1000 Things

...not done ...rambling ...sorry

How many things do you have? How many of them matter, i.e. how many of them do you use or even remember you own? Perhaps for every one thing you want that you don't have, there 50 things you have but don't need or even want. I'm not suggesting you could somehow exchange these for what you want now; I'm simply working on the notion that the space and mental freedom of getting rid of the stuff you don't want is underappreciated.

I once came across a story online about a man who disliked materialism enough to do something about it, at least in his own life. He claimed the average person in the U.S. has 10,000 things, so he tried to get by on only 100 things. (I thought this was a link off Philip Greenspun's Materialism page but apparently not or not anymore.) Personally I don't think materialism itself is a problem. I want a Porsche 911 as much as the next guy, I just don't want to have to sift through a pile of junk to find the keys. The '100 things' story seemed pretty neat though -- the cost of another thing isn't just the amount you pay for it (obvious) or even the amount of space it takes up in your house (less obvious), the cost of another thing includes the attention it uses up. Actually limiting oneself to 100 things seems like it would be a hardship. I'm trying out the philosophy, though, that there is an ideal number of things on the order of 1000 things, and limiting oneself to this number of things actually improves the quality of life in the long run. I'm trying this out and my goal (which I'm far from) is 1000 things -- get rid of everything except the 1000 most important, useful or meaningful items I own, occasionally adding new higher-value items, and my life will go more smoothly and I'll be much happier... or at least the average value of my stuff shoots up.

For example, after unpacking from my last move I found 6 rolls of regular scotch tape, 2 rolls of double-sided tape, and 1 roll of duct tape (but I know I have at least 2 more somewhere).

Does a box of 100 toothpicks count as 101 things? Of course not. How about a collection of 100 CDs? Most definitely. The issue isn't so much the volume of the things but the space they take up in your brain. If you were to make a list of everything you own for the purpose of restoring your living space after a fire, let's say, you'd need the name of every CD you have. You wouldn't need the name of every toothpick.

How about volume? I recently got married and moved into her place. I *know* everything I've got fits into a 14' moving van.

Is it possible to remember all the things I own?

Food items count. "Do we still have any more of the crackers we bought with that cheese we finished last Saturday?" If it's something you keep track of, it counts.

Here's what we had around May 2001:

• kitchen: 478 things
• pantry: around 200
• hallway: 40
• bathroom: 121
• my study: around 2000
• hall closet: around 250
• Yonghong's study: around 700
• living room: 66
• TV room: 472
• bedroom: around 750
• cellar: around 700

That's around 5777 things for two people, and as it turns out I'm directly responsible for around 3150 of them and have joint ownership of another 780 -- that's the equivalent of 3540 things for me.

Here's a plan:

1. pile everything you own into one room or unused space, except maybe the things you obviously use every day
2. whenever you need to use something, put it where you would normally keep it

What would the minimal amount of stuff be?

1. Enough clothes for two weeks.
2. Have all your books and most other reading material online.
3. Have all your music & video material online.
4. No hobbies that require stuff.
5. A newish car (or no car at all) thus no car junk.
6. A new apartment or condo, thus no large set of tools.

Some dilemmas:
Having a CD on your computer instead of on a shelf uses less physical space but doesn't it use up as much mental space? Not really. You have to remember you own it so you don't buy it again but you don't have to remember which shelf it's on too.
It takes money to have stuff, but it takes more money to have less stuff. With money it's easier to throw something away, because you know that if you need it again you can get it again. My wife says that while growing up in communist China it did not escape their attention that in the U.S. the poor people were fat. Just as a large number of calories does not imply wealth, neither should a large pile of stuff.

How many things does the average person have? I don't know; most people don't count their things. There are notable exceptions. One Matthew McClintock has catalogued around 2000 of his things, which he estimates is 70% of the total, putting his total number of things in the neighborhood of 2800-2900 (read more about it: 'Do You Know Where His Keys Are?). A case could be made that anyone who catalogs, photographs and posts all of his possessions for public viewing is not your average person. I suspect his total number of things is on the low side 1) because he seems like a neat, organized person who wouldn't accumulate a lot of extra junk (and I don't see piles of random junk in his catalog), and 2) because junk, by it's nature, should be easier to throw out than to catalog, describe and photograph.

Anyway, the point of reducing the number of things you have is specifically so you don't have to catalog, describe and photograph them all to keep track of them.