Curious Realizer - Collecting Things
Curious Realizer - Collecting Things
What have you collected and does it inform your learning, thinking and creativity?
Many people collect things. Taken to an extreme you might be considered a hoarder1 if you can’t let things go but for most people it’s quite normal to have a collection of some kind. Here are some of the things that I’ve collected over the years:
Pins
Badges
Stickers
Coins and stamps
Action figures, dinky cars or other toys
Lego (Lego tends to accrete more than being collected)
Trading cards (non-gaming)
Tracing cards (for gaming)
CDs, VHS cassettes, DVDs
Computer/video games
Books (in a series)
Comic books (I still have close to 1,000 taking up space in my home)
Blog posts and articles (I used to print them, save them and reread them periodically)
Notebooks and stationery stuff (still doing it!)
There are all kinds of interesting collections out there. When I was Australia many years ago I met a fellow who collected steamrollers (I know, right?) And so on.
Commonplace books, Zettelkastens and journals are other types of collections, basically collections of words, pictures, facts and ideas.
Collections2 can give you a purpose in life: they provide mini-quests to obtain things. The planning, hunting, finding, arranging and storage are all part of the fun. Thinking and talking about your collections can provide a lot of joy and you can learn a lot through collecting. Anything you learn could manifest itself in other ways, too, like providing inspiration for writing.
If you’re willing, I’d like you to share some of your own collecting experiences: did they give you joy at one point? Are you still collecting and enjoying it? Do collections spark other thoughts and ideas?
Or, conversely, if you are opposed to collecting, maybe you could share those thoughts?3
Not judging here, by the way, I have things that I can’t seem to part with.
See also this Austin Kleon post about collecting.
I acknowledge that for financial or domestic reasons some people aren’t able to do much collecting. And some people prefer to minimize their possessions so fair enough.
As a child, I collected rocks. I could sit for hours in the driveway searching for unique shapes, colors, textures. As an adult, I have a much smaller rock collection. I also search for tiny seashells on our annual beach trip.
I don’t know if I would call it a collection, but I have pizza boxes (they are the perfect size and many loca pizza joints will give them to you if you ask) full of my kids’ art work and writings. I keep saying I want to digitize all of it and then get rid of it. My mom is a big time collector of things (borderline hoarder?), to an unhealthy point. Years ago when I realized this, I began culling my possessions and creating a “life of less.”
I’m curating ghosts and memories in my old childhood farmhouse this summer, through my ancestors’ various collections. Books, musical instruments, antiques, manuscripts, sketches, journals. It’s a lot.