Read All About It by Becky Esker

Reading clutter…we all have it. There is so much information in the world and much of it ends up on our kitchen table, in the magazine rack, next to the bed and shoved under the sofa. But why won’t we just PITCH it? Well of course, there must be something of extreme importance in it. It is also the fear of throwing out the unknown…not knowing exactly what it is that you are pitching. When it comes to letting go, our EMOTIONAL decision making kicks into gear. We need to think beyond the emotions and move into some logical decision making.

WHEN THEY PILE UP
Let’s take magazines for example. If we have a BACKLOG of 10 magazines, that doesn’t seem like many. However, if the magazines arrive on a monthly basis, that is almost one year of magazines in arrears. Also, when we take into account that it takes a good two hours to read a magazine from cover to cover, that is 20 hours of reading for a backlog of 10 magazines. Twenty hours! Think about it, that is almost one full day or 1/2 of a work week. Logically, now what were just 10 magazines is now 1/2 of a work week.

KNOW YOUR LIMIT

Expectations are another component of our reading clutter. Quite often we set high UNREALISTIC expectations of ourselves. Get real. Are you really going to spend what equates to 1/2 a work week getting caught up on reading materials? So, how do we combat the reading clutter?

BE CONSISTENT
Have a SYSTEM in place for giving attention to your magazines. For example, take 20 minutes at the end of each day to wind down and read or take the time in the morning to ease into the day before things get busy.

BE SYSTEMATIC
Replace the old magazine with the NEW one as soon as it arrives. Then (and here's the really important part), don't just leave all the old ones sitting around in a pile or basket or box -- get rid of them!

BE REALISTIC
Logically evaluate the time you REALLY have to read, not the time you WISH you had to read. Then compare that with the number of magazines, newspapers, books, etc. that you have lying around waiting to be read. If the two don't quite match up, you might need a reality check in terms of your reading material -- only keep what you have the time to read and learn to let the rest go.

BE AGGRESSIVE
Don’t be afraid to tear out ARTICLES and information of importance. One or two articles occupy much less space than an entire magazine. Take care to file away the articles you do keep, so you can find them later.

BE CONSCIENTIOUS
RECYCLE the reading clutter in a recycling bin or donate to hospitals, doctor offices, or care centers. This goes for books too. Once you have read the book, DONATE it or sell it. A read book taking up space in your home or office is a thief of your space and energy!

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Oh how I love this article. Paper is such a huge time waster for all of us. I love magazines. And this is my weakness. I have gotten a better handle on it over the years but I still need work in this area. Tuesdays are my designated day to deal with paperwork and that usually means dealing with magazines.

I earmark pages I want to return to when I first read a magazine. Sometimes I just want to look up a website. Sometimes I want to clip the recipe. On Tuesdays my goal is go through these magazines and take action. I think my plan needs some tweaking but I'm doing better these past few years only because I plan.

Make a plan. Try it out. Tweak it. Live with less paper clutter.