Books
The next category after clothes is books and this was surprisingly easy for me. I split my books into 3 categories;
- Japanese textbooks/reading books
- Pagan/spiritual/self development
- Other
The Japanese books were the easiest. Pretty much all of them spark joy. I'm very lucky to have the school textbooks. The day after I got them I was scared to get out of bed in case the previous day had just been a dream and to this day I still feel giddy with joy when I hold them.
I dip into the reference books all the time. In fact, even the basic grammar books get thumbed through at least every other month when I blank on a fundamental grammar rule. So for the Japanese books I just let go of 2 reading books for kids, a phrasebook, big book of verb conjugation and a book on basic kanji. These will be offered to the members of the conversation group.
Everything else was just sorted a little more neatly, so that the line sweeps upwards from left to right because Marie says that a diagonal line that sweeps upwards to the right evokes a positive emotional response.
The pagan etc books were easier to let go of. I began by taking out the titles that definitely spark joy. Those I'd want to take with me if I was going to be living over seas for a year or so. After that, I just held everything else in my hands and asked myself if it sparked joy and if I still dip into it. If yes to both, it went on the keep pile. No to either, then they went on the rehoming pile.
I took a photo of the books I no longer wanted and offered them up to members of my local moot. Altogether I reduced my collection by 21 titles, which was over a 3rd of my total collection.
I've been buying a lot of new books on pagan/spiritual topics lately and so it was a relief to not only fit everything on the shelf in the wardrobe I keep my witchy stuff in, but to also have space left over to store some of my other books, freeing up valuable shelf space elsewhere in the flat.
Finally came the 'other' category. I'm not big on fiction, having just 2 novels that I love enough to want to keep; The Onion Girl by Charles De Lint, and Only Forward by Michael Marshall Smith. I love the Tiffany series of Discworld novels (starting with Wee Free Men), but these are so popular that should I fancy reading them again, I can easily order them from my local library. The only other book I'd have kept was my Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy (in four parts), but it was battered and old, and JP has all the books anyway, including the ones not in my trilogy, so it was easy to let that one go.
My animal books were a bit harder to sort. Much of the information is readily available online, and things like the David Attenborough books have the same ease of access via the library as the Pratchett novels (and even pop up frequently in charity shops if I really regret letting them go). Even so, I've had some of these books since my childhood and have fond memories of flicking through the pages in my desire to know everything there is to know about the animal kingdom! In the end, I decided to hold onto just 2 books; a big encyclopedia of mammals with full-colour glossy pages, and my Biology textbook from University, that is dated but still contains lots of less easily accessible information and has sentimental value. Everything else is waiting to go to a charity shop, even my copy of The Origin of Species <single tear>.
The amount of space taken up by my books has dramatically reduced, although admittedly most are still piled up in the bedroom awaiting their new lives. This is huge for me because when I was unhappy with the 'clutter' in my home, it was mainly the sheer amount of books that bothered me. Of course, my collection was nothing compared to JP's so we still have books in almost every room, but JP wants to redecorate the study and do it out as a study/bar so is keen to reduce his own book collection at some point. In the meantime, a bookcase with empty spaces looks a lot neater than a jam-packed bookcase at least!
Papers
I was dreading this category but it turned out easier than I thought. It was boring as pretty much nothing sparked joy, but I was able to sort everything in around 2 hours.
Collecting all my papers together in one place was pretty eye-opening. I had a big thick ring binder that I had set up when I took over tenancy of this place with the intention of keeping all our bills, contracts and user manuals in one place, that was now so packed it bulged at the sides. Then there were files for qualifications, folders for certificates, folders for old rotas, payslips and so on. The thing is, none of these files and folders actually contained what they were meant to. Over the years I'd shoved things in any-old-where. I had bills going back to 2011, contracts for phones or TV services that I no longer use and payslips from when I worked at the animal shelter in 2003!
I sorted everything into 'shred', 'recycle', 'training manuals for work' or 'deal with' and then anything I needed to keep went straight into a plastic wallet and into a regular sized My Melody file.
Unfortunately I have to keep the training manuals for work because they just send us new question papers when our training needs refreshing. I threw out all of my certificates from training through. I first discarded any that had expired and then put the rest in alphabetical order. Finally I wrote a list of current certificates with the date I did the training and the date it expires, highlighting any that expire this year. That's all I need after all because my company keeps a record of all the training I've received anyway.
In the end I was able to reduce all my papers to just a plastic folder for my training manuals (sorted alphabetically), and then that single My Melody file which incidentally, sparks joy! These then slotted neatly into my bookcase alongside my textbooks as shown in the photo at the top of the page. There is a wire book stand next to my desk that I use while studying and that is a perfect place to slot the 'needs attention' paperwork. If I want to study I'm going to have to move these papers and so am unlikely to just forget about them as I might if I found a drawer for such things.
Freeing up so much space, discarding all those tatty old files and folders, and knowing that if I ever apply for a job, or need to change electricity suppliers or have to refresh my training for work, all the information I need is instantly to hand, feels amazing!
