that accumulated upon it.

Where there was a filing cabinet now sits several small stacks of file folders. But again, as with the coffee table, the room is now much bigger. Even with the floor littered with file folders, the room has grown in size. It’s not about increasing how much space you have, but rediscovering how much space is already there.

We also got rid of our old home stereo system, and will hopefully today be rid of a charcoal grill that came with the house and the second litter box we no longer use. Last week about 7 CD’s sold, and we went through our books to see what to donate, so the shelves are now more spacious.

The goal has become to move out of our house with less than we moved in with. This will be a challenge given that we’ve since had a kid, but I think it is possible. At the very least, we might be able to break even, which is still saying a lot.

So, yes, a fantastic weekend!

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