Decluttering: "In Case I Ever Want to Use That," and Other Personal Myths

As I sat here this morning, wading through the usual 100 or so email messages that greet me at the beginning of every day, I found myself looking at a few of them with that feeling of "maybe I should SAVE this, in case I ever want to USE that, or have a closer look at that" that sometimes often comes over me.

Perhaps it comes over all of us, from time to time.

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Winter View

However, I have become better at living in the real world, in which my... "rational?"... self is perfectly well aware that I will never have time to "look at that" and it will just sit there until the next time I grow so overwhelmed by the inputs in my life that I feel compelled to simply ERASE my "To Look At Later" folder with all its contents.

FilterTree

Truth is, I don't even have enough time for now, so how on Earth could I possibly think I will ever have time for things, "later?"

A large part of my current efforts to simplify life revolves around relieving myself of the accumulation of "hopes, dreams and ambitions" saved along the way... with the illusion that "someday we will have more time" so we can dig our these relics of another time in our lives and enjoy them in peace and quiet.

It all made me just STOP and ponder how it is that we have become slaves to this existence in which we are so eternally busy just dealing with the essential business of keeping our lives afloat and on an even keel that by the time we get ready to simply start our current day, we already feel exhausted purely from dealing with the basic infrastructure of our lives.

On some level, I do understand — on an intellectual level, at least — that in order for "profits" to exist and grow we must consume at all times, whether it's products, services, time or resources. And that consumption "machine" is fueled by appealing to our root emotional FOMO across every aspect of life.

But why would we — as a species — so willingly choose that?

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Mt. Baker in late afternoon sun

As a student of life and psychology, I have long observed just how many decisions people make NOT out of authentic joy, but as a result of a subtle background (and even subconscious) voice going "If I don't 'X,' then 'Y' might happen, and people will think 'Z' about me."

FilterTree

We tend to gloss over this seemingly pervasive subtext of existence with fear-instiling "motivational" phrases like "Choices have consequences!" and "The early bird gets the worm!" in order to make ourselves feel more like this is just a shared burden we all must carry as a fundamental part of being human.

Thinking about all this triggered a memory of a discussion I had with my late mother, many years ago... about grating cheese.

She needed to have some grated cheese for the top of a casserole dish she was making, so she brought out the food processor and grated the cheese. She seemed unable — or unwilling(?) — to understand my argument that even though it might take me two minutes longer to grate the cheese on a hand grater, the time it took to get out and set up the food processor and use it, followed by the time it took to wash and dry six dirty parts, and then re-assemble and put the whole thing away again actually turned a very simple process into something far more complicated and time consuming than it needed to be.

This isn't a story about grating cheese, mind you... but the odd cognitive dissonance my mother experienced in the face of her "helpful and time-saving equipment" actually being a waste of time reminds me a lot of how the entire world not only runs, but has been designed to run.

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And subsequently how we end up in a place where we feel like "we don't have time" for a lot of things because we're spending all our time on "time-saving" things deigned to give us more time!

The considerable restrictions people have been dealing with due to lockdowns and more offer an interesting (and unexpected) insight into just how addictive human busy-ness has become for many... as they find themselves going slowly "stir crazy" on account of the fact that their access to doing all those things, all the time has suddenly become limited.

Yet... when subjected to a direct line of questioning as to why this "busy-ness" is actually a good thing, answers are typically pretty vague and ambiguous, along the lines of "because it's what we DO!" and "because that's how you GET AHEAD in life!"

Says who?

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This bird is watching you...

Is that your own educated perception, or just FOMO speaking?

Sadly, relatively few answers are attributed directly to missing some kind of authentic enjoyment of life. We talk about the "hamster wheel" of life, and how hamsters just keep running and running, without even knowing why OR ever questioning the why.

Well, I guess I'd better add some photos and publish this before it gets so long people won't have time to READ it!

Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!

How about YOU? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!

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Created at 20210212 13:26 PST

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There is another adage that I we used in the theatre .... KISS it ...Keep it simple, sugar/silly/stupid ... depending on who you are talking to.

Love the shots and you got me thinking about some call and answer to this.

Happy Winter.

PS: we are neighbors. I do believe I look at the other side of MT Baker up here in Vancouver.

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Simplicity rocks!

Yup, we're pretty much neighbors. Vancouver is somewhat hidden behind Whidbey Island from where we are... but from our back porch we look across the straits at the night lights from the city of Victoria.

Stay warm! We already have a good bit of snow on the ground and it's supposed to keep snowing till 4:00 pm tomorrow...

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Yes ... we had out first bit of accumulation. It's nice because it won't stay for long.

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A modern life thing that boggles my mind is videos...

So many, so boring, such a waste of time.

Do people actually watch all that crap?

Can millenials read?

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I'm totally with you on videos... and no disrespect to anyone, NO vlogs.

I'm "of an age" where I can read what you say in 10 minutes... in two minutes... because university, 800-page books, and studying... with a vlog? I have to sit there for the entire 10 minutes, waiting for someone to make their point. Or NOT make their point, as the case often is.

Idiocracy, here we come!

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I have this thing with any videos I do click on - I give them 60 seconds to gain or lose my attention - most of them waste that with music and intros so by the time they get around to speaking I'm already gone.

If they do gain my attention they may get my full maximum 5 mins video watching time, and if it's really good I'll sometimes listen to the rest later as an audio when I'm doing housework. But if any video is longer than an hour they don't even get to the 60 seconds test.

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I find it hard to believe, but maybe people are just that bored due to lockdowns and such... but one of the fastest growing segments of web video content is at the long (hour+) end of the spectrum.

I have several friends who seem dead set on proving that... they send me emails with "This is really interesting" statements, and then there's some three-hour video presentation at the other end of the link.

DUDE! Ain't got time for that...

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Imagine if there was a post on Hive that summarised the real reason for nearly everything that is going on in the world at the moment.

A post like that would get masses of votes, comments, reposts, and would wake everyone up.

Wouldn't it?

Oh no, not now, there are celebs tweeting about Bitcoin, that is far more important...

And do you have a two hour video version posted on Youtube? (Reading words is so confusing)

https://peakd.com/gems/@francesleader/the-all-seeing-eye-oculus-orbus

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