I’ve decided to rip all of my CD’s to my computer so that I can get rid of the physical discs themselves. Tonight I started this in earnest and ripped the first sixteen. It was just after number 16 that I realized the checkbox “Add ID3 tags to encoded files” was not checked. 
OK… CD ripping: TAKE 2!
–sigh–
As I continue the process of de-junking I’m beginning to sell (and give away) my things. I’ve found it interesting that more often than not, reducing the amount of things that I own gives me a sort of euphoric high. This is due in part to the fact that each item I rid myself of takes me one step closer to leaving. However there is more to it than that.
I also think that offloading my junk is, on some level, allowing me a form repentance for becoming the stereotypical, materialistic consumerist that is so prevalent in our society today. My apologies if I sound preachy, that is not at all my intention; by all means go and buy your iPods. For me however, I had hoped to see myself in a different light. There is no doubt by the amount of garbage I have collected that I am indeed a brain-washed consumer. My forced recognition of this is exactly why I am now enjoying shedding my possessions. However there are those few things that I find myself sad to part with.
Tonight I loaded up my weight bench & all my weights into a friends truck. 2 1/2 years ago I stopped weight lifting due to health issues. A little over a year ago I got clearance from my doctor to get back to lifting, however I never did for a variety of reasons (reasons, or excuses?). But often times I would go into my weight room, put on the gloves, lay down on the bench and put my hands on the bar. I would usually do a quick set, maybe two. I told myself that I wouldn’t start up a full routine until I could truly devote the time to do it right. However with the upcoming move, that just never happened. Then with the decision to de-junk it became apparent that it wouldn’t happen again for quite some time.
We all have different activities that, for whatever reason, fit us very well. Weight lifting was one of those activities for me. Beneath the weights I found a catharsis for the stress of daily life. In learning proper form, and ensuring that I retained it, I found both control and harmony. After especially tough workouts, when I was thoroughly sore the next day, every movement brought with it a sensation that made me feel very much alive. In those post-workout minutes when my heart was still pumping, when I continued to sweat as my body tried to lower my body temperature, when my muscles were still engorged with blood I felt like I had just descended from Olympus.
I found many benefits in weight lifting, physical, mental, and emotional. I’m sad to see the bench go.
In my continued effort to declutter my life I’ve decided to join paperbackswap. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s worth checking out if you’re an avid book reader. Put simply, it allows you to list all of the books you’re willing to part with. If someone wants one of your books you send it to them (you pay shipping). In exchange you get a “credit” which entitles you to request a book from someone else. It’s a neat concept, I’ll find out how well it’s executed in the coming days / weeks.
To start with I’ve posted 25 books. I think that I immediately received 4 requests (I’m still figuring this out).
Since this involves actually mailing books to other members people will see your name & address. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with this. However since I’ll be selling my house soon enough I figure I’ll at least give it a try.
I’ll let you know how it goes. =)
As I’ve been moving along trying to plan out what I’ll need to do post house-sale I’ve started looking at renting a truck. I figured I would pack my junk up, throw my car on a tow dolly, and head up to Portland, OR. Once there I would put all of the aforementioned junk into storage and then figure things out from there. I started by looking at the Uhaul trucks, and the more I looked the more I started thinking that maybe this isn’t my best option.
Let’s look at some of the math behind this:
I started with the assumption that I would use a 14′ truck. Uhaul’s website allows you to get an instant quote (Kudos to Uhaul! Penske, are you listening???) so within moments I had the numbers. The rental of the truck would be $718. Add the car dolly ($96) and San Antonio sales tax ($71.23) and I’m at $885.23. Now here’s the kicker: I still have to fill up the tank.
Uhaul claims that their 14′ truck gets 10 mpg. I asked google what sort of real-world fuel econonmy I could expect but I couldn’t find any answers. So I’ve made some assumptions. I assume that 10 mpg is the best fuel economy possible. In other words, I assume the 14′ truck will get 10 mpg when it’s empty, with the wind at it’s back, going 55mph downhill, being driven by a midget who weights 85 pounds. Fill up the truck and put a tow dolly on the back and drive 65-70 mph and I’m assuming that I can expect the fuel economy to be cut in half.
So $4 per gallon going 2300 miles at 5 mpg gives us $1,840. Add that to the above rental costs and it will cost me $2,725.23 just to get up there. Driving my Civic will cost me $287.50 in gas. Therefore not renting a truck will save me $2,437.73.
But wait! There’s more savings yet! I’m still not sure if I’ll be going straight to Portland or what. But the assumed plan involves dumping all my stuff in storage for some amount of time. Let’s assume that I’ll store for 2 months. Renting a large storage unit two months will run me about $150 / month (I’m guessing). Then when I move into an apartment I’ll need to rent a truck again: rental + mileage + gas will cost me an estimated $50. So savings is now up to $2,800-ish.
At this point I began to wonder. How much is my stuff even worth? I figured I for sure own over $3,000 worth of junk, but how much over? Then I took it a step further. Let’s forget what the value of my stuff is, but what exactly would “replacement value” be?
If I’m going to try to be more a minimalist in Life 2.0, then that means I’m going to get rid of a portion of my belongings. So when I look at replacement value (RV), anything I wouldn’t replace would have have an RV of $0. My treadmill cost me about $700 when I bought it, but if I don’t plan to replace it the RV is nill.
Another way to lower the RV of my goods is by replacing them with cheaper crap. =) If my intention is to survive 4 years on a budget and at the same time trying a more minimalistic lifestyle then there’s no reason I need to replace my stuff with equivalent-level stuff. Of my 4-piece bedroom set I only really need 1 piece. My fancy real-wood bookcase in my office can get functionally replaced by a $40 bookcase at Target. My weight bench (which I love) can be replaced with a set of dumbbells and some creative exercises.
But in the end, even after adjust the value of belongs for using RV instead of worth I’m still over $3,000. But not everything has a monetary value. If I were to actually get rid of almost everything I have I will gain several things:
At the start of this, I really hoped that somehow this would be economically advantageous. That’s not the case. But as I pointed out above, there are other advantages that come with going in this direction. I’m not yet sure what I’ll decide, but I’m finding myself leaning towards this direction more & more. As I’m cleaning my house and organizing / boxing things up I sometimes feel like I’m drowning in all that I’ve accumulated.
At this point in my life I’m more interested in asking questions and imagining possibilities than making firm decisions. Sometime in the near future though, I’ll have to decide on which approach I should take. In the end, I’ll go with whatever my gut-feeling tells me is best.
We all have these images of ourselves in our head. Sometimes those images are pretty close to reality, other times it’s like we’re smoking crack. Considering myself a minimalist is an instance of the latter. My mother can be quite the pack-rat and when I moved away from home I decided I would make sure not to do the same. I loved the notion of minimalism and decided to live a life free of unneeded junk.
I failed.
Big time.
Cleaning up & packing my house I’ve learned what a pathetic job I’ve done at being a minimalist. I’m not even close. My crap level is insane. And I’m not talking about the sort of stuff that I have & want but others would consider crap. No no, I’m finding things and asking myself, “Why the hell did I hold on to this?” I found an old phone book (the kind you fill in, not the yellow pages) with phone numbers of people whom I have completely forgotten about. This is stuff that I concede is complete & total crap.
One of the good things about moving is that you’re forced to go through everything. I’m throwing away a lot. So my first attempt at minimalism was a failure, but I’m not done trying. I read a good article on unclutter.com, it was about taking pictures of your keepsakes as opposed to dragging them along with you. After de-junking, that’s a good second step to try out. One of the goals of Life 2.0 will be to be more of a minimalist. I want to be a more minimalistic for two reasons: to live a cleaner, simpler life and because of my general disdain for the frenzied consumerism so prevalent in our culture.
Clean = good. Cluttered=bad. It all sounds good on paper I guess. Now let’s see if I can actually follow through with it. I’ll keep you posted.
