Spam in the snail mail system still exists and companies continue to clog our mailboxes to the point that we have to weed through the junk mail to find the mail that is important. Haven’t the companies who constantly and consistently send this stuff to people who didn’t ask for it and don’t want it ever heard of going Green?

Most of us are pretty savvy when it comes to recognizing junk mail. But we are so inundated with it that I find myself being extra careful when thumbing through a stack of mail almost fearing I’m going to miss a piece of mail that I actually need.

In my line of work as a professional organizer, I often hear complaints from clients’ family members about the amount of papers being hoarded and piled up all over the house. It is not uncommon, especially with the elderly, for me to see piles (dare I say mountains) of paper stacked up on tables, chairs, desks, and dressers. We’re talking about everything from shopping catalogs to charitable organization donation requests. Even my mother will ask me if a piece of junk mail is important because it looks important to her. A typical example is junk mail from an insurance company in a large envelope that says “Action Required”. Mom actually thinks she needs to respond in some way. And no offense to Publisher’s Clearinghouse but mom really believes she may have already won something from you within the 20 envelopes she gets every month. Enough already!

And these things go as viral as they do on the internet. Once you respond to one charity, or buy something through one catalog, or ask for more information from any of a number of companies hawking their product or service, the word is out. Now you can expect 30 more pieces of mail from all the other charities, catalog companies, or other companies that found out you’re an easy mark.

I’m not saying people shouldn’t be charitable. It’s a nice thing to help. But when a charity sends someone like my mom a trinket or a few greeting cards and then asks for money, they feel compelled to send a few bucks back -- after all they should pay for the free gift, shouldn’t they? That’s how mom feels. Targeting the elderly or other people on fixed incomes and who simply can’t afford to give money to every charity that asks is inexcusable.

Problem is, some people feel all mail is important enough to keep. I have found 5-year-old shopping catalogs, medical explanation of benefits, and grocery receipts in those piles. People who hoard junk mail just don’t feel right throwing it out. They are made to feel it’s all important by the hype or by the way it tugs on their hearts-strings. Or they simple have a sort of addiction or psychological attachment to the meaningfulness they feel all this paper has. Maybe it gives them a feeling of importance or takes the place of something missing in the rest of their lives. Or perhaps they just don’t realize it’s okay to ignore it and throw it in the recycle bin.

It’s simply a matter of letting go. Organizing these piles means picking through them to find the gems -- which are few -- in the stacks of needless papers. It’s time-consuming. And it’s not uncommon for me to hear, “I was looking for that” or “I needed that and didn’t know where it was” in the midst of weeding through a mass of papers most of which gets relegated to the recycle bucket where it belonged the day it arrived. One of the best ways to keep your home organized is to toss the junk mail as soon as you get it and only keep what you have to keep for only as long as you have to keep it.