Culling Books Again

Yesterday while sick and resting in bed I put on a TiVo recorded Dr. Phil which featured a hoarding woman. She had filled a condo and a 3500 square foot house, both stuffed to the gills including with rotting food (she had a big thing for hoarding food, even years after it was rotted).

I couldn't take it for more than a few minutes. As I looked around my bedroom I saw stacks of books. I looked over to the sitting room's built-in bookcases and saw overstacked shelves. Right then and there I got up and began culling books.

I first went through the non-fiction books on pregnancy, birth and parenting. Next, nutrition and medical books. Then other non-fiction categories, some left over from my business corporate days. I keep asking myself these things:

1. Is this book something I will ever read again?

2. If the book is so great why haven't I read it yet?

3. Does this topic pertain to my life right now or is this something from my past that is no longer relevant?

4. Do I care enough to learn about this to spend my time reading it?

5. Do I really need the book or do I just like what the book is about? It is okay to like a topic and to love what an author has to say but it doesn't mean I have to own the book if I'm not using the book.

I rid myself of over 50 gardening magazines saved as I thought I'd re-read them someday. I decided I have gardening wisdom in my head already and what I need to look up I can do in one of the many gardening books I also own. I posted those to Freecycle immediately.

I then loaded some books into my PaperBackSwap account to swap out via the Internet.



(If you join PBS--free of charge---through my link then I get one free book. I thank you in advance!)

I then showed my husband a little of the show and he walked over to his desk. He began sorting papers and shredding stuff up. He moved on to a file about the sale of our former house and the purchase of this one and began throwing stuff out. I saved a few momentos such as the official listing of the house and the contract.

I was out all day today but just now I returned to the task.

I went through half of my fiction books which are mostly all unread in a big 'to be read' pile. I found an unprecidented three copies of one book. Wow. (Most of these were purchased for 50 cents at library sales and most are in 'like new' condition.)

I have been reading the backs of the fiction books and really figuring out which don't appeal to me. No mind that it is an Oprah book club book, if I don't want to read it, I'm letting it go. I am letting go of some chick lit which really is not something I'm interested in reading. As a happily married mother now in her 40s I just am not entertained by reading of the dating scene and the 'search for love' or 'search for a man to marry' stage of life. Do I really want to read a book about a murder? Have I tried to read this before and just was not interested--if so why am I keeping it?

Right now I'm looking at a number of books by a few different highly acclaimed fiction writers. I am thinking that I should again try to read some and if they don't click with me then get rid of them. Again, it doesn't matter if an author or a book is popular, if I can't stand to read it then why is this book clogging my bookshelf?

I felt so inspired by the fact that I'm letting some more books go that I popped online to share that with you. Now I'll get back to culling more books.