Cleaning out files

Its something I have put off for a very, very, very long time. Cleaning out the files that contain things that relate to the work I used to do. In some bizaarly unexplainable way, having those things in files and moving them around over the years comforted me. Those mounds of paper showed I was who I was, that I did what I did. That I had positions that people looked up to. Ho-hum. So what. I'm not that person now.

The idea of cleaning out files, ridding my home of who knows what to create space, downsize, and prepare for my next move has made sense for years. I don't need all this paper. Keeping things that you don't know you have, or if you know you have them can't find them, is, politely put, NUTS! Yet I did it. Now I'm trying to undo it.

The process requires focus, and determination. Focus as in, don't find something more pleasant to do only 15 minutes into what is clearly a multi-hour job. Determination as in, don't look at every piece of paper in every file, reliving the time that paper came from, reminiscing about the people, the experiences, the....whatever. Just don't do it. Just grab, glance (to make absolutely sure something crucial isn't being tossed), toss and move on.

But I have to admit, I found a page ripped from the 1998 June issue of Red Herring, a publication that doesn't even exist any longer that stopped me in my tracks. It was an example of the kind of thing I tried to get "answers" from back then. For the most part, I didn't fit into the corporate settings I was in and was constantly trying to figure out "the" answer so that I would. Finally I realized that leaving was what I needed to do, so I did. But back to the magazine page.

I had highlighted a segment of the article. This particular bit of wisdom that I'd gleaned and thought so important I had to keep said:

"The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in 'Metcalfe's law' - which states that the number of potential connections in a network is proportion to the square of the number of participants - becomes apparent: most people have nothing to say to each other! By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet's impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine's."

Sheesh. Not only was this prediction really, incredibly wrong, but I was appalled to note that it was made by someone who I continue to read (in the New York Times) and typically agree with. Sigh. While the part about people not having anything to say to each other (nothing significant anyway) is true, the economic impact thing, is 180 degrees off. And the title of this article? "Why most economists' predictions are wrong." The author? Paul Krugman. Nobel prize winning, Paul Krugman.

Ok. Everyone can be...correction - is...sometimes wrong. But not everyone has the type of bully pulpit that people like Krugman does. So - note to self - the stuff in the files doesn't contain consummate wisdom.  Just because someone writes something down and gets it published, doesn't make them smart or right (although I admit many people who write and are published are quite brilliant.) I'm long past needing answers in files and can finally admit that throwing it out all this stuff won't change who I was and what I did.

Back to the files...