Getting rid of unwanted stuff

Yesterday, I cleared a lot of things from my house. And at the end of the day, the effort was worth it.

I had a whole pile of clothes most of which I had not worn at all in the last 1 year. Off they went! And so did a lot of books and other stuff like stationery, footwear, CDs and DVDs, etc!!

What was discarded?
1. Anything not used for more than 3 years (except a few things)
2. Anything that was < Rs 100 and unsure of usage in future.
3. Clothes that weren’t in my best 15 pair list.
4. Papers/books that I had not bothered to use in the last 1-3 years or more (depending on the book)
5. CDs and DVDs that were too old.

And I gave my mother strong instructions to discard unwanted stuff in the kitchen. She was too unwilling to do that initially. Had to really convince her into doing it. So we even discarded some unwanted utensils, plastic items, bottles, etc.

Where did it go?
1. Some books went to the 2nd hand vendors
2. Some books sold to local paper boys
3. Clothes given away. (and not many these days want used clothes!!!)
4. DVDs and CDs and other stuff to local paper boy on weighted basis.

What books did I discard?
1. Novels by Sidney Sheldon, Robin Cook, Michael Crichton, etc. I havent read a single novel in the last 4 years!!
2. Sub-standard books as per my review
3. Books on topics of little interest to me and having low purchase value.

Lesson learnt
I have a huge unread list!!! 40% of books I ever bought have not been read!!! Right from my 8th std!! Though the topics of interest have changed, the habit has been the same. I get too excited and buy a lot in advance. Lose interest in it later and it stays unread!!!!

Almost 60% of stuff we stack is unwanted!!

In my opinion, an empty house is more alluring to my eye than a stuffed and decorated house. I now feel good that I removed a lot of clutter!