Honestly, it’s a combination of persistence, patience, restraint, & dumb luck. It has taken a long time for me to cultivate the restraint part. I try very hard to think of an EXACT place for something before even inquiring and especially before dragging it home. Not just “that would be cool *somewhere. *” It has to be, “I could really use that in ThisSpecificPlace for ThisSpecificFunction.” But even now I still falter and bring home stuff that eventually just gets donated & taken as a loss/learning experience. It has gotten easier though.