Things

This is going to be an extraordinary post. A post not about my actions or creations but a post about my thoughts. And things. Lots of things. All sorts of things. Things. Things that we own. Things that own us.

In the past weeks, months, even years, I've been going through ... things. My things, my parents' things, my great-grandparents' things, my great-aunt's things... lots of things! I've literally been enslaved by them. I needed to sort them, to decide what to do with them, whether to keep them, and where to put them. And I've thought a lot ... about things.

And I've come to the conclusion that we live in a way too material world. We work hard so that we can buy things and then we buy large houses to keep all the things and we have room for more so we buy more ... We feel bad throwing them away because someone obviously paid for them and we keep it just because maybe one day someone might need them...

I really want to break this cycle.

So I've decided to sort the things by three criteria:
1) do I need the thing?
2) do I want the thing?
3) it is valuable (material or emotional value)?

If a thing fails the test, I get rid of it. Sell it, donate it or throw it away. But I do not keep it - why would I keep something I neither need nor want?!?

I must say it really clicked in my head when I came to this conclusion. I feel like I own things and not vice versa. I feel liberated.

Now I just have to raise my kids in the same manner :-)