Marie Kondo and I have a few things in common.
My understanding is she is a life-long tidier, pulling whole rooms together by the time she was five years old.
She may have me beat in terms of her age, but I wasn’t too far behind.
I think by the time I was in third or fourth grade in elementary school, I was making scratch biscuits on my lunch hour to share at snack time with my fellow classmates.
Walking back to school, carefully carrying my towel-covered baking pan, I’d also left the kitchen counters crisp-clean and clutter-free.
I’ve always been tidy. One of my favorite “mom memories” is working in her kitchen cleaning out the pantry, organizing the refrigerator, moving frozen food from the upstairs freezer to the downstairs bigger freezer, all while having a wonderful chatty conversation.
I will confess to liking housework, and never defining household chores as “unpleasant but necessary,” (which is the dictionary definition.)
So, this will no doubt come as a surprise.
I'm not a big fan of Marie Kondo and the KonMari method of decluttering.
I think she is adorable, but the whole “sparking joy” thing. Does it have to be that deep?
I’m aware she’s sold about a kazillion books, has been interviewed by every media outlet, has a great collection at The Container Store, not to mention we’ve collectively crowned her the queen of tidy.
But for lots of people, the process of decluttering is apparently frustrating enough. Why would we add additional layers like sparking joy and showing gratitude to the socks and shirts? Of course, I love joy and gratitude. And I do feel joy and gratitude for all I have. But must we associate it with the decluttering process?
I don’t know and I’m no expert. But I’m going to share anyway. My practical approach to decluttering can be summed up with these three simple points.
Make it fun.
A little preplanning helps with this. Know the room or the area you’re going to tackle. Invite a girlfriend over to help out, maybe a couple of girlfriends. Laugh, make snacks. Or maybe it’s fun to go solo, giving you the opportunity to finally listen to that podcast you’ve been eager to hear. Do that. Have snacks.
Do it often.
The easiest way for me to stay on top of clutter is to declutter often. I don’t wait for a big decluttering session that eats up an entire weekend. Instead, I break it into bite-sized pieces. I might tackle my shoe collection. Trash, donate, shoe repair. Done. On another day, if I notice my tee-shirt drawer is overflowing, I’ll do the same thing – take a minute and go through just that one drawer. No big projects. Mini declutters on the regular.
It's all okay.
If something feels too hard to part with, don’t part with it that day. Just tuck it back into the drawer. This is where the “do it often” suggestion comes in handy. My experience is if I can’t bring myself to toss out that tee shirt I wore when I broke the tape at my first 10k, that’s okay. Who knows, maybe when I revisit that drawer in a month or two, I’ll be ready to part with it.
So, of course, we want to hear what you think. What’s the hardest part of decluttering for you?
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