Diamonds, rubies, four-leaf clovers, and first-editions of classic books.  What makes these items precious is that they are rare – it’s hard to find these items, and they don’t come along every day.

Rarity drives up the price on things like gold jewelry and fine wine, but there is a lesson to be learned when it comes to our belongings, as well.

Think about your keepsakes for a moment.  If you lost a loved one and you were able to keep just one small box of items to remember them by, those items are likely very precious to you.  However, if a loved one passed away and you now have an entire storage unit filled with old furniture and boxes upon boxes of items filled with their belongings, those items feel more like a burden than precious.

The same concept goes to keepsakes you hold on to for other reasons – maybe they are items from your kid’s childhood.  If you had one or two boxes filled with art projects, baby clothes and old toys, they would feel like precious keepsakes.  But what if an entire room in your basement was filled with totes upon totes filled with every onesie and t-shirt they ever wore, every award they won and every picture they ever colored?  Once again, the sheer amount of stuff would be overwhelming and feel like a burden to you (and to your grown children).  A box or two of items would be precious.

Think about the precious experiences in your life – drinking a glass of fine wine, traveling to an exotic destination, eating a fancy dessert in an upscale restaurant.  The reason these experiences are so joy-filled is because they don’t happen all of the time – their occurrence is rare, which is why you enjoy them so very much.

So keep this idea in mind when you are culling through your collections and your keepsakes.  Less is more.  And, the fewer of something you have, the more precious it becomes.