I recorded Oprah's show from Thursday (7/23/09) and had a chance to watch it last night. Her show featured two families who had a lot of "stuff". One family had an enormous amount of food in their pantry...enough to last several months, if not a year. Their children had a tremendous amount of toys, most of which they never used. The other family had a mother who bought a lot of clothes and shoes that she never wore.  The challenge was for each family to live with less for a week...no TV, no computer/internet, driving less, and boxing up anything that wasn't worn within the past 2 months. It was an eye-opener for the families and what they discovered is that there is value in spending time together and separating ourselves from a lot of unnecessary "stuff." The family with the overflowing pantry sent some of their food to a homeless food pantry...and though her food donation was substantial, the impact to her pantry was minimal. The other family realized that they had not sat together for dinner in 2 years!

The show really made me think. It made me think about the excesses in my life. How many times do I buy food and let it rot? How many pairs of shoes are in my closet that I don't even wear? The effect is of throwing money in the trash. And staring in front of TV (and allowing your children do the same) robs them of the family time interaction that can really be enjoyable and worthwhile. There is a lot more bonding and learning that can go on if they're not mesmerized by the "one-eyed monster."

So this is the challenge to myself. For the remainder of the week, I will severely limit the amount of time that the TV is on. I will preview upcoming shows on the TV guide and record anything that is worth watching. My US Air miles are about to expire, so I redeemed them (at no monetary cost to me) for a number of publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Money Magazine, Inc., Forbes, Fortune, and Essence. I will spend more time reading and helping Tyler explore his world through learning. Over the next two weeks I will go through my home and figure out what is excess (I know I have about 5 comforters for my bed...why???) and either give them away or discard. If I'm not watching the DVDs I already have, I probably don't need to buy anymore. I'm interested to see how this will go.

(This process reminds me of a college professor (Dr. Kerkeslager) I had who raised 2 children with his wife and they did not have a TV in the house. As college students, we were dumbfounded at the idea alone. "So how do you learn about the news?" He would reply "Through newspaper and radio." We thought radio was for music and newspaper was for packing boxes. The thought never crossed our minds to pick up a newspaper. I had no sense that his children were deprived of anything valuable. My professor was one of the most knowledgeable and insightful people I ever met; he pushed his students to think and not settle for mediocrity.)