Hoarding — a curse in disguise
Another perspective to the ‘big circle’ problem
I have dust allergy. It took me quite some time to catch the culprit. Reveal at the end.
So hoarding is the art of stocking up resources for the what if alternative of your future where you need them. As a result, you invest time in stocking as much as you can and ensuring you are equipped — even in the case of a failure.
However, hoarding does come at a cost. It might not be viable for you to do this especially when it costs someone else scarcity of options because you put yourself before them. It might also make you prey to Hicks law of not settling for any due to the fear of making the wrong choice.
For me, however, I hoard because I worry of missing some crucial factor in the future. So to put it straight forward, hoarding makes me conscience feel better. But for the 1% I am forced to save 99% of the rest.
Sometimes you hoard when you are lazy to sort and filter out the essence. The truth is when you glance at the mammoth of content you have stocked up in your shelf, you give up meeting the purpose of stocking up in the very first place. In time, you realize how nothing changes.
To speak in my view, I have far too many objects in my room — most of which I do not use and catches dust — adding on to my allergic dust sneezing nature of my body. This realization forced me to fight laziness and do a deep analysis to see what matters in my life moving forward.
I found the fear and dealt with 10,000+ images on my phone. Sure, it did cost me time but being clutter free and reducing the stress on the mind creates more space — both in mind and in reality.
At any given time, my mind is clogged with several dozens of thoughts — similar to the condition of my room. One might even argue that this cluttered state of the mind is the cause of my delayed actions to rectify issues in the room. Anyhow, I do write it all out on papers to make my mind free of worries but then it just becomes another monument of admiration over time. I become habituated by the large number of objects in the room, that I give up even attempting to get started at any point.
Why not just throw it all away? So long, the fear of loosing something critical always lingered in my mind but finally I believe I have battled that fear and come to the conclusion:
If I have not utilized it thus far, I probably will never use it.
Even if I needed it, chances are that I would forget where I placed it in the room and then resort to plan B of taking a copy of the same information that is elsewhere.
So, I decided to fix the problem.
Now, my room is in a better state and so is my mind. I am learning to say ‘no’ to new opportunities in the hopes of giving myself enough time and mind space to complete whatever I have started.
Another important realization that I had was that when I fail to respond pro-actively to issues, it magnifies over time and then I respond reactively — dozing the fire. A stitch in time, saves nine is indeed a valuable message to take to heart with respect to this matter.
I hope you keep your livelihood tidy as well. Let go of alternatives and be decisive for a better tomorrow.
