One of the hardest things to let go of in the modern era is the desire for physical objects. Many of us were raised when everything we owned existed in the real world. When I wrote papers in high school, I turned them in as pieces of paper to my teacher. By the time I was in college, emailing them to the professor as an attachment was completely acceptable in many of my classes. It can be a difficult mental adjustment to make, but going digital is one of the best ways you can reduce clutter in your home.
The two easiest things to go digital on are music and photos. The advantages of putting both on your computer are staggering. You can take them anywhere (my iPod holds 30 gigabytes -- more than enough for a year's worth of photos and my entire music collection), store them safely offsite with one of many online media storage options, and crop/make playlists/alter to fit your needs whenever you like.
To go digital on your music you will need various things depending on what format your music is currently in. For CDs you'll need a computer with a CD drive and a music program such as iTunes. For tapes, records, minidiscs, and other formats, you can sometimes buy a cable that will permit you to link a player with your computer, but you may also have to investigate a company that specializes in media transfer. Another great option if you don't have that many CDs in the first place is a site like the Zune Marketplace which allows you to listen to music and even keep the songs you like for a reasonable monthly fee. It's a great solution to keep yourself clutter free once the majority of your music is digitized. I use both the Zune Marketplace and iTunes for most of my music needs now!
For photos you will need a computer and a scanner. Easy enough! Just scan the photos that you want to transfer to ones and zeroes, and save them in your favorite photo editing/sorting program. You can easily keep them online on a site like Flickr or Picasa as well if you don't have the storage space on your computer. Now you can stack all your old pictures into small, efficient boxes (buy archival safe containers!) if you want to keep them, or recycle them if you don't.
Today, mix it up and look at what you own that could be compressed into a digital format! Now think about what you can do with all that space...
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