Today while sorting stuff, I flipped through a notebook. It looked new but I’d written in a couple of pages. It was a diary from several years ago. And what was I writing about? Decluttering! Apparently I spent a whole weekend doing it.

I’ve been making very sincere efforts for a while now to weed out stuff and I think it’s going quite well. I don’t hoard so much stuff now (I used to call it “collecting”) plus there’s stuff set aside that’s earmarked to go once I get a chance to spend some time sorting through it.

One rule that I really like is the one in one out rule (or something like that). Basically if you’re going to bring an item into your home you have to get rid of one other item. So this is going to be my blueprint for the future.

I’m feeling quite pleased because in the garage now I’ve packed 10 boxes to take (more will be added) but the stuff that I’ve decided to give to charity is 16 boxes. BF’s mom was here today and she looked quite surprised that it was such a large pile.

Here’s an example of what I’m donating – some board games, a couple are brand new. The fact is, BF and I don’t play board games when we’re together, we either watch TV or go for a walk. So all the board games except one are going.

And as of today I’ve discarded all my lecture notes from the course I started (but never finished) 12 years ago. It was a bit sad as I was looking through them but I feel like they belonged to a previous version of myself. The new me has no time for these notes.

Another thing I’m going to do is to go through my old journals, take out only the juicy stuff and put them into my online journal. Then I can get rid of all the notebooks, about 10 of them or so.

I am also giving away quite a lot of books. One thing I am embarking on is to get e-books and to do away with actual books. As much as possible. I will try not to buy any actual books in the future.

I’m going to look through the bathroom now to see if there’s any stuff there I can get rid of.