born on date

My father in law is one of the smartest people I know, he has a knack of keeping this simple and always seems to be able to find the right thing to say without saying too much. Well one of the best things he ever told me is his concept of born on dating when storing shit. See his theory is that when you put something into storage while in the vast majority of times you should have instead thrown the crap out. The issue though is that we all love our crap, they hold memories, were often costly and always seems like something you may need at some point....or at least that's what you tell yourself.
Well my father in law has a great concept and it's simple but perfect. When you put a box down in storage write the date on the outside. If you come back down there in one year and that box hasn't been opened then pick it up and bring it immediately to the dump. Don't open it up because if you do there will be some reason to hold onto it because you'll see a book you think you might read or an ugly sweater you might wear. See if you wait one full year then you have gone through four seasons and you lived fine without it. This avoids throwing out your skis or your bathing suit but keeps you from accumulating shit.


Now he's also got a garage full of shit from 1972 so obviously it's not that easy a concept to work in practice
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