I look around my living room as I'm typing and see that most of the things are family keepsakes, music boxes and figurines that were in our family home for most of my lifetime...there's a figurine that supposedly represents a famous sea captain uncle, another that my Mom saw as a reflection of herself. I wonder where these will end up someday, but for now, they do provide some measure of comfort.

Other items are little things we've picked up on our recent travels. These days, whenever I buy anything new, I'm consciously imagining the space it will occupy and if I can't mentally fit it in anywhere, I don't buy it. And we've switched to finding small fridge magnets for our travel souvenirs now.

I do think there are stages, as if the things we collect somehow represent something about the part of the journey we were on at that time. Then as we move on, I suppose it no longer becomes necessary to hold on to those "time-holders"...I can't think of the exact quote, but what comes to mind is the notion that in order to find space within ourselves for new experiences and new thoughts, we have to empty out the old ones first. I see the decluttering as a physical manifestation of that evolution in our inward journeying.