I have so many books that I’ve run out of book shelves. Books are now stacked in neat piles on the floor, desks and coffee tables. Buying more shelves is out of the question as there’s no more free wall space either.

I have books that are over forty years old. Mainly non-fiction (as I turn over my fiction books), I’m now at a point of conceding defeat. It’s unlikely I’d ever read them again so they need to go.

Books that were my interests years ago, are no longer so why hold onto them?

Here’s how I choose which books must go through my own selection process. 👇

Since I created and uploaded this video, I’ve turfed out more but ITS HARDLY MADE A DENT ON THE SHELVES! There’s some gaps here and there but on the whole, despite getting rid of these, I still need to be more ruthless.

This weekend I dropped some of the books (fiction) to a community library at the local U3A but my non-fiction will be a tad more difficult. I’ll need to drop them to a second hand bookstore to see if they’ll accept them. Themes are mainly ancient history, politics and, maritime history. Do people actually read older non-fiction books anymore? I’ve no idea…

Meanwhile …

I’ve no idea what has got into my husband but he has gone on a second hand book store and charity shop bender.

“I’m on a quest,” he says to me.

“And what quest might that be?” I ask without looking up from my knitting.

“I’m in search of John Grisham novels.”

I look up at him and sigh.

“You do realise that there’s tonnes of those and I’m only just clearing some book shelf space?” I ask.

“Sure, so now we’ll now have more room for Grisham!”

I groan.

Not exactly what I had planned but not surprising.

Books are our downfall in this household. Remove one book, it’s likely that three or four will replace it.

Andrew has been steadily building his collection of Grisham novels so it looks like our book shelf space will be filled again.

We have such different reading preferences and it’s evident on our shelves. My ones are filled with modern classics and literature, his with general popular fiction.

If you want a tour of our respective book shelves, check out how different they are: 👇

I’ll continue to clear out as many books as I can but I’m determined to whittle down my books to ones that have inspired me, moved me or and ones which I love and adore and will be read again.

Getting Rid of Business Texts – An Ongoing Process

Over the last year or so, I’ve also been getting rid of my business texts in Learning & Development, eLearning and other similar topics. I created an eBay store and have steadily sold these which is also a good way to make a bit of money (although overall, I’ve lost money).

I don’t think adding my maritime history, politics or ancient history books to my eBay store will ever sell (not quickly anyway) so there’s going to come a time when all these books left on the shelf waiting for eBay buyers will be ditched in the big black bin outside.

It does make me wonder why I ever bought them? 🤔

Sure, they helped during my professional working years and I had a great reference collection but look at me now. I’m retired. I play golf, I knit, I read literature and learn French. I look at all these business texts and they’ve all just become so……pointless. Irrelevant. They’re from a past world. A past me.

All my resources now are in other forms (videos, podcasts, online dictionaries, social groups…) and are used in the moment. I don’t need to keep anything any more.

How do you choose which books stay or go?