Do You Really Need All That Stuff?

When I was in my early twenties living in Germany working as a civil servant I bought a lot of nice things to pad my nest. I got Noritake crystal and china at prices half of what I would pay in the States. It made me feel special. I bought expensive figurines for my shelves and a first-rate stereo. My record collection grew, and I was proud of my half-speed master recordings. I collected a lot of knick knacks. Little ceramic birds. A carving of St. John made in South Tyrolia. Carvings of faces made from blocks of wood in Austria. A ceramic mask from Venice. A rock from the coast of Yugoslavia.

When I returned to the States I lived with my parents for a while, which was barely tolerable. I moved a few times after that, even got married and divorced, until I ended up in my own apartment in Sunnyvale, California. Apartment 24. I loved living there. My next door neighbor became a very close friend and the godmother to my cats, and I to hers. She had five cats: Whiskers, Smokey Joe, Billie Bob, Oscar, and Dot.

I lived there for ten years amassing more possessions. I filled my home with quality belongings. When I decided to lighten my load, I began auctioning off my book collection, which had grown too large. Whoops. I started making money. On my way home from a massage one day I saw a sign for an estate sale advertising, among other things, BOOKS! I bought five boxes of books for a quarter each book. Thus began my third business, and I soon filled my home with books, books, books. So much for downsizing!

One winter I flew to Hawaii to visit a woman who had been my best friend in high school. What I noticed most about her home was that it was decorated sparsely in beiges and off-whites. Her home was so restful to the eyes and the spirit. The lack of clutter relaxed me. When I flew back home and walked into my bathroom I was assaulted by my multi-colored shower curtain. It was too loud! My whole apartment was too loud. My décor jarred my senses and set up a discordant vibration.

A few years later I drove several times to Oregon looking for a house. I put in two offers but they both fell through. I really needed to get out of California’s Silicon Valley, so I bought a motor home. I sold my Teac reel-to-reel (which hurt a little), my massage table (that hurt too, but I never used it!), my wheatgrass juicer. I was able to sell quite a few things, but I was left with many more things that wouldn’t sell: the solid pine Virginia House dresser, mirror and nightstands, my thousand dollar queen-sized bed, the Noritake china and crystal, the dining room set, the professional Beseler 45MX enlarger and color darkroom equipment. Stuff. Stuff I ended up donating to the Salvation Army. I left a lot behind and lightened my load considerably.

The world has to learn that the actual pleasure derived from material things is of rather low quality on the whole and less even in quantity than it looks to those who have not tried it. –Oliver Wendell Holmes

A young couple who lived in our complex came by to look at my stuff. I watched, entralled, as they discussed a tea kettle for five minutes. It had cost me over $20 and I was selling it for $5. They went back and forth about whether or not they should buy it, and in the end walked away empty-handed. Their own apartment, I had heard, was filled with trash, paper, newspapers, barely room to walk. And they were both well-educated, well-paid professionals. I’m not sure whether it was the additional acquisition or the $5 that concerned them, but I’m leaning toward them just being tight.

I had managed to stop collecting trinkets, trifles, knickknacks, gewgaws, baubles, gimcracks, bric-a-brac. For heaven’s sake, why so many names for stuff? The names are as useless as the stuff! Okay, so no more little figurines. Maybe a small stuffed animal once in a great while. It was enough to pick up something “cute,” admire it, and put it back. I also found perverse pleasure in watching other people pick up and buy crap they didn’t need because it was cute or adorable or pretty. I watched them ooh and aah over bric-a-brac near cash registers strategically placed for impulse buying. How many people actually look for the aisle of small, cute, expensive crap?

My brother’s Russian wife and step-daughter went shopping one day. When they came out of the clothing store my brother wanted to go home and they said, “But we still have a dollar. Can we go to the dollar store?” Money. It had to be spent. Something had to be aquired. It wouldn’t occur to them to save it for something they really needed.

Which of these is the wisest and happiest–he who labors without ceasing and only obtains, with great trouble, enough to live on, or he who rests in comfort and finds all that he needs in the pleasure of hunting and fishing? –Micmac Chief (1676)

I loved living in the motor home for the next three years. It was small and easy to keep clean inside (the outside was another story). I couldn’t and wouldn’t collect stuff. Having lightened myself of so many things was liberating. But I wondered if I merely transferred my need for aquisition to books. I was filling a 7,500 square foot warehouse.

I was working my ass off for more money that I couldn’t enjoy because I was too busy working my ass off. How did I get so imbalanced? Why was I working ten hours a day almost every day? The picture to the left is the inventory I amassed in California. All the money I made was put back into the business. I asked my accountant a stupid question: “Is it good having $200,000 in inventory?” He said, “If you want to sit on that much money.” I didn’t get it then. Looking back, I could have kept the business small and made a good profit, but I bought into the notion that bigger is better. I have been sincerely stupid, but that’s okay too.

I was tired and I wanted to stop being an entrepreneur and start being a businesswoman. I’d been self-employed since 1993, and my income was always reimbursement for my own labor. I wanted someone else to labor for me so I could enjoy the fruits of my hard work. But the economy started to crash, good help was hard to find, too many people began selling books, and I made a few mistakes. I bought too much house and moved out of the warehouse too late.

But all the time I was buying this inventory I kept thinking, “There’s a reason for this. There’s a reason for all this inventory.” Well, I’ve been living off this inventory for the past year. And the sale of this inventory next month will liberate me again when I satisfy the IRS. I am not sorry for any of it. I am exactly where I need to be.

You see, I was trying to manifest an avenue of wealth doing something that I just didn’t enjoy anymore. I typically burn out around year seven in any venture. I’m an entrepreneur. I create. I enjoy the challenge of building new things. Maintaining something is deadly for me and will make me sick. Fear and laziness motivated me to hold onto my business. I didn’t know what else I would do, and I didn’t want to do word processing again. So I kept selling books, hating it. I cannot wait to get rid of this business and devote my full energy to this blog and book reviews.

The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into silver and gold. –Kahlil Gibran

People often express concern or sympathy for me because I’m “losing” my home and my business. I’m not actually losing my home. I’m giving it back to the bank. I’m giving up the business to do something worthwhile that I’ll enjoy and that will hopefully contribute to others. I’m a believer in manifesting, and I manifested this situation I’m in. Because I know what I’m supposed to be doing, but I’ve let fear stand between me and my future. I’ll be writing a lot more about manifesting in the future.

How About You?

Is your stuff holding you back or weighing you down? Do you work your ass off to buy more stuff you can’t enjoy because you have to work long hours to pay for it? Do you thereby neglect the important things, such as family, purpose, contribution, community? Do you feel crowded by your stuff? Does your home make you nervous? Get rid of it! Give it away. Throw it out. Lighten your load.

You can never get enough of what you don’t need to make you happy. –Eric Hoffer

The neighbor I spoke of earlier could have opened a curio shop with all the expensive teddy bears and knickknacks she had collected over the years. She had clothes filling her multiple dressers and on top of them, stacked in piles under and around her bed. Store catalogs were stacked against walls. She died of cancer. When we started cleaning out her apartment we opened the door to her walk-in closet. She had filled all the shelves and the floor a foot-high with STUFF. Bras that would never fit her. Socks. Purses. A comforter set for every day of the week.

I think in the end she must have been so very sad that shopping provided temporary relief, and she must have been equally embarrassed by her compulsion and so hid her purchases in her closet. But the compulsion preceded the cancer. I remember listening to a doctor talk about a patient of his with cancer who was a hoarder, and he felt there was a correlation.

I would propose that if you are a hoarder, hoarding isn’t the problem. Something else needs to be addressed and dealt with, and then the hoarding will resolve itself. Hoarding is just a symptom. But giving things away will help bring the issues to the surface. For me, when I was young I bought things to impress others. Look at me, I’m 25 years old and I own expensive crystal and china. Who really gives a shit? When I was older it was my business success. “Look what I did, Dad. Are you proud of me YET?”

Now I would be happy to have a small home on a piece of land where I could grow my own food. I do want a high-quality television, because I love and collect DVDs. I’d love to have built-in shelving for my library, because I love learning and teaching others. But I hope I’ve gotten over needing to impress people or gain my father’s approval or buying to provide a temporary lift. The things I buy now I pretty much need. How about you?

Next time you get ready to exchange your paper currency for an object, ask yourself if you really need it. If you’re not sure, decide that you’ll sleep on it. You can always get it the next day. What’s the rush?

I have to go pack a hundred books. So I leave you with a little humor and present George Carlin on “Stuff.”

Tagged as: freedom, hoarding, possessions, stuff