Decluttering: Free Yourself and Help Animals
For the past month or so, I have been tackling the daunting task of total home organization. It has been quite a process, and it seems to have turned my house upside-down—piles of things are strewn all over the place with labels such as, “Keep,” “Discard,” and “Donate.”
In addition to the ridiculously gigantic piles of office supplies that have turned up—and look as if they are currently digesting my dining-room table—I have also realized that I am guilty of some serious animal rights–literature hoarding. It seems that the past 16 years of activism have left me with a plethora of leaflet bundles, books, and movies as well as multiple copies of vegetarian cookbooks.
A lot of good these materials are doing cooped up in cardboard boxes, right? If you, too, are looking to get your stagnant, dust-collecting literature back into action, the following are some ideas on how to get it moving (after you’ve wiped off the dust, of course):
- Donate books and magazines that are in good condition to your local library or community literacy programs.
- Make a delicious vegan dish for a friend, and give him or her one of your vegan cookbooks as a gift alongside it.
- Next time you go to the doctor, leave a copy of PETA Global in the waiting room.
- Host vegan potlucks and screenings of the animal rights films you have lying around.
- Include PETA literature with every bill you pay, and place an animal rights sticker on the outside of the envelope.
- Post PETA literature on bulletin boards (it’s free).
- Stand on a busy street corner and pass out free PETA literature to passersby.
- If you have literature that has become outdated, get extra-creative and incorporate it into arts-and-crafts projects, such as collages and papier-mâché.
Freeing yourself from clutter will also help to free animals from suffering. What are you waiting for? Go get that dusty box out from under the couch!
