Tag: simplifying photos UK

Are you like me, at that point where you’re starting to think about how you can tackle your collection of photographs? You want to simplify all of these photos that you have collected for years and years and years and years? Well my friend, this video is for you! You are in good company.

I think it is important for us to clarify whether we are in the same boat.

What Is Your Objective

Well, maybe you’re reading this and thinking about preserving your entire collection of maybe 20, 30, 40 or 50 years plus of photographs! That is not what I am going to talk about today because my objective is completely different. If you are trying to simplify your photos by getting rid of some of the paper, the physical photos and streamlining your collection, then you and I are aligned my friend!

If you want to keep all of your photos then you’ll want to be thinking more about storage options and how to store them. If you want to save just those that are perhaps the highlight reel of that year or that decade of your life, then you’re going to want to look at ways that you can have limited storage but easy access.

You want to dig through all the unnecessaries and just have your focus. So think about what your objective is here. I can share that I have allocated just one basket. The photographs basket! That’s it. I really want to cut down on all the paper stuff. So clarify your objective.

Pick Your Method

You’re going to need a game plan in how you start to attack the photo collection. Are you going to look at photos based on your age, say from age 0yrs to 10 yrs in one pile? 11 – 20? 21-30? Is it going to be by theme? Maybe before something happened in your life, and then after that thing happened? Could it be that you’ve lived in a few different countries and you want to categorise your photos by country? I don’t know. So have a think about your method. That’s going to really help you start to get to a place where you think, okay, I know what I’m doing. I have picked by decades, but also by age, as my method.

How Are You Going To Start

So maybe you’ve selected all your photos by decade. Sure, that’s all good, but it doesn’t mean that you’re going to keep them ALL. So I like Marie Kondo and her methods for organising your life, and she often says that you want to hold an item and see whether it sparks joy for you. How do you feel when you’re looking at this particular photo?

I found a photo the other day, I must have been maybe 3 or 4 yrs old, and it was me sitting with my Dad, on a Sunday afternoon, and I was mimicking what he was doing and actually, he was reading the Sunday papers. So I must have grabbed part of his paper, and I was holding it up in front of me, copying my Dad.

I don’t know what I was doing, but I looked at the camera and I was laughing. That’s when the picture was taken. So I had forgotten about this photo, and I picked it up and OMGoodness! I couldn’t stop laughing, and even now that I speak about it, I’m laughing. So you know, that totally sparked joy for me. Definitely a keeper!

But there was another photo that I saw which was like, photo 5 of 10, of this same one tree, back in my university days, and I don’t even remember the story behind the tree! It must have been very significant then, but why do I have 10 different photos of this one tree??!! So you know, no joy there, just frustration. What is going on Tessa??

So I would encourage you to maybe think of that method for you, in terms of how you are dividing up the photos that you have, what to keep, what sparks joy for you, and what you’re going to say thank you to, and let go.

Are you with me?

Emotional Disposal

If you are a minimalist at heart like me, then you might want to (now please don’t hate me) get over this emotional block of the sacrilege of ripping up a photograph!!! Don’t get overly emotional about disposing. Unfortunately, it appears that because of the chemicals used in printed photographs, you can’t recycle them like you would paper (apparently). I looked into this because I was thinking surely there has to be a way I can recycle these prints. But alas no. So you’re going to have to make your peace with tearing them up and getting rid of them (or another way you choose). However, all is not lost………

Aspire Towards Digitising Those Photos That You Are Keeping

So there are some great scanners available, that just have the one purpose of scanning photos really quickly and easily, so you can feed them through quickly and get through lots of photos at a time. That is something really great to aspire to because then you can digitise your photos if you choose.

You then have the option of having no paper at all, if that’s your heart’s desire or maybe it gets you excited just thinking about it though you’re not quite there yet! And obviously that is much better for the environment. So, something to think about my friend!

So there you are. Some ideas planted to get your mind buzzing and the juices flowing. This is something that you CAN do. You CAN do it!

I look forward to hearing how you get on.