ENDING MY ADDICTIONS

Addiction is a terrible thing. And pretty much everybody who understands it, will admit that it takes great strength and determination to beat it. It’s pretty easy to just say: Get over itor You can stop if you want to – but alas – the psycho-emotional component is a trap hard to escape.

Soos there’s liquor and drugs and food and cigarettes and any number of “fetishy”  things and I’m here to report on  how I found the best cure for my particular addiction.(s) In a few words: I am addicted to “excess.”   (as in :  if one  (of anything)  is good, two is better and three is ideal and also, as in : one addiction is not enough) combined with the inability to throw anything away , a penchant for collecting pens and elephants and old match books and print articles of particular interest to me, and letters –  remember letters? and a compulsion to shop  anything that says “Buy one, Get one Free.” Know ye well, that this does not augur well when in the process of downsizing one’s living quarters by about 2000 square feet.  

Thus, the cure.  Take away that 2000 square feet of living space for starters – and for sure there is some physics theory that says something to the effect that there is a limit to how much solid stuff can actually fit into a specific amount of space.  And so the “tossing party”  begins.  We – I say “we” but it is actually only me —   “do” categories. – Saving — donate – give away – sell – garbage – And here, of course is where I break the addiction.

And then a funny thing happened to me. I became obsessed with the “garbage” category. And furiously did I dump the junk of my life – what I had thought to be the sustenance of my life — the stuff that I would have been too embarrassed to give away, donate, and certainly would not expect to sell. Why did I save this? Why did I acquire it in the first place?

You can call it cold turkey. That’s how I eliminated about 90% of my worldly possessions. Ah, but wait.

Then came the move —  and there is still too much – and now I am dealing with having to eliminate about 90% of what is left – resorting to the same categories.

Soon this torture will end. Soon I will be settled in with just the right amount of “stuff.” And already I can see how effective was the cure. Retailers, marketers, hawkers of various wares, all of you out there, I give you fair warning. I am not your patsy any more. If I don’t need it – I don’t buy it. And if I need it – I buy only one.

I feel like a new person. I have shed my stuff. It’s better than taking a bath. It feels so good.

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