Lots of really good replies and perspectives in this thread, I wanted to take some time before I responded. I took a break for a few weeks on basically all my hobbies and feel refreshed but I want to make some changes.
Around the start of the pandemic I started collecting Micro Machine toys pretty heavily- I've always collected them but until then it was never an online thing. I got into it, joined the FB communities and was having a ton of fun and it gave me something to do through the pandemic. I built up a good collection, but also amassed a lot of doubles which I'm still trying to trade or sell off. I think this constant "watch ebay, buy, sell, repeat" was a big part of my burnout- it has started to feel like a job and not fun. I felt like all my free time I was listing or checking ebay and not doing anything else. I stopped checking ebay/mercari every 30 mins and now only check once or twice a day. I still going to collect the new ones, but that will be mostly it.
With games, terry's post did hit home even if it wasn't specifically directed at me. I am guilty of buying all these limited Switch games because I know they'll go up in value in the future. I need to stop that and only buy games I know I will really enjoy and play a lot. This was the other part of my burnout.
I've felt like actually playing games again so I've decided to go through some systems and games and slim down. For instance:
-Games I own on multiple systems
-Games that are genres I do not like/ can't play (FPS and 3D Platformers make me motion sick- why do I own any?)
-Games that will take up so much time to complete that I'll never have the time to play them through
-Games I own just because I think they may be worth something one day or stop holding on to them because they may be worth more
-Games I forgot I even own
I have a lot of sealed games for systems like the DS and 3DS and am torn on what to do with these. I like those systems and planned to open them when I got around to playing them but with prices being so high it feels like a bad idea to open them. I am going to mod a 3DS and see how I feel about playing that way and go from there.
For my older systems I am not sure what I will do in the future. I do think I enjoyed collecting them, reading about them, and talking about them more than I do playing them. Even today I'd probably have more fun reading an early '90s issue of EGM than playing any of the hundreds of games featured. I did the near fullset deal with some of these, and I'd hate to break it up so if I sell I'd like it all to go together but that seems unlikely at a major price discount.
Since I've made this thread I've not bought anything online. I've also been selling some other toy things and it feels good to get them gone. I've held onto most of the boxes I've received from buying things and my goal is sell enough that every box and bubble mailer I kept to recycle is gone.