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Just don't use "It's illegal" as an excuse to avoid doing something.
You took the words right out of my brain.
This is where several sessions with the right therapist could help. Like several others, I see an underlying psychological issue that left unaddressed could lead to future "collecting" episodes.
I think I am on a roll. We had 5 18 gallon tubs in the garage of books from when my kids were younger. I took three full tubs and threw them in the garbage probably containing 200 books. I hate doing that but I don't care. I hate these items and I am putting no energy into finding them new homes.we bought them all. Let someone buy new ones,for their children. Garbage truck comes tomorrow morning. It isn't worth selling them for 10 cents each at a garag sale. Will report back.p soon. There were some great posts on scanning. I will be doing that. One thing that is being said is wrong. You cannot rip your CDs and sell them. That is illegal. I majored in music business in college and tool copyright classes. You are allowed to make a copy of your albums for your car or whatever. It is covered under fair use. However, once you sell them. You no longer have the right to retain a copy. If the RIAA comes to your door, you better have the physical copies of your mp3s or proof from iTunes that you purchased the. It has happened to people. Same goes for DVDs. Just informing some of you.not that I am such a do Gooder.
Wow.
This manic behavior and attitude just suggests even more that you should get professional help IMO.
Also interesting you are so irate about books that were YOUR CHILDREN'S. Not YOURS.
Jeeze all you had to do was drive over to the Goodwill or somewhere.
So no, you didn't "hate doing that".
I can't wait to see you do that to YOUR stuff. Like your CDs which are certainly taking up LOTS of your "energy".
CDs>books
And FYI, Goodwill, Habitat and other charities will even do PICKUPS for usable things It's also tax deductible, which, if you file a long form you should know.
So yay you filled up your garbage with usable things cuz you were mad.
And I'm FAR from a do-gooder.
But I do know how to be organized, clutter free and downsize.
I am going to go through a lot of my stuff tomorrow to separate what I can part with.
Sorry, only made it to page 4, but to echo what a few others said, do it the other way. Say, "I am getting rid of ALL this, but I will allow myself to keep a few (3-5!!) out of the pile". I have to do this with everything, most recently a huge box of orphaned electronic accessories and a drawer of t-shirts.
And FYI, Goodwill, Habitat and other charities will even do PICKUPS for usable things It's also tax deductible, which, if you file a long form you should know.
Exactly right. My buddy got tired of moving all of his old military stuff--uniforms, plaques, etc. He called Goodwill and asked about donating. They drove up to his storage unit with a truck, and loaded it for him. Handed him a receipt. And he was done with it.
Exactly right. My buddy got tired of moving all of his old military stuff--uniforms, plaques, etc. He called Goodwill and asked about donating. They drove up to his storage unit with a truck, and loaded it for him. Handed him a receipt. And he was done with it.
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Yep I just did that myself. Downsized my condo's stuff. Tired of moving my grandmothers/mothers/sons sentimental items, too. Also got rid of furniture in a spare room that nobody ever uses etc.
All I had to do was pack stuff in boxes beforehand. They even took my kid's ENORMOUS collection of trading cards.
They'll even take old moving boxes if you break them down.
Ironically, it was veterans I was thinking about with this OP throwing books away.
We have wounded veteran's book, CD, DVD programs and they ARE fathers who might have appreciated free books for their kids. IN fact it may not just be wounded veterans but even active duty - I forget.
Our veterans even have a store in our local (nearly bankrupt) mall and it's so interesting to see their stuff there in addition to regular new mech.
My Mom was the original depression era hoarder who would even go through trash cans retrieving anything that "might be useful". She lived with my sister before we moved Mom into assisted living and it took weeks to cull out the real and true trash. Then there was all the good will stuff. Then the personal memory stuff that hurts to discard or give away.
Then my sister with whom she lived complained about living in a house with thing piled upon thing, yet she is just as bad. She asked me to reorganize her kitchen which I did. Sis promptly bought more stuff to cover up the now empty counters because 'you never know'. Now she has asked my daughter in law to reorganize her house "because I want simple and minimal". Ha.
So maybe their causes are more fear related than sweet memory related as yours seems to be, but the outcome And cause are probably similar
So ask yourself 'do I want my children have to wade through this stuff -which they probably will not want anyway- or do I do something now?
For myself, I scanned all photos, sent them to other family, and pitched the photo albums. I sent children's drawing keepsakes back to the child involved.
If that doesn't work then seek help.
What sealed the deal for me that I was right to do so when I visited my Mom with severe dementia. She not only doesn't know me but she said 'that man followed her every where' of course it was a photo of my Dad, her husband of 63 years.
Beloved photos no longer meant anything at all they are just things that need dusting
My parents, grands, and my H all died within a few years of each other and somehow I ended up with all the stuff. And that's what it is, stuff. I had to go through everything because these people used money for bookmarks and did things like store gold coins in boxes of buttons. It took me 5 years to be able to park a car in my garage. 5 YEARS of my life to sort and get rid of their stuff. And I am still getting rid of stuff today, a bit at a time. Is this what you want for your kids? If not, you have to change.
Another thing you are doing is training your kids to keep everything. If this is not the legacy you want to give them, retrain them. If you bring something new into the house, you have to get rid of something! Encourage the kids make their areas clutter free and keep only things they use.
If you post here, you have a computer. So buy an archival quality 2TB drive that comes with cloud storage as a backup. Put all your music and photos on the drive and back it up to the cloud. Tape your passwords and the cloud location to the drive. Then take pictures of all your precious items and put those on the drive too. Then get rid of all that junk! Some can be donated and other things you can sell on e-bay or CL. There is a market for some of this stuff. BTW I would frame that baseball ticket and display it on the wall. Then I would get rid of the other baseball stuff. Sell it!
Keep 1 of each musical instrument plus the AMP and get rid of everything else. Keep whatever is the most playable for you. All that editing stuff is so far out of date it is hardly useable. It's all done on a computer today anyway! Take a look at Goldwave. You can still play if you want to but all the excess equipment is gone. Take pictures of everything before you sell it.
All those old tv series are always available to stream. You don't need them. I am currently watching Peyton Place for the first time. All the episodes are on youtube for free. I even watched My Favorite Martian not too long ago. Sometimes they come and go on netflix and hulu but if you want to watch them, they are always available somewhere.
There has to be a reward. Maybe you can open a bank account and put all the proceeds there. And when all the clutter and collections are gone you can buy something you really want or do a vacation with the family. The biggest reward won't be financial, you will be able to breathe again. If you collect too much stuff eventually the stuff becomes the master and you are the servant!
I think he meant he hates to put things in the garbage that someone could use, like books. Were they not already on the curb I would have suggested freecycle or other ways to get rid of them besides garbage. But he may have needed to do garbage while IN THE MOOD to be ABLE to get rid of something. Stopping to figure out how to get them somewhere else might stop his momentum.
Why would you want to get rid of things you love, though? I also have a lot of stuff, thousands of books, CDs, DVDs. I go back and read and view and listen to all that stuff all the time. At some point it was all chaotic and it made me feel overwhelmed, the way the OP seems to be feeling, but then I sat down, wrote lists of everything I have (literally everything, down to the toothbrush), and organized everything so that related items are together in boxes or on shelves. Now I know exactly where every item is, and once I listed and inventoried everything, I was no longer feeling overwhelmed but happy to have all my largely worthless treasures. So, I think all that OP needs to do is to get all of his posessions listed and organized. Once you are in control of all your things, the amount of them will no longer bother you. I don't think hoarding per se makes people miserable, but chaos and disorganization and being buried in stuff, yet not knowing where anything is.
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It's also tax deductible, which, if you file a long form you should know.
