"The more I purge my belongings and move towards a simple and non-materialistic lifestyle, the less I want to accumulate “stuff” ever again. I thought I had purged most of my “stuff” prior to moving into the place we are in now, but alas 2 years of living in one place brought into our repertoire many items that we “simply can’t live without”!
I hope that in the future I can hold more perspective on this point and continue to learn the difference between wants and needs. I can only imagine there are many things we’ll encounter in our travels that we see as “needs” that many native-dwellers would disagree with. For example….shoes. Shoes are pretty non-negotiable for me. I like them, I need them. If I don’t have them, my tender tootsies are miserable. I can’t walk more than a few feet a minute without them. Yet for others, shoes are more of a luxury.
….Shoes, a luxury. Ha! And here I am wondering whether or not to bring my pretty pink high heels, or just to “make due” with my black slingbacks. Yikes!"
I am in the middle of the Great Purge 2010, in an effort to try and weedle down my possessions to fill the space of three suitcases. Today I managed to take a car load of things to Goodwill, and list some of the more high end items on Ebay. It was the last hurrah, as I have probably poked through my items several times by now. The first round was the most emotional; as I moved through items I remembered the sentimental or monetary value of them, even if they had never been used (I was real bad about this with my shoes). The second time made the "donate" pile grow a little bit larger, as I'm sure a few days mulling over the idea of donating these things seated itself deep in the survivalist part of my brain. Do I need the American Eagle hobo bag that I bought 6 years ago and never used? Sure, it was cute. I had gone over it several times in the past as something I needed to keep and use, but it always seemed to lodge itself into the darkest depths of my closet, never to be found again.
During this final attempt, I found myself thinking more rationally. Will I ever use the purse? (Maybe) Is it more important than packing dress shirts for work, or nice shoes, or the cheese grater*? (No!) To the "donate" pile it went. 30 minutes later it was still there. The next day it was still there. No urges to go and pick it out of the pile, second guessing myself again.
I do realize that I don't need to bring over much besides my passport and some cash. Clothes would be nice, and 3 suitcases provides for a lot of packing space. I'm not exactly showing up in Oz with my skivves and some documentation. During a conversation I was having yesterday, we discussed how free it felt not to be inundated with so much crap. The things you can do without cartloads of crap to worry about. She was very right about the feeling of freedom, and as I was handing my stuff to the Goodwill helper, it felt like a burden was being taken away. It's just stuff.
Stuff can be bought, lost, stolen, given away or destroyed. Why attach such a value to it?
*I love my grater. It's perhaps the best kitchen tool I've ever purchased.
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