Taming the Paper

I've had two clear bins of paperwork hanging around for a couple of years now. They're a mix of all sorts of stuff--old bills, investment statements, bank statements, letters. I've avoided going through them because I felt I had to properly sort everything, you know, bank statements with bank statements, phone bills with phone bills. Then, I realized, why? Why do I need to do that? I don't and I'm not.

Here's what I am doing instead. I have two bankers boxes. One is for paperwork to keep (investment statements, tax documents, banks statements, etc.). The other is for letters, cards, kid's artwork and the like. Everything I don't need is getting shredded or recycled. You don't need to keep phone bills from three years ago, and neither do I! Ditto product manuals for products we no longer own, paid bills, or newspaper articles clipped for who knows what reason.

At the end, I'll have two bankers boxes, which I may or may not put into the filing cabinet. We'll see.