KonMari

My KonMari Blitz

~ Housework Disciple ~ 3 Comments

I love Marie Kondo’s book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing. The KonMari method is the only decluttering method that has ever worked for me long term. I tried it, it worked for me, and then I kind of forgot about it. This is like a lot of other good things I’ve discovered in my life.

This week I decided to do something radical. I decided to KonMari my entire house and life and not stop until I was done. I had a vision: I was going to systematically work through the house and do nothing else until I was finished.

I figured it might take a week, maybe a week and a half, but it would be so worth it. For the first time ever, we would only have things around us that we loved and needed. There would be a place for everything. There would be nothing unnecessary. We would only have the things we really cared about for our life together as we are living it now, having jettisoned the baggage of the past and discarding everything no longer meaningful to us. The endless to do list in my head would still be there, but it would be short a bunch of tasks that had become permanent residents on the list. I would be able to open any cupboard in my house without shame or threat of injury.

So, it’s Friday. I’ve done one cupboard. Actually that’s not quite accurate. I have almost done one cupboard. However I really don’t care that life has got in the way and I haven’t got as far as I wanted. Who cares? I am going to brag about it anyway.

BEFORE

Before
DURING

During

AFTER

After

My KonMari Project

~ Housework Disciple ~ Leave a comment

I read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing about six months ago, and wrote about it briefly here.

Since I wrote that post I’ve been thinking a lot about the KonMari method. Marie Kondo claims that if you use her method you’ll tidy up once and never need to tidy up again.

I liked the book, but I was sceptical. The claim that you could tidy up once and be done with it seemed on a par with “drop a dress size in a week”. I didn’t believe for a moment it could ever be a permanent solution, but I decided to try the method with our clothes. I gathered all the clothes in the house together, and sorted them according to the KonMari method. I got rid of a crazy amount of stuff, and organised what was left. My wardrobe looked amazing, my drawers were a delight.

Six months later there are probably a few things which the kids have outgrown which I need to move on, maybe an item or two I could retire, but THE CLOTHES HAVE STAYED TIDY.

I never worked through any other categories. I did the clothes, then I got distracted and never got round to doing more. Thinking about this, realising that I’ve had clutter-free clothes for six months, makes me realise I need to work through the rest of the house NOW.

The life-changing magic of tidying up

~ Housework Disciple ~ Leave a comment

I like reading feng shui and decluttering books because they make me feel like I’m doing something to clean up the mess and chaos of my life. It’s like buying vitamins and feeling good that you’re doing something for your health, but forgetting to take the vitamins. Or feeling virtuous about a fridge full of fresh vegetables that you never get around to cooking. I prefer to sit around reading about storage solutions and ambitious decluttering plans than to address the reality of my overstuffed disordered messy life.

I’ve read a bunch of decluttering books and none of them helped me do it. After I read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing I went through every item of clothing in the house and ended up dropping off 18 black sacks of clothes at the school for their fundraiser. I didn’t even know we had 18 black sacks worth of clothing in the house, let alone items I would be happy to get rid of.

I would love to write about why this book worked, but I don’t know and I’m not sure I want to know. There’s something magical about this book and like any mysterious magic I’m not sure it pays to examine it too closely.

I will write about my KonMari project though. After my initial crazy clothing purge I got sidetracked (as I frequently do) and never worked through the remaining categories of stuff in my home. I would love to though. The KonMari method is the only decluttering method which has ever worked for me.