As I was preparing to leave, the overwhelming process of :

what to keep vs. what to throw away 

what to pack vs. what to store away

what's important vs. what's not

were like hungry questions chasing me down, requiring an answer, and fast. 

If I thought too long, I'd become frozen, like my mac screen often will do, with an invisible spinning pinwheel for my face...loading, loading, loading...CRASH. Mandatory shut-down.

During these moments of being surrounded by piles of things that looked like a mess to the foolish, naked eye, I realized why people DON'T do this. It's too hard. 

Why am I putting myself through this?

During the packing process, I wasn't really sure I could answer that question. Now that a few weeks have gone by, I'm glad I didn't give up, despite not having a reasonable answer.

The payoff is worth the getting rid of a few things. I think after this journey, I'm going to have a 10x30 storage unit full of stuff that I'm going to realize, I didn't need at all.