Everything Must Go!

Tuesday August 6^th, 2013 – Fox Lake, IL

   It’s prime time for a possession purge in my life. I feel a backup of clutter weighing me down, and chopping as much dead weight as I can will free me up to move forward. I try to live as lean as possible – or at least I thought I did – but too many piles of junk still manage to accumulate. 

   Books have always been my downfall, and that’s the pile that needs to be trimmed most. I have way more than I’ll ever read, and at this point they are just weighing me down. I do read as much as I can, but often it’s online or other sources. These books will be best served in someone else’s possession, as even if I’d start tomorrow and read twelve hours a day I’d never finish them all.

   Almost all of them are nonfiction. I have a ton of self help and how to books, along with health related, biographies and business. I’d love to get to every one of them, but that’s just not realistic and never was. What guy doesn’t want to sleep with every centerfold? That won’t happen either.

   I also have a butt load of audio programs – most of them on cassette. Nightingale Conant is the company that puts them out and most if not all are excellent. I found the majority at thrift stores or rummage sales at minimal cost, but I know for a fact the retail price for a long time was $60.

   I checked on Ebay, and they’re being offered at around $12.99 each for the “buy it now” price. That doesn’t mean they’re getting it, and I’ve got at least 100 titles from Anthony Robbins to Zig Ziglar and everyone in between. I’ve got a few CD sets, but the majority of them are cassettes as that was the technology at the time they were made. The content is still good, but who wants it?

  I’ve listened to quite a few of them, and luckily I happen to have had cassette players in my last few cars but there’s no way I would ever hear them all even if I drove to the North Pole and back six times in a row. Most of them I haven’t gotten to, and they’ve been gathering dust for years.

   If I really wanted to hear them I would have by now, and the same goes for the books. I got to as many as I could, but the future looks bleak for the rest of them. I just don’t have as much time as I’d like, and it would make me feel much better if I’d cut ties with all of it and cleanse my life.

   I took a big box of books to the Salvation Army today, and that felt great. Many of them I read, but a few I hadn’t. It stung a little to put them in the box, but I realized if I hadn’t gotten to them by now I probably never would. I don’t want to be the equivalent of a cat lady for books. I’m not a hoarder, and if I really want that book in the future I can check the shelf at the Salvation Army.

   That’s where a lot of this stuff came from anyway. It gave me something to do on the road, and it didn’t cost much. A couple of bucks here and there weren’t missed, but it sure would be nice to have all of it back and start over. Too late now, as the choices were made. Time to choose again.

   Making time to list the titles and then listing them on Ebay isn’t what I see myself doing in the next little while. I’ve got other projects that need attention, so I think the best option is to clear it out any way I can. If I have to give most of it away, so be it. It’s time to cut losses and move on.

   If you happen to enjoy reading or listening to what I’ve described, feel free to contact me and it will be my pleasure to hook you up with some outstanding material. You could pay me money if you want, but far better payment would be to make use of it yourself then pass it to someone who might also enjoy it and help make the planet a better place. That’s what I’m trying to do myself.