Books, Why Can't I Quit You?

I have been trying to determine what it is about my books that makes them so very difficult to part with.

In the above pile are several French language books from my undergraduate days. Not only will I never read them again, I doubt that I still have the ability to. In addition, there are a couple of books I read in middle school (!) and have never picked up since (specifically The Autobiography of Malcolm X), a book on teaching film in a high school English classroom, a cookbook I have never used, and a book a poetry that has become obsolete now that the Internet is a thing. (Not that I was in the habit of perusing it before that.)

Rationally, I can look at these books and recognize that they are no longer useful in my life.

Emotionally, it took me three days to screw up the courage to cull them. And these were the easy ones.

After thinking about it, there are five reasons why I, personally, want to keep books that are serving me no purpose:

1. The book represents the knowledge within it. If I get rid of the book, I'm afraid I'll lose the knowledge. Even if I don't remember anything beyond the fact that I read the book, I still feel as though I will always have some of that knowledge as long as I keep the physical book.
2. The book evokes a memory that I am similarly afraid of losing.
3. The book was a gift.
4. Owning lots of books makes me feel smart. I want to be the kind of person who owns a lot of books.
5. Owning lots of books makes me feel as though I always have lots of reading choices.

As for the first three reasons for keeping unnecessary books, I have decided on a new course of action. I am now keeping a journal of what I read and what books I purge.

That way, I know I will always have some kind of reminder of what I have read, of the knowledge and memories those books have given me, and of the people who were kind enough to share books with me. If all I need is a reminder, a book journal is a heckuva lot more portable and storeable than shelves upon shelves of books. I'm excited about this solution.

As for reason 4, I need to recognize that I'm the kind of person who reads a lot, so there's no need for me to own a lot of books. There is no other area of my life wherein I'm looking to impress people. I can let go of my books.

And as for my final reason for hanging onto myriad books, I'm finding that books are turning out to be like clothes. Just because there are a lot doesn't mean I'm happy with my choices. I tend to reread the same old favorites over and over, and there are always an almost infinite number of choices available at my library and as ebooks. I don't need full bookshelves to have plenty of choices.

This was my first pass through, and I'll go through my books repeatedly over the next year. I'm going to start by getting rid of books that I have read and know that I will never open again. For the future, I'm going to find it in my heart to get rid of books I've owned for years and still haven't read. Yikes!

Eventually, I hope to get down to 200 titles total (not including J's or the boys' books). I have no idea if that's even feasible, but it's my goal.

Do you have trouble letting go of books? Why are your unnecessary titles still hanging around?