Discardia_ More Life, Less Stuff - Dinah Sanders [45]
Carve away the clutter and polish the valuables that start to shine through. You’re all warmed up, so it’s time to be a hardass about making life more excellent. Any junk that has survived this far into the year needs to justify its place in your life.
When you want the whole to be better, inquire of the details “Is this necessary?”
Symptom #17: Carrying an Albatross
Solution #17: Lighten Your Load
Never underestimate the value of removing friction from your day.
—Michael Lopp
Why weight?
What are you carrying around with you every day? Take your backpack, laptop bag, purse, wallet, and beltware and lay it all out on the table. Do you really need all this crud with you all the time? Do some weeding to optimize your kit. Are you using the right thing in which to carry it? Last time I did this exercise I changed to a smaller laptop bag, which set an upper ceiling on the amount of stuff that can accrete into my routine load.
Create your kits
Make a mini-kit that has only the essentials for a walk or evening out. I have a simple wallet that holds my transit passes, ATM card, credit card, paper money, health care card, and ID. With that, my keys and my mobile phone (with its built-in camera), I'm pretty much ready for anything that doesn't require my computer.
If you often work on the go, create an on-the-road kit with the essentials for your productivity. Discardian freelancer Mary Hawkins shared this tip: “I recently transformed an empty makeup bag into a ‘freelancer’s bag.’ It has everything I need to be productive in someone else's office for the day—my extra hard drive, my favorite mouse, a handful of pencils and some stickies, headphones, extra cables, cough drops, eyedrops, chapstick … Most of those things were just floating around in my bag, so now that I have everything consolidated, I can just take it [out] when I don't need it and free up a bunch of space. It's also see-through, so I know what I have with me and keep everything in it relatively neat.”
Keep the core items at the ready
If you have different kits for different purposes—for example, a purse, a laptop bag, and an errand satchel—set each up with the things you always need so you only have to transfer your unique items when you head out. I move my wallet, phone, and key ring to the appropriate bag knowing that it already has a pen, handkerchief, index cards for notes, business cards, and a comb. This is one place a little redundancy makes a lot of sense.
Optimize for what you really do need often and what would be a serious hassle if you needed it and didn’t have it. Then keep fine-tuning to keep up with changes. It’s amazing how fast you can collect random stuff and carry it around constantly.
Get in the habit of quickly returning your daily kit to its base condition. Toss that extra change into a jar on your dresser, throw out the bits of trash, and put the receipts in with your bills, at least once a week or, better yet, each time you get home. Your back will thank you!
Pack less, way less
You really appreciate having less when you're racing across an airport or schlepping from train to train in a strange place. Traveling with a single carry-on bag is an art form well worth mastering. Don’t just figure, “Hey, the airlines let me check a bag, so I might as well do so.”
You can cure yourself of this habit the first time you walk off a plane with nothing but a carry-on and are on your way, while everyone else is milling around waiting. Next time you're at the airport, watch the people claiming their luggage. I certainly hope some of them are actually moving to the country at which they're arriving because you shouldn't need a bag the size and weight of a coffee table to get you through a vacation. Who looks oppressed and in pain? Giant Bag People. Who looks excited and adventurous? The ones walking past baggage claim on their way to the exit because they already have all their reasonable