Welcome to session #2! If you didn't catch the Traveling Light intro, now's the time! Today, we're going to get the first 6 insights from the man's perspective. Here we go ...1. Start with this principle - Francine Jay's The Joy of Less shares that "decluttering is infinitely easier when you think of it as deciding what to keep, rather than deciding what to throw away." What a freeing ground rule for all these discussions.
2. Figure out your household's "pen life" - When evaluating your office supplies, ask yourself how long you would be able to write with your current supply of pens (assume each will last for a conservative 6-months). When we calculated this it was over 15 years! This didn't even include mechanical pencils, highlighters, Sharpies, crayons, and white board markers! There's no way we needed nearly 40 pens for the two of us. We organized by color and style and strategically located those we'd need around the apartment (e.g. by the fridge, office, bedside table drawer). The rest we said 'sayonara' to, and then repeated the process with another office supply.
3. Sell the old when buying the new - We saved 58% off a new GPS by shopping smart and then selling the old version on eBay. It made us feel like we got an amazing deal when we factored selling the old item into the new item's cost.
4. Apply Pareto's Law - This is commonly called the 80/20 Rule, which states that 20% of your stuff gets 80% of the use. Think of your go-to clothes, DVDs, games, shoes, and electronic devices. With this principle in mind, focus on eliminating much of the 80% that gets little use. Case in point ... we had a 13-piece knife set which worked well, but needed replacing. We realized there are really just 3 knives that we used the most, so we pared down (pun intended as the paring knife made the cut!).
5. Clean surfaces are amazing - We never realized how wonderful it is to have clean surfaces. We are down to 2 items on our kitchen counters (toaster and a crock with cooking utensils). The more we removed, the more we realized we appreciated clutter-free surfaces. We bought new knives with sheathes so that they can be stored in a drawer. Now there's no more knife block on our counter!
6. Photograph your memories - We learned that memories are not found in a souvenir, knickknack, or tchotchke. Memories are found by recalling the experience itself. Rather than keeping a lot of trinkets, we found that taking a photo of an item and storing it in a "Memories" folder online or on your computer is an excellent way to remind yourself about an experience and tell others about it.
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2 Questions from Linda
Which one of these 'traveling lighter' brainstorms grabs you?
What's one step you can take today to head in that direction?
What's one step you can take today to head in that direction?
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