The Money Mustache Community
Mustachian Community => Mustachian Book Club => Topic started by: StubbledCPA on December 09, 2014, 09:35:34 AM
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Has anyone read the following book: The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1607747308/farnamstreet-20)? The Farnam Street blog (http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2014/12/the-life-changing-magic-of-tidying-up/) had a post about it today and it seemed like it would fit in with the Mustachian way of life. It seems that the focus shifts to what items we have that truly bring us joy and focusing on getting rid of the rest. I think I will be giving it a shot (once it becomes available again at my lovely local library) but I was curious if anyone else had previously read it :)
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I did read it and its a big motivation to really start a more organized and less cluttered lifestyle. Its in my opinion a very extreme book, you have to really trow away a lot of stuff. BUT its great to just start somewhere and see if you like the idea of living minimalistic or not. I did read it and a lot of stuff left my home since then.
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This was recently in the NYTimes:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/23/garden/home-organization-advice-from-marie-kondo.html?_r=0
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I read it and found it very extreme…but in a good way. I like the concept of keeping only the things you love…that resonate with you in some way. I have not been able to keep my dresser drawers and storage areas as tidy as the author recommends, but at least I have a goal to strive for. I would recommend her book.
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I just purchased this and am only partway through, but it really appeals to me. It's extreme, yes, but it fits our household philosophy.
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I think this highlights one of my problems with tidying up. I'm fundamentally anti-materialist. Not, like, I don't like things but I don't like thinking about them. I feel I should be above having to deal with them or even think about them.
So I can't deal with this, 'Folding your clothes puts positive energy into them and makes your life better,' stuff.
I'm like those people whose financial affairs are in complete disarray because I 'don't like to think about money' (even if the result is that I have to think about money more than someone whose affairs are in order).
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Following thread. DH just bought this book, and boy does he need it.
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
My apologies for the long reply. Maybe this will help you with ideas.
I haven't read the book but here's how I did a massive declutter when the kids were young.
I thought it would be traumatic for them. Truthfully, they were a bit confused about the process while it was happening. I realized about a month later that they seemed so much happier than before. The clutter was affecting their lives too. Plus it was so quick and easy to do chores so we ended up spending more time on the fun stuff.
One of my tricks was to ask them to put aside a designated number of their favorites - example: three favorite dolls. Then we boxed up all the other dolls together and I put them in the attic. It was important to let them know they weren't going away; they would be close by in case they were needed.
A few months later I would haul in a box of something (dolls in this example) and we would go through the box. The boxed toys were new again to them and if they found some things they would rather have then we switched them out with the ones that were in use. Still only three dolls out, but might not be the same ones.
Then together we would pick some from the box that could for sure go to donation. This was easier now because they had just picked their current three favorites. A smaller box of dolls went back to the attic and we would repeat the process in a couple of months, especially before holidays and birthdays. Sometimes this meant that a brand new gift was snubbed because a child preferred the current three and that's okay. Into the box it went.
The key for us was to not donate the first time we boxed. One of my children had developmental issues around any change in the environment and would sometimes demand to see something from the box to ensure it was still there. After a few exchanges it was easier for them to let go of the not-favorite items.
As they began to get older they started doing this on their own because they preferred less clutter. By the time they were teenagers they usually skipped the interim box and happily donated or sold their excess. Now they are grown they actually are better than I am about holding onto things.
And I have to confess - I am still holding two boxes in the attic. I am needing to declutter which is why I clicked on this thread. I think I will ask them to go through the boxes one last time and then we'll donate.
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I've got this book on hold at my library. The wait list is long. sigh
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Just read this from my library last month. I really liked some of the ideas: to pick what few items to keep based on what brings you joy; to visualize your end result before you begin; to fold clothing when you put it away so you can see the condition of the item; to not just dump all your discards on family members who will have to deal with it later themselves. Also good ideas on what order to do things - start with the least personal things and work your way up to letters and sentimental items last
"The best sequence is this: clothes first, then books, papers, komono (miscellany), and lastly, mementos."
However, I don't think having all your dark or visually heavy items NEED to be on the left side of the closet (mine are on the right side), or that having labels with words on your storage boxes behind closed closet doors will psychologically disturb an otherwise tidy place - but I do agree that it will make things look more tidy when you open those doors. It was definitely worth reading, but I wish it had more of an emphasis on reducing what you bring in and recycling or donating what you discard. Right now I'm reading "The Joy of Less" by Francine Jay and I find it addresses those points better.
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One of my tricks was to ask them to put aside a designated number of their favorites - example: three favorite dolls. Then we boxed up all the other dolls together and I put them in the attic. It was important to let them know they weren't going away; they would be close by in case they were needed.
A few months later I would haul in a box of something (dolls in this example) and we would go through the box. The boxed toys were new again to them and if they found some things they would rather have then we switched them out with the ones that were in use. Still only three dolls out, but might not be the same ones.
Then together we would pick some from the box that could for sure go to donation. This was easier now because they had just picked their current three favorites. A smaller box of dolls went back to the attic and we would repeat the process in a couple of months, especially before holidays and birthdays.
Thank you, Rezdent. I really like that idea. Did you ever try this *after* holidays/birthdays instead of before? If so, how did your attached child handle it?
I have a couple of Rubbermaid tubs that would be perfect for this. And I would LOVE to have less stuff floating around the house.
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One of my tricks was to ask them to put aside a designated number of their favorites - example: three favorite dolls. Then we boxed up all the other dolls together and I put them in the attic. It was important to let them know they weren't going away; they would be close by in case they were needed.
A few months later I would haul in a box of something (dolls in this example) and we would go through the box. The boxed toys were new again to them and if they found some things they would rather have then we switched them out with the ones that were in use. Still only three dolls out, but might not be the same ones.
Then together we would pick some from the box that could for sure go to donation. This was easier now because they had just picked their current three favorites. A smaller box of dolls went back to the attic and we would repeat the process in a couple of months, especially before holidays and birthdays.
Thank you, Rezdent. I really like that idea. Did you ever try this *after* holidays/birthdays instead of before? If so, how did your attached child handle it?
I believe we did start this after the holidays the first time. That first time I did it was because we were drowning and I was desperate do something. I honestly didn't thin enough out the first time - I think limits were like twenty dolls per child out. Sometimes the limit was too tight, which was easier to fix. We got better with practice and we just fell into a rhythm.
I realized that before the deluge was a great time to thin stuff. I told them we were making room for the new toys - LOL.
After a few days with all the new toys they would be able to pick their current favorites so we would do it again, and that was a great time to thin out old stuff to donate since they needed more room in their boxes for the new stuff (no room for more boxes).
Our last child was pretty far off the bell curve due to some damage as a newborn (now outgrown). Any change led to weeks of behavior issues.
We opened the boxes often when she was young. She was the least likely to make a trade but most likely to request to look.
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I read "The Joy of Less" by Francine Jay first, and this book only recently. I think they work wonderfully together rather than on their own, and that this talk of touching things and the concept of "sparking joy" filled in some gaps for me. I like going through my socks and thanking them, and I loved reading about this topic from a Japanese perspective where the base home size is much smaller.
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I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book! It brought final decluttering efforts full circle and made me realize how little is needed to create a lovely environment. The author's habit of thanking items for their service and taking the time to tune in to each home she is helping to tidy, was what makes her method work for me.
The spaces tidied using her "KonMari" method have indeed brought great results. Decluttering is now not so much an ongoing process as is discernment. There are more questions asked prior to bringing home new purchases.
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18 holds on 5 copies at my library -- should only be a couple of weeks!
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18 holds on 5 copies at my library -- should only be a couple of weeks!
I signed up in queue for one from my library the same day I started this thread. 5 total copies through my library, currently 4 of 16 in queue :/ lol
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Thank you for the recommendation, I have ordered from the library :) . I read up on it in the blog you mentioned. & although I tend to keep clutter to a minimum, not to the degree I would like. I love the approach of deciding what to keep, rather than what to get rid of...
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I signed up for a one-month free trial of audible.com to get two free book credits. (I will cancel the service the week before I am to be billed.) This book was one of my choices, and I am now about halfway through.
As for the book... It is certainly revolutionary, if not a bit odd. Sometimes I find it a bit difficult to get beyond her tales of treating inanimate objects as having feelings and reading lifestyle magazines and organizing books when you're five hardly seems a recipe for a joy-filled childhood. Still there is so much helpful advice and I can appreciate that the author comes from a country where a 2000 square foot home for four people is not the norm.
I am constantly sorting and hauling away, so I am hopefully drawn to the idea that once you are done sorting you will be done forever. In practice I am not certain this works. It takes constant diligence and I'm wondering how she deals with the problems of other family members. (I have to counsel my husband each time he sorts through his closet.)
I do like her advice to sort by category, not room. This makes the process manageable. It is easy for me to fathom taking a day to deal with clothes and haul away my excess, a day to deal with papers and take it to shred, and so forth. Perhaps this is addressed at a later point in the book, but she does not stress how to properly dispose of our excess.
There are other great books in this genre. I tip my hat to the Francine Jay book which has been mentioned upthread.
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
I have an 8 year old and a 5 year old. Both of our parents are divorced and remarried so my kids have 4 sets of grandparents. All competing at Christmas and Birthdays for the biggest and best and most presents. Sigh.
I read the book and have used the ideas in the book with them. I feel like when I go through stuff with my kids they get so upset at the idea of parting with things. In the book she talks about focusing on what you get to keep. I had them touch every single item like she says and I would ask "Does this make your heart happy" and they would answer. They answered no way more than they ever did when I would ask "do you play with this anymore". That was always met with a resounding, "Oh I forgot we had that!". I liked them going through everything with them because there are random items that I see as pointless to keep that right now they attach a memory or it means something to them.
They had items that they said to get rid of right away and then there were some that they went back and forth about. So we did the same as a previous poster and put those away to go through again in a couple of months.
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
My apologies for the long reply. Maybe this will help you with ideas.
I haven't read the book but here's how I did a massive declutter when the kids were young.
I thought it would be traumatic for them. Truthfully, they were a bit confused about the process while it was happening. I realized about a month later that they seemed so much happier than before. The clutter was affecting their lives too. Plus it was so quick and easy to do chores so we ended up spending more time on the fun stuff.
One of my tricks was to ask them to put aside a designated number of their favorites - example: three favorite dolls. Then we boxed up all the other dolls together and I put them in the attic. It was important to let them know they weren't going away; they would be close by in case they were needed.
A few months later I would haul in a box of something (dolls in this example) and we would go through the box. The boxed toys were new again to them and if they found some things they would rather have then we switched them out with the ones that were in use. Still only three dolls out, but might not be the same ones.
Then together we would pick some from the box that could for sure go to donation. This was easier now because they had just picked their current three favorites. A smaller box of dolls went back to the attic and we would repeat the process in a couple of months, especially before holidays and birthdays. Sometimes this meant that a brand new gift was snubbed because a child preferred the current three and that's okay. Into the box it went.
The key for us was to not donate the first time we boxed. One of my children had developmental issues around any change in the environment and would sometimes demand to see something from the box to ensure it was still there. After a few exchanges it was easier for them to let go of the not-favorite items.
As they began to get older they started doing this on their own because they preferred less clutter. By the time they were teenagers they usually skipped the interim box and happily donated or sold their excess. Now they are grown they actually are better than I am about holding onto things.
And I have to confess - I am still holding two boxes in the attic. I am needing to declutter which is why I clicked on this thread. I think I will ask them to go through the boxes one last time and then we'll donate.
Wow, I just love this. I don't have kids (yet) but I will try to remember this and do something similar in the future. All the toys and gifts that other children get really freak me out. I also notice that some of the kids I know don't even really play with their stuff anymore but just run around with things in their hands. They do not appreciate what they have, not creative at all, have a small attention span and somehow the parents do not see the connection with the bunchload of crap they have.
I also find it difficult to give gifts, because somehow I feel this is required but often I think.. they do not need more. For some kids it's different though.. Kids from friends for example. But from family..
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I am waitlisted #126 at the library. ha!
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
Catomi, I haven't read this book yet but I have read "The Joy of Less" (mentioned up thread) and even more relevant to those of us parents out there "Simplicity Parenting". Both are great books for decluttering but the later really did a fabulous job of laying out the "Why" of having less for kids is more, and then provided a ton of great tips on keeping it manageable. Our kids have probably a dozen items around the house and they regularly play with all of them, get along better than other kids I observe with tons of toys (read: have learned to share because there are fewer things around), and can quickly clean up after themselves in just a few minutes because they don't have huge piles of toys everywhere. We aren't perfect but I'm a huge advocate for controlling what comes into the house for kids (we work with family around holidays/birthdays to get more experiences etc.., and if they do get toys they are more along the lines of the super useful, multiuse, creativity inducing toys that MMM talks about).
Anyway, my .02 on the topic. I'm going to grab the Life-Changing Art of Tidying Up to see what other ideas I can gleen.
onemorebike
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This is crazy. I just bought this book about 3 weeks ago, recommended it on another post, and now i find it here. Getting rid of clutter Physically and mentally! Thanks MMM!
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Something I struggle with is reconciling anti-clutter (AC) guidelines with DIY/crafty tendencies. For instance, saving glass jars/bottles without a particular purpose contributes to clutter; they are good to have around for dry-goods storage or craft projects.
My parents were packrats and their house was gross and overstuffed with useless crap - BUT - the supply of raw materials for projects was damn-near limitless. Halloween costumes or school projects? No problem. If I radically decluttered my house, then I would need to shop for most of the materials everytime I embarked upon a project. This would probably make the expense/hassle a huge deterrent to starting any project.
I know that lots of people on this forum have strong DIY inclinations; how does this work with anti-clutter?
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Hi Sherry---I don't know if this helps, but my rule is to keep around X number of the item I'm considering. For example, I find the large empty yogurt containers can be handy, but I certainly don't need to have 47 of them. So I keep 3. If one is used, then I'll keep the next one. Same with shoe boxes---they're useful, but you probably don't need ALL of the ones that come into your life. Decide how many shoeboxes, jars, whatever it makes sense to have and then discard the rest (and any future ones until you need a replacement to maintain your inventory).
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I still haven't read the book (#106 wait list at the library) but did clothes and books last night. Certain items I had trouble letting go of even though I felt that they didn't bring me joy. So I think I'll do another run through of everything before I'll consider myself finished. And hopefully be more discerning. I have been able to let go of many other items that I had held onto though and that feels amazing!
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Hi Sherry---I don't know if this helps, but my rule is to keep around X number of the item I'm considering. For example, I find the large empty yogurt containers can be handy, but I certainly don't need to have 47 of them. So I keep 3. If one is used, then I'll keep the next one. Same with shoe boxes---they're useful, but you probably don't need ALL of the ones that come into your life. Decide how many shoeboxes, jars, whatever it makes sense to have and then discard the rest (and any future ones until you need a replacement to maintain your inventory).
Good tip!
To have a space allocated for it is another tip, similar to this one. For example, I have a place to put my empty shoeboxes (in this case to use for shipping stuff I sold) but if it doesn't fit anymore, I can't keep another. I also keep empty jars and I keep them in a box in the shed. If this box is full, ditch the rest until I use some!
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I liked parts of the book; the tales from her life and about former clients, and some of the advice for decluttering. But this stuff about loving objects, thanking them, and rules about storing everything upright, that is not for me at all.
I have Peter Walsh's "It's all too much" and Andrew Mellen "Unstuff your life" on Audible. Those were really good. I decluttered out attic listenting to Andrew Mellen.
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So I can't deal with this, 'Folding your clothes puts positive energy into them and makes your life better,' stuff.
I hear you on that, and I simply translated it in my head to something that works for me. I do like the idea of asking if an object gives me joy or not--rather then figuring out if it fits, etc.
For any who have not heard of it, Unfuck Your Habitat is pretty awesome. It's worth a Google.
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UFYH and The Life-changing Magic are really helping me keep the house nicer, although I don't follow either of them to the letter. Whoever said something like, "If you can do the task in 5 min. or less, just do it." has helped me a lot. When I put my oatmeal in the microwave in the morning, it takes 3 minutes to cook. I've learned that I can make my bed and empty the dishwasher in those 3 minutes, so I Just Do It. (I don't make my bed the minute my feet touch the floor because I like to mist it with lavender water first.) The Life-changing Magic 's advice about not keeping something if you don't love it has been useful, too. It isn't as airy-fairy as it sounds. When "stuff" is just "stuff" --where my feelings are kind of neutrally-blah...it makes it much easier to just unload it…but if I have some "stuff" that I like, and for whatever reason rings my chimes, resonates in some way, I know that is "stuff" that I will keep, because it makes me happy or whatever.
I have this personal thing I do that I have not read in any book, but it helps a lot and isn't hard. I pick one area or room each day, and say to myself, "What can I do in ten minutes or so in this room that will make it look better and brighter…more homey, more welcoming, whatever. Then I take ten minutes and just fix up that one room or area. In the winter there are seven areas, and in the summer what with the porch and the shed there are nine areas. So in seven to nine days, depending on the season, I have gotten through the entire house and made it better. This does not always mean straight housework. Sometimes I decide the room is clean enough, but it needs a different afghan or quilt brought out, or the pictures on the wall changed around. It just depends, and it gives me room for creativity. Today was the dining room, and I did do a quick dust and vacuum, but I took the plastic bag of apples out of the kitchen, put the apples in a nice basket, and put that on the dining room table. No big deal…just a little nicer. It all adds up after a while.
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(I don't make my bed the minute my feet touch the floor because I like to mist it with lavender water first.)
OMG. That is awesome.
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I read it about a month ago. I made changes to my items and found that my children were interested in doing theirs. They were excited to learn how to fold the items and have done a decent job keeping up with it.
For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles. I've heard from several people who shared the video with their children instead of having them read the book and that they responded positively. Maybe this is another way that people could get their family on board.
I haven't shared the mini-drama with my family, but I do have a friend who is interested in seeing it. I'll show it to her and see what her reaction is and will come back and report here for everyone.
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For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles.
Is the mini-drama available online? What is the link, please?
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I enjoyed the NYT article and did a couple of drawers and most of my closet. It did feel good. Thanks for posting.
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Yep! That's it. Thanks Malaprop for getting to it before I could.
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I read "The Joy of Less" by Francine Jay first, and this book only recently. I think they work wonderfully together rather than on their own, and that this talk of touching things and the concept of "sparking joy" filled in some gaps for me. I like going through my socks and thanking them, and I loved reading about this topic from a Japanese perspective where the base home size is much smaller.
Yes, when I visited I was *shocked* by how small the houses were. Of course, it was mostly because most of them were built over 100 years before. But everyone had very clean and tidy spaces.
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I'm 136th in the local library queue. They've got 33 copies, so should get it just in time for summer!
I liked The Joy of Less but the author didn't seem to really cherish some things the way that I do. While I'm not particularly materialistic, I do grow fond of things I've had for a long time. Perhaps this book will be a better fit for me from that perspective?
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I'm 136th in the local library queue. They've got 33 copies, so should get it just in time for summer!
For the ebook, I'm #57 with 4 copies.
For the physical book, I'm #190 (not sure how many copies across the entire state library system). The copy from my local library, says 'Claimed Returned' -- yeah, right!
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There is also this write up in the New York Magazine at: http://nymag.com/thecut/2015/02/marie-kondo-room-purge.html#tmhmdj:sJ1
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For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles.
Is the mini-drama available online? What is the link, please?
The one I'm aware of is actually a full-length movie in two parts.
Part 1: http://tinyurl.com/phnnmtr
Part 2: http://tinyurl.com/kh2f3gt
Thanks Malaprop & Secretly Saving!
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I really enjoyed the Japanese movie. Thanks for the links. It was helpful on one level to show the tidying up, but also a fascinating window into a different culture.
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Thank you so much for posting these links -- it was a nice teaser until my book arrives at the library!
ETA: Down to 6th hold on 8 copies! Wahoo! Need to clear my reading schedule!
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Its been really great doing all this decluttering & reading up on all the info on Marie kondo's book (still wait listed . about 80 out of 190! 26 copies). Have become motivated to get back into my organizing & decluttering business on the side ( makes three fun ways to make $$$$$. Others are cosmetologist & artist). Business cards (cheap via vista print in the mail).
Also, really enjoyed the 2 part miniseries! Thanks for posting.
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At first I thought it was weird that she wanted you to thank your items that you got rid of, but it did help me when I came to a couple items that were gifts or expensive. I was hanging onto them because of guilt, but by accepting that they served their intended purpose, I was able to let them go.
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DH bought this book a couple of months ago (for himself), and it's been sitting unread on the dining room table ever since. I picked it up this week and I actually like it. The way she divides items into categories and subcategories and tells you exactly in what order to tackle them appeals to me.
So "clothes" is the first category, and "tops" is the first subcategory. She says the average number of items in this category is 160. No way, I thought. I gathered them all and counted them. 126. Yikes.
After the first pass, I had 25 definitely in and 36 definitely out, and the rest maybe. After the second, I'm at 61 in and 45 out. I should probably just get rid of the remainder. That's a lot of clothing. Sure, it covers everything from camisoles to sweaters, but still. I'd much rather have the space.
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I didn't see this thread before, but I just finished reading her book. And up popped this thread. I really liked the book and immediately ran and got rid of a bag of clothes I was keeping that I knew didn't bring me joy.
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I have had this book out but its already due back and I'm only a third of the way through it. I reallllly wanted to buy a copy from Amazon, but instead, I put myself back in the hold queue. I'm 36th on 6 copies, so it won't be too long.
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I haven't read the book but here's how I did a massive declutter when the kids were young.
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This is such a wonderful way to handle it!
I feel like I only saw the (bad) extremes as a kid. My house was the very, very, very cluttered one (I reacted against it and declutter constantly; my kid sister was groomed by it into a major clutterer), while my best neighbourhood friends had parents who sort of violently decluttered. The rule in their house was "if it's still on the floor the day after you were supposed to pick up, it's going in the trash." Or out the window into the rain.
I always thought that was seriously harsh for their kids, especially at the younger ages, not to mention teaching a form of wastefulness that I don't think the parents would have actually supported if they'd thought it through (they were pretty thrifty in other ways, and very big on making food from scratch, gardening, etc).
I'm not in close touch with those kids (now adults!) anymore, but I suspect it's as likely to have backfired and made them cling obsessively to their possessions as it is to have taught them to be tidy.
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I've got this book on hold at my library. The wait list is long. sigh
Ha, same! Though I've been on the hold list a while, so there are now only five people ahead of me.
(I really wish more people at my library used the non-automatic return when they finished books. The moment I finish a library book, I click to return it through ADE, so someone else can read it. Seems like everyone else just lets the three weeks run out.)
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I read the book in two sittings. I've been in a major purge for two years and have done well but a couple things resonated with me:
1. Thank your items for their service. Pick them up, hold them in your hands, and literally say out loud, "Thank you for your service." This helped me get rid of some sentimental clothing, work items, etc.
2. She likes a massive one-shot purge. Just dump. Fill 50 bags, whatever it takes. No Craigslist or eBay or however the Japanese prefer. I have a rule that if I can sell it for $50, I throw it out on Craigslist. The problem is that it can be time consuming.
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O my goodness! I ordered the book 9 weeks ago & its finally in transit !!! I'm excited :)
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"Life-Changing Art" zeroed in perfectly on one of my weak spots: rationalizing keeping things (part of a set, wardrobe essential, maybe useful someday, book!). I do that less often once I've determined that interacting with something does not make me happy. I also found talking to the items weirdly helpful - maybe because it forces a shift in perspective? "I love your design, but I haven't worn your style of t-shirt for the last decade. It's not you, it's me. No hard feelings."
And I liked the author quite a lot - Marie Kondo comes across almost as a (semi-)reformed villain. She used to throw away other people's things without permission! But now she is a productive member of society and will tell you how to organize your life so that nothing terrible will happen to your favorite books. Just in case. (If you happen to have played the Portal video games, I realized part-way through that the audiobook narrator sounds an awful lot like GLaDOS.)
Like several previous commenters, I thought of Francine Jay's "Joy of Less" (the only minimalism book that I haven't decluttered yet). I'd recommend that one first, or at least as a companion book - its process is much more detailed and practical (storage strategies!), and it spends more time on why you might want to minimize. Less overwhelming to contemplate.
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I LOVED this book, and it's no surprise to read that it has become increasingly popular. If I were to place a hold on one of our library's 186 copies today, I would be hold #1004.
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I absolutely loved this book! I have a very difficult time getting rid of things, so her 'permission' to get rid of things that don't make me happy was a bit revolutionary. I got a bit stalled out after going through all my clothing, but I'm slowly working my way through. Due to various circumstances, I'm doing it a bit more piecemeal and not necessarily in the order she recommends, but slowly picking away at things.
The two big things I get stuck on are 1) actual disposal of stuff (Ebay is taking a bit longer than ideal) and 2) stuff I will absolutely need in 1+ years, but do not need now. It sounds a bit mad, but I'm currently in a roommate situation, but saving up for a house which will happen sometime in the next year or two. I have a set of dishes in the shed that I'm not using now, but I love them and don't want to get rid of them since they will be hard to replace. I also justify some of that stuff with it is easier to spread those kinds of purchases out over a longer period of time so that when I actually do the house-buying, I don't have to outfit a kitchen at the same time.
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Can I just say that I LOVED those videos! So cheezy but terribly heart warming and giving my strength for the clothes purge which is happening tomorrow anyway. Once again, mustachians to the rescue!
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For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles.
Is the mini-drama available online? What is the link, please?
The one I'm aware of is actually a full-length movie in two parts.
Part 1: http://tinyurl.com/phnnmtr
Part 2: http://tinyurl.com/kh2f3gt
Thanks Malaprop & Secretly Saving!
I sat up and watched most of these two videos last night-- will finish tonight. How inspiring, and also what a humorous peek into Japanese culture. The second one seems to be much more "tug at your heartstrings"-- but the first one is just wonderfully charming.
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I just read the book about a week ago and am working through the sections. I ended up buying the book on my kindle since I was >200 on the wait list for my library!
Her recommendation of laying hands on each item in order to make a decision is proving to be really, really helpful for me. It's forcing me to consider my emotional attachments as well as practical function. Just this morning I boxed up a bunch of my grandmother's baking dishes that I have never used (why do I need a dozen pie pans? I have plenty of other things of hers that I do use.). I admit I have veered out of order but there is a closet that had turned into a place where I stuck things I couldn't decide on over the years that was driving me nuts. It's now almost empty :) I'll be done with it in the next day or so and can get back on track.
It's also working on my children. We just went through all their clothes and by watching their expressions was able to quickly pare it down to the things they loved and wear very frequently. Next we'll work through books, school papers, art stuff and toys one by one.
I'm having fun with it although I will admit I have yet to thank my socks and give them proper rest. I do, though, like the concept of expressing gratitude for what you do have if not exactly the way Kondo recommends.
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I read the book in two sittings. I've been in a major purge for two years and have done well but a couple things resonated with me:
1. Thank your items for their service. Pick them up, hold them in your hands, and literally say out loud, "Thank you for your service." This helped me get rid of some sentimental clothing, work items, etc.
2. She likes a massive one-shot purge. Just dump. Fill 50 bags, whatever it takes. No Craigslist or eBay or however the Japanese prefer. I have a rule that if I can sell it for $50, I throw it out on Craigslist. The problem is that it can be time consuming.
I recall one example in her book of the "one shot" tidying taking 6 months.
We've put things on CL, but if it doesn't sell quickly, it goes in in the next charity shop pick up. Where we live, there are 3 that make the rounds with regularity. We've also posted things on Freecycle, though I haven't in a few years. I prefer to give away through our local charities that provide for the homeless.
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I recently finished the book (so for those of you in my library system, it should be coming your way soon!), and really found it a motivating book for cleaning out the clutter. I am even considering taking a day or two off work in the next few weeks to do the full purge of my belongings. Since I share half of an apartment, I don't have a great deal of clutter, so I am thinking two days will be enough.
The part I found the most interesting is finding a place for all of your stuff and allowing everything to have its specified place. Then nothing is ever out of order, it is just not in its place. From emptying out your purse everyday to placing the shoes you've worn that day in a cubby by the door, it really was a new way of thought for me. I tend to stack things - not necessarily put them in their place, but just put them somewhere. This quickly desolves into clutter and stress. I'm interested to see if the act of de-cluttering really does what she says and leads me to a better understanding of what I would like to be doing with my life in terms of my career and goals.
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I just finished it and really enjoyed it, so much of it resonated with me. I'm going to throw myself into declutterig this weekend, though I am dreading saying goodbye to my beloved button collection, even though I've never used it. ::sigh::
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I finally received and read through the book (after 3+ months on the waitlist!) . I enjoy her approach and certainly find it helpful. I especially found the material on psychology/emotional reasons for cluttering quite interesting . and her written exersize about why we feel compelled to tidy was very enlightening! Recommend
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I just finished reading this last night and am now inspired to do a purge. To be honest, it took me a while to get over the hokey "energy"/anthropomorphic aspect of the book, but once I did, I really enjoyed it. I agree that "thanking" an object for serving its purpose can probably alleviate some self-imposed guilt about letting go of stuff (e.g., emotional attachment for gifts that you never use, clothes that you bought but never wear but can't throw out b/c of sunk costs).
I personally don't like to accumulate stuff. And I think this attitude of "my stuff doesn't own me" has led me to be less careful and appreciative of the stuff that I do own and enjoy (including my house as a whole). Her book really made me reflect on the stuff that I do own and to have more pride of ownership. I'm hoping that with this perspective, I'll be less like to leave the stuff that I do have (and love) randomly strewn about.
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In the past 10 years I have done a lot of decluttering & didn't think I had anything else to get rid of. Then I bought the book & read it one night. The next day I spent 10 hours straight working & the next day 4 hours. I filled my entire car with stuff to donate & filled a huge garbage dumpster & a huge recycling one with stuff. It was amazing how much this book helped me.
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I had started hearing about this book on various blogs over the past few months and was intrigued by the clothes folding photos I was seeing in particular. A friend of mine has been going through some major live changes and commented how everything at home was in such a mess at the moment. So I bought her this book and then borrowed it from her when she had finished. The weekend I was reading the book, she was busy with clothes and ended up getting rid of something like eleven big bags full.
I wasn't sure how I'd feel about the talk to your things aspect but actually I found it resonated with me surprisingly strongly. I still haven't greeted my house more than once or twice (keep forgetting) but I find I really like the idea. Partially, I'm sure, because I live on my own and it does kind of bring a bit of life into the place to talk out loud, even if it's just a few words, when I get in the door.
I have lots of issues with clinging to stuff and have gotten better over the years but still have a long way to go. This book is definitely helping in that respect.
The one thing I don't like, as some have mentioned, is that she seems to just literally dump everything that gets decluttered. I think once she mentions recycling but that's it. While I understand that having the stuff hanging around can lead to it becoming its own form of clutter and/or tempting you to take stuff back out of the bags, my eco-friendly side rebels at the idea of just dumping it all and I think that can be handled better. Also, do have to admit that the whole feminitiy aspect of some of what she was describing felt very old-fashioned and kind of sexist to me. If she's into that kind of thing, great, but I don't need lacy t-shirts or whatever the hell it was to express me femininity - I feel like I have a whole other kind of femininity going on and that those parts of the book where a bit judgemental. But maybe that's just me overreacting to a perceived criticism of my life. :)
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The one thing I don't like, as some have mentioned, is that she seems to just literally dump everything that gets decluttered. I think once she mentions recycling but that's it. ... my eco-friendly side rebels at the idea of just dumping it all and I think that can be handled better.
As I understand it, it is quite difficult to recycle or otherwise dispose of goods in Japan. It may be from this context that the mention is slight? I have Japanese relatives, but their experience may not be a stand-in for the whole country.
Still hoping to read the book and get started on this decluttering path one way or another.
Recycling rate in Japan is apparently 20.8% (compared to 34.5% in the US): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recycling_in_Japan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recycling_in_Japan) I was wondering while reading this book if she was grouping recycling and trash together when saying "garbage," since recycling pickup is pretty common, from what I've read.
Unsure about a Goodwill-equivalent in Japan, but I know there are at least a few stores like this, just not sure how common.
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To the book itself - almost done reading it now (well, listening)! Got the audio book through the library using OverDrive, which is now my new favorite app. Haven't started tidying yet, but the plan is to go through clothes this weekend. If nothing else, the book is inspiring. I am itching to get started. The book does goes on a little too much about how successful the method is, how no one has rebounded. I'm a little skeptical, especially since it would be so easy to say "oh, you just didn't do it right" if someone claimed to fail.
My biggest issue right now is that very few of my clothes "spark joy"...only one pair of underwear and one bra, for example (a little too minimalistic, methinks), and some clothes that spark joy can't be used 364 days of the year for one reason or another (like a poofy, sparkly skirt that is a fur magnet and is simply too dressy for most occasions anyhow). I'm going to predict I purge ~6 tops, 3 pants, 1 skirt, hole-y socks and underwear, and probably some scarves. We'll see!
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I just finished reading this book and loved it. I'm going to try her approach of decluttering categories rather than physical areas. I won't be as extreme as her in my discarding, but I'll give it a try and see how it goes. I think I'll find a lot of clothing to discard, and probably a fair number of books too.
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I finally got this book through my library last week (though I didn't have to wait nearly as long as some of y'all!). Absolutely loving it. I'd already been in hardcore decluttering mode for a few weeks, so it's been really helpful in doing the stuff that's harder (mementos, "I might need this") vs. the easy stuff I don't need outside motivation for.
It never fails to blow my mind just how quickly stuff can accumulate. I've always been a pretty staunch declutterer, and yet EVERY spring I'm throwing out bags and bags of broken/stained/useless stuff, and donating bags and bags of good-but-not-for-me stuff. I only moved into this apartment two years ago; how is it even possible that I've gathered this much crap?
Hopefully, taking this clean-out really seriously might lead to a more permanent fix. I love her concepts of getting RID of storage instead of getting more creative storage--that's exactly what I'm interested in.
Did anyone else really feel a lightbulb turn on when she started talking about how silly the "organizational flow" concept is, because it doesn't matter whether something's easy to access, it matters whether it's easy to put away? I would never have thought of it like that, but she's completely right.
If I need something, I don't think twice about the effort involved in retrieving it. For instance, if I need a particular ball of yarn, my current system requires opening a door, pulling out a storage bin, bringing it into the next room, sorting through for the yarn, pulling it out, putting the lid back on, putting the box back, closing the door--but I've never once thought "hmm, this is a hassle," because all I'm thinking about is "yay, yarn!" or "yay, new project!" The same goes for pretty much anything I need to retrieve: I'm thinking about the thing, not the process.
So the getting-it-out effort is irrelevant; I don't need my things to be instantly to hand except in the kitchen and washroom (where they already are/would be). But if it's an extra step to figure out where something goes, or to shove it into space, or to move a box so it can go behind, or whatever--forget it, it's not getting put away.
She describes that much better in the book than I've done just here, of course ;)
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I think some of the areas I'm going to have problems with, trying out her method, are:
1: Things I'm keeping because I'll definitely use them some day. For example, I have way too many socks - they don't even fit in my large drawer. However, socks eventually wear out so I can't see throwing out perfectly good ones just because I have too many right now. Anyone have any ideas about this type of thing?
2: Hobby supplies. I have a LOT (to put it mildly) of hobby supplies. I love it, I can work on many of my hobby projects without having to buy any additional supplies. However I actually have more than I'll probably use in my entire lifetime - just have no idea which ones I won't use.
3: Garage items. For example, I have a TON of scrap wood. Usually when I'm working on a project/repair, I can find a piece of wood that will work in the garage - I don't need to run out and buy more wood. However, it takes up a lot of space and I don't know if I should keep it all. Same applies to screws of different sizes, nails, and so on.
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I finally got this book through my library last week (though I didn't have to wait nearly as long as some of y'all!). Absolutely loving it. I'd already been in hardcore decluttering mode for a few weeks, so it's been really helpful in doing the stuff that's harder (mementos, "I might need this") vs. the easy stuff I don't need outside motivation for.
It never fails to blow my mind just how quickly stuff can accumulate. I've always been a pretty staunch declutterer, and yet EVERY spring I'm throwing out bags and bags of broken/stained/useless stuff, and donating bags and bags of good-but-not-for-me stuff. I only moved into this apartment two years ago; how is it even possible that I've gathered this much crap?
Hopefully, taking this clean-out really seriously might lead to a more permanent fix. I love her concepts of getting RID of storage instead of getting more creative storage--that's exactly what I'm interested in.
Did anyone else really feel a lightbulb turn on when she started talking about how silly the "organizational flow" concept is, because it doesn't matter whether something's easy to access, it matters whether it's easy to put away? I would never have thought of it like that, but she's completely right.
If I need something, I don't think twice about the effort involved in retrieving it. For instance, if I need a particular ball of yarn, my current system requires opening a door, pulling out a storage bin, bringing it into the next room, sorting through for the yarn, pulling it out, putting the lid back on, putting the box back, closing the door--but I've never once thought "hmm, this is a hassle," because all I'm thinking about is "yay, yarn!" or "yay, new project!" The same goes for pretty much anything I need to retrieve: I'm thinking about the thing, not the process.
So the getting-it-out effort is irrelevant; I don't need my things to be instantly to hand except in the kitchen and washroom (where they already are/would be). But if it's an extra step to figure out where something goes, or to shove it into space, or to move a box so it can go behind, or whatever--forget it, it's not getting put away.
She describes that much better in the book than I've done just here, of course ;)
this is an excellent point. It was so much quicker and easier for me to declutter, than to select a place for each item, and put it away. but now that each item had its own place, I find myself naturally putting everything away. its rather interesting to me. the way Marie Kondo thinks & works seems frequently to me to be the opposite of how ive been doing & thinking. Hey ways are so much more efficient and effective!!! i'm very impressed with her. I have an organizing business ( in addition to 2 other businesses) and have begun implementing what ive learned from her - to those that are willing! there are still many of course who only want some certain area or issue addressed . or they want me to tidy myself with little imput from them.
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I think some of the areas I'm going to have problems with, trying out her method, are:
1: Things I'm keeping because I'll definitely use them some day. For example, I have way too many socks - they don't even fit in my large drawer. However, socks eventually wear out so I can't see throwing out perfectly good ones just because I have too many right now. Anyone have any ideas about this type of thing?
2: Hobby supplies. I have a LOT (to put it mildly) of hobby supplies. I love it, I can work on many of my hobby projects without having to buy any additional supplies. However I actually have more than I'll probably use in my entire lifetime - just have no idea which ones I won't use.
3: Garage items. For example, I have a TON of scrap wood. Usually when I'm working on a project/repair, I can find a piece of wood that will work in the garage - I don't need to run out and buy more wood. However, it takes up a lot of space and I don't know if I should keep it all. Same applies to screws of different sizes, nails, and so on.
since the idea presented in Marie Kondo's book is to keep "only what sparks joy", I think all if these issues will naturally resolve themselves. she says that when you pull everything in a category out and put it in a pile , then touch each item one by one that you will almost intuitively feel whether to keep it or not. when an item "sparks joy" its clear. more difficult is discarding what doesn't give that feeling. often if we're not sure, its a discard. most likely most of your craft stuff will spark joy, many of the socks, etc- but who knows? I ended up donating maybe half of my arts crafts and sewing things. I only felt compelled to toss the socks that were very worn or had holes (which were several ) and kept the rest. its definetly an interesting process ! good luck!
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AlwaysbeenaSaver:
to give you an idea, I actually picked up each spool of thread and made a decision. I kept most , but those made with weaker fibers that always tend to break (so I never never them anyway)- I got rid of all of those. I didn't go through every pin or needle, but did pick up each box I keep them in to see how I felt.
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Thanks for the replies, it's great to hear from someone who's already done/started the process! I just got started tonight.
I went through my socks and underwear and it was so rewarding! I put all the ones I definitely like back in the drawer, and it looks so nice and tidy now! It's really a great incentive to get rid of some, to keep my drawer looking tidy! There are a few pairs in the laundry that I like too but I think they'll fit ok.
I'm throwing away all the ones with major wear - this is a pretty big pile; the mustachian in me likes to wear them until they are completely unwearable. I thought about keeping them as rags, but I already have way too many rags.
I'm donating the ones that are in good condition but I don't like (socks only, I don't donate underwear!)
And I'm saving 3 pairs of stained socks I wear when painting, gardening, etc. Getting rid of the rest of the stained ones too, I had 6 pairs dedicated to this, way too many.
I also put all my winter socks that I like in 2 small boxes in the closet - I switch out my winter/summer socks about this time of year so this was good timing for me to do this.
I can't wait to move on to my t-shirt drawer, maybe I'll have time tomorrow after work.
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Thanks for the replies, it's great to hear from someone who's already done/started the process! I just got started tonight.
I went through my socks and underwear and it was so rewarding! I put all the ones I definitely like back in the drawer, and it looks so nice and tidy now! It's really a great incentive to get rid of some, to keep my drawer looking tidy! There are a few pairs in the laundry that I like too but I think they'll fit ok.
I'm throwing away all the ones with major wear - this is a pretty big pile; the mustachian in me likes to wear them until they are completely unwearable. I thought about keeping them as rags, but I already have way too many rags.
I'm donating the ones that are in good condition but I don't like (socks only, I don't donate underwear!)
And I'm saving 3 pairs of stained socks I wear when painting, gardening, etc. Getting rid of the rest of the stained ones too, I had 6 pairs dedicated to this, way too many.
I also put all my winter socks that I like in 2 small boxes in the closet - I switch out my winter/summer socks about this time of year so this was good timing for me to do this.
I can't wait to move on to my t-shirt drawer, maybe I'll have time tomorrow after work.
its amazing how much we get into it after beginning isn't it?
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I knew there would be a thread for this book! It definitely feels like it dovetails well with Mustachianism in that emphasis on only keeping the things that give you joy and surrendering (recycling, donating, selling, giving away, tossing out) the rest.
I read the whole book yesterday. I bought it ($9 in hardcover at Amazon!) so I could 1) make notes in it and 2) give it to my mister to read. When I handed it to him, he said, "I don't need this! I'm already tidy!" Which is true. He's an excellent cleaner and not one to clutter up anything except the garage, which I've happily ceded to him. He taught me the Joy of a Clean Surface (tm).
BUT! I said, "I'm ready to go to the next level." We have boxes of college texts and papers and journals. Every single piece of paper related to the adoption of our daughter 13 years ago - and let me tell you, that is a METRIC SHIT TON of paper right there. Knickknacks and souvenirs and file folders full of crap, and that's AFTER we downsized from 4200 s.f. to 1300 s. f. and sold two-thirds of our stuff six years ago. STILL we have all that. *shakes head*
Upthread, someone noted that the anthropomorphizing didn't work for them at all. Interestingly, that is one of the things that resonated the most for me, because our teenager has anthropomorphized everything in her life her whole life. We have had pine cones with names, people. In some ways I think that will make the process harder for her if she chooses to do it, but in another way I think she will nod a lot as she reads that part. I'd read the NYT article about the book, including thanking items for their service before they're sent on their way, and we did that with some of my daughter's things, and it made everything feel more comfortable.
I can't wait to get started.
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I did my t-shirts last night, wow, I LOVE how my t-shirt drawer looks now! I still have 30 t-shirts I ended up keeping (I do love them all) but they all fit in the drawer and are folded in such a way that I can see each one and don't need to "search" for anything. I even found 1 of my favorites that has been missing for a long time. I have a large pile for Goodwill too. BTW something I learned a long time ago, put donation items in the trunk of the car immediately, so they can't find their way back into the drawers. Then whenever you pass by a donation station, you can just drop them off.
I don't know if I've ever bought a t-shirt, despite having so many. I'm going to tell my family not to get me any more t-shirts as gifts, I think 30 is enough!
Next on my list is "sleepwear", which is something I love but have way too much of. This is going to be a tough one to tackle, as I don't think there's anything there I don't love, but I really shouldn't have that much.
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Good job on the T-shirts!
When we downsized, we sold our bedroom dressers (a tall chest of drawers and a large six-drawer dresser with a mirror). I only have this now:
Ikea MALM 6-drawer chest: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60127973/ (http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60127973/)
15" x 19" x 48"
I keep socks, pajamas, underwear of various types. But I bet if I take everything out of it and fold stuff the way she suggests, I can empty at least two drawers.
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Drawers is one of my sticking points with her method, actually. I love drawers but I have very few of them. At the moment I'm not buying anything but just trying to let my sub-conscious work on coming up with a solution using stuff I already have. I'm pretty sure I must have boxes or containers of some kind that I could use to store on the shelves in my wardrobe. One side has four shelves that would lend themselves pretty well to this (so I could pull out the box like a drawer, basically). I'm ruminating on it.
And in the meantime keep thinking of more people I would love to share this book with :)
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Good job on the T-shirts!
When we downsized, we sold our bedroom dressers (a tall chest of drawers and a large six-drawer dresser with a mirror). I only have this now:
Ikea MALM 6-drawer chest: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60127973/ (http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60127973/)
15" x 19" x 48"
I keep socks, pajamas, underwear of various types. But I bet if I take everything out of it and fold stuff the way she suggests, I can empty at least two drawers.
That's impressive (getting rid of the dressers!) I'm sure I'll need to keep my dresser, however once I'm completely done going through clothing it will be interesting to see whether I have empty space on shelves and in the other closet where I keep coats/etc. So far I'm still using the same number of drawers in my dresser, they're just much easier to open/close and I can see everything. Confession: my tshirt drawer couldn't close prior to yesterday, due to being too full.
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Last weekend I used the 'method' or what I've gleaned because I am still on the wait list...
Cleared out my pants drawer and folded everything as well to stack on the end. I love her method of folding. I've tried the vertical folding before, but it always fell over. This stands up and it makes it work! My bottoms drawer looks so good. I also love thanking items for their service. And letting things go that don't bring me joy but might bring someone else joy. Sometimes I get really scared that something will go to 'waste' and no one else would like an object because it isn't working for me. But now I am trying to remember all of the times the thrift store gods have smiled on me, and how often I have been thrilled with something, and it makes it easier to let it go.
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2: Hobby supplies. I have a LOT (to put it mildly) of hobby supplies. I love it, I can work on many of my hobby projects without having to buy any additional supplies. However I actually have more than I'll probably use in my entire lifetime - just have no idea which ones I won't use.
This has long been one of my problem areas, too. I don't know what your hobby is, but in mine, there is never going to be a real shortage (of yarn or spinning fiber). So for years I've been essentially using her technique without having a label for it: if I pick up a skein and it thrills me and I ache to get started with it right away, I keep it. If I pick something up and my only thought is "I mean, this might be useful sometime," I give it to a friend.
Honestly, I've been much happier with this system, and it helps me keep my purchasing in check. If I have sixteen things I ache to use, I don't need to buy something else just yet, regardless of whether it seems to be (never is!) the deal of the century.
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If I pick something up and my only thought is "I mean, this might be useful sometime," I give it to a friend.
This is great advice, I'm going to start paying attention to the things that I've got because they might be useful sometime, rather than because I really love them.
Meanwhile, decluttering sleepware last night didn't go all that well. Only identified 4 things to get rid of, although I ran out of time and do still have a small pile left to look through. I think I'm going to have to revisit what I decided to keep and double check that there isn't more in there I could part with, even if I love it. I'd like to keep it down to a single dresser drawer, and folded in her method so I can see everything at a glance.
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Getting rid of clothing is continuing on. I'm fuming at myself for having so much clothing that I don't like/don't wear. I'll be dropping off my 3rd load to Goodwill tonight, and I'm not quite finished with clothing, but almost. I'm allowing myself to keep some clothing that I like but don't get much opportunity to wear - I don't want to regret getting rid of things I like, and have gotten rid of a large amount so I feel ok keeping some of these things.
How is everyone else doing?
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I am moving June 1 , so I will do another run through , hoping to let go of even more . the place I am moving into isa little smaller, so that is good motivation.
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Moving is the best motivation! My first solo move was the thing that really got me started on minimizing my belongings, after years and years of dragging a full bookcase (for instance) to all my dorm rooms. Not having my parents and sisters to carry boxes made my first "adult" move look very, very different, and I ended up clearing out 80-90% of my books, and a lot of my junk, before the next move.
Ever since, thinking "would I really want to have to pack that up, carry it, and unpack it again?" has been a great way of assessing some categories of "things" for me, physical media especially. Forget it--digital for me, 98% of the time.
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I agree that moving is a great way to get rid of clutter. When we moved (many years ago) we got rid of so much junk, it was unbelievable...kinda makes me wish we were moving again!
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I recently read this just before "spring-cleaning" time, which included cleaning out all the junk from my unfinished basement (which now can be finished), and clearing out the other half of our garage... And who'd thunk it, WE CAN FIT BOTH of our cars in a 2 car garage!!! :)
PS, I have this audiobook if anyone's interested in "borrowing" it. you can PM me.
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WE CAN FIT BOTH of our cars in a 2 car garage!!! :)
Awesome!
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I just finished reading it this morning. It finally came through for me on overdrive last night.
I find myself oddly excited to gather up every bit of clothing in my house and dump it on the living room floor. I'll be sure to take a picture. It's going to be ridiculous.
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I read the book last weekend and immediately went on a discarding binge. I went through my clothes and threw away a bag and have another bigger bag to donate. I also, and this is big for me, went through all my books and probably gave over half of them to the public library for their book sale. I'm bad about picking up books in thrift stores and then never getting around to reading them. I think this experience is going to help me be less likely to do that so much in future. I could still ditch some clothes and some more books if I really followed her method--maybe I'll do another round in six months or something. I need to get through papers and mementos next. I'm kind of putting that off....
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I read the book at the end of last year and de-cluttered over three weekends.
Six months later I can tell you it has a lasting affect. A couple of examples:
I now shop better because I know what I have and what I need and I'll only purchase if the new item gives me joy.
Paper doesn't last long in my house. It is either shredded/recycled straight away. A few tax related items have been scanned beforehand shredding.
So those that are skeptical - it has worked for me!
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I read the book at the end of last year and de-cluttered over three weekends.
Six months later I can tell you it has a lasting affect. A couple of examples:
I now shop better because I know what I have and what I need and I'll only purchase if the new item gives me joy.
Paper doesn't last long in my house. It is either shredded/recycled straight away. A few tax related items have been scanned beforehand shredding.
So those that are skeptical - it has worked for me!
That's great to hear, nice to know all this hard work is really going to "stick"!
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I'm really glad she recommended starting with clothing, I finished that yesterday and then took a look at books. I can say for sure clothing was easier.
I can't do too much about fiction books because most of them belong to my SO. I generally get my fiction out of the library, but I do have a few I need to make decisions about. I've gotten rid of some "gift books" too - neither of us really likes those even though people give them to us.
Non fiction such as cooking, home repairs, etc. are mostly mine so I'm going through those.
And I have a TON of magazines I need to read then discard.
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My progress:
Books: went through all the books that are mine or were gifts that neither of us wants - have a pile to get rid of, and the remainder are better organized, but really didn't make a big dent in them.
Magazines: I've gotten rid of a lot, trying to flip through several per evening then toss them. Also didn't allow myself to bring any more home from the library "free" pile yesterday!
Paperwork: I emptied out a 2nd filing cabinet drawer! We now have 2 completely empty drawers so I need to move things around and get rid of one of the 2-drawer filing cabinets, I hope I can get SO to agree to this. I'm not done going through all the paperwork, but once I'm done, I want to come up with a place to file "keep for a few months" paperwork, so I can easily find and purge it after a few months. I have the book out of the library again and want to reread parts of it to see if she offers any useful suggestions that I've forgotten. I plan to finish going through all paperwork during the long weekend.
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Wow. I finished this book this week and today I started with just my tops. I counted because in the book she says the average number of tops she encounters in her clients is 160. I have 125. JUST TOPS! This includes sweaters, t-shirts, camisoles, blouses, etc. I had no idea I have that many. I can't even believe it.
Anyway, I went through them and only found about 14 to get rid of. I think I'm doing it wrong :) I have to go through them again. I did fold them the way she does in the video (I had to watch a video because I just couldn't visualize what she meant in the book). It really does look nice and neat. And they do stand up; I was doubtful, but it doesn't matter too much because they hold each other up anyway.
Well, gotta go back at it. My goal is to streamline enough so that I don't need to store out of season clothes in a different place other than my dresser and closet.
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I thought I was tidy before I read this book.:D.
It helped me to streamline my stuff much more neatly and I did purge some more things. I also like The Joy of Less and The Minimalist's book.
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This looks great. One of the things I want to work on as more time emerges is decluttering. I have it coming from the library. We moved my husband and his kids into my house when we got married two years ago and we have definitively too much stuff. We have different ideas about getting rid of stuff or sometimes even moving it, but I like to do the Flylady thing and start with my own things. People who moved into my house and kids who have just gone off to college don't need to deal with me eyeing their things. I can't do a big push right now but I can work on it a little at a time.
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I am 64 of 149 holds for this book at the library system. Seems a bit in demand. Is it worth the $7 to buy the kindle edition, do you think?
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It might be worth it to you if you want to start the process right now.
I waited, got the library copy, and then typed any phrases that I thought would help me later in a word document. It's only one page, but the sentences seemed key (often she has these in italics) help get me going now that the book has been returned.
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I am 64 of 149 holds for this book at the library system. Seems a bit in demand. Is it worth the $7 to buy the kindle edition, do you think?
I bought it on my Kindle. I think that I probably will re-read it soon to take in more of the concepts (first read through included a lot of eye rolling from me), so I'm happy enough to have bought it. But I think that you can Google it and read up enough about the general idea to get you going while you wait for the library version.
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I am 64 of 149 holds for this book at the library system. Seems a bit in demand. Is it worth the $7 to buy the kindle edition, do you think?
I bought it on my Kindle. I think that I probably will re-read it soon to take in more of the concepts (first read through included a lot of eye rolling from me), so I'm happy enough to have bought it. But I think that you can Google it and read up enough about the general idea to get you going while you wait for the library version.
Thanks Norrie! Lately, I have been having the mindset that my decluttering and cleaning is happening slowly and steadily. Instead of trying to declutter the entire house, I am trying to just keep on making forward progress. It does feel so good that my clutter load is getting gradually lighter. (Not that we have tons, but there seems to always be plenty of extra junk needing to be purged!) Reading books does help stay motivated too.
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I started reading this book recently and am almost through it. Between reading I've been taking plenty of breaks to discard and tidy.
The methods for storing clothing have been revolutionary to me. My old way of folding clothing and stacking things on top of each other had always bothered me but it didn't even occur to me that there would be a better way. Not only is my wardrobe much tidier, but now that I can see everything, finding something to wear in the morning is a lot easier. I'm only sad that I had been doing it so wrong for so many years. Even just for those tips this book has been completely worth it.
I'm a bit stuck on her advice about book collections however because I have large built-in bookshelves in my living area that look great with my book collection on them. Of course only a small selection of my books 'spark joy' when I touch them, but I don't want to throw them away and I certainly don't want to go out spending lots of money on a large collection of books that do 'spark joy'. Maybe I'm not up to that part yet.
In general I've have held onto a lot of things that don't 'spark joy'. I found that that very few things I own spark any joy but I can't throw away all my underwear and keep just one set, or discard all my winter clothing, or leave myself with not a single pair of shoes. At least now I suppose I'll hold my standards higher for any future acquisitions.
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Read the book a few weeks back, started decluttering my apartment and I'm happy to say the journey has been great! I still have my kitchen and my jewelry to declutter but for the most part, it was easy to donate/sell/throw based on konmari method. Oh! We found a few things we had thought was lost in the process. I'm donating/selling more than a thousand pieces. I can feel my house getting lighter as more and more junk leaves it.
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I used it for everything but undies & socks. These have a basic purpose & don't need to spark joY:)) I did use it on bookshelves though & cut down my # of nik-naks by using some of the shelves that used to have books for those other things that I truly loved.
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I used it for everything but undies & socks.
Ha- this was a big area for me !
socks - got rid of anything with holes, or socklets that slipped down
undies - got rid of threadbare ones
And I obviously had too much in this area as I haven't had to buy any replacements since I kondo'd at the end of last year!
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I'm re-reading it right now and forcing myself to stop with the eye-rolling any time she mentions that she's been a tidying expert since she was five, and just embrace the important content.
I REALLY struggled to get through my clothes, because clothes don't spark joy for me. The only article of clothing that sparks joy is a pair of sweatpants that I bought at Target years ago. They are so comfortable, and feel like my best friend some days. Other than that, I resent the fact that I even have to own clothes.
But I finally finished going through my clothes this weekend, and our bedroom is super tight and clean. Books are up next, and that's going to be a pain in the ass only because they're still all boxed up from our move (um, a year ago). It's so liberating to get rid of tons and tons of stuff.
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I am 64 of 149 holds for this book at the library system. Seems a bit in demand. Is it worth the $7 to buy the kindle edition, do you think?
If you Google around, you can find blog posts on the topic that could help you get started.
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Read the book a few weeks back, started decluttering my apartment and I'm happy to say the journey has been great! I still have my kitchen and my jewelry to declutter but for the most part, it was easy to donate/sell/throw based on konmari method. Oh! We found a few things we had thought was lost in the process. I'm donating/selling more than a thousand pieces. I can feel my house getting lighter as more and more junk leaves it.
Congrats! I find it gets easier. I started with clothing and donated maybe 10 bags or so. Then, I moved on to books and gave away 200+ books. I am now working on paper...but I sometimes go back and find more books or clothing. I have not moved in the strict order the book instructs us to do, yet it's working just fine. =-)
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WHOOT!!!
I left the book by hubby's night stand and suggested he read it. Didn't have much hope, he is an engineer's engineer and I thought the language and vague, touchy feely, wooo-wooo vibe would totally turn him off.
Woke up to him saying "Man, you know, we have a lot of clutter"
I mentioned via email I was going to work on my cloths today and asked if he was interested? Got this back: "There’s no time like the present, I’d like to get on it. The idea of paring back what we own is actually quite exciting to me…"
So yeah, excitement! Now I suppose the real work begins :)
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WHOOT!!!
I left the book by hubby's night stand and suggested he read it. Didn't have much hope, he is an engineer's engineer and I thought the language and vague, touchy feely, wooo-wooo vibe would totally turn him off.
Woke up to him saying "Man, you know, we have a lot of clutter"
I mentioned via email I was going to work on my cloths today and asked if he was interested? Got this back: "There’s no time like the present, I’d like to get on it. The idea of paring back what we own is actually quite exciting to me…"
So yeah, excitement! Now I suppose the real work begins :)
Awesome!!!
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I am a little late to the thread. Just wanted to add that this book has actually truly been life-changing for me, as it led me to MMM.
Back in October, I was feeling trapped and burned out at my job. It paid well, but I've never been much of a "stuff" person. We love traveling, and it seemed that was the only time our lives expanded - when we were in nature, seeing new things. We had money (which we mostly spent, aside from some retirement savings), but no time. Kept wondering if this is all there is to life - work, earn money to travel in small gasps, return to your work, retire when old, die?
Read the NY Times article on Marie Kondo's book, and became a person possessed. Went through a flurry of decluttering, getting rid of hundreds of dollars worth of stuff; cut 2/3 of my closet, even managed to trim my personal book collection by 30% (a hitherto-unimaginable feat). Realized could happily get rid of much more if my spouse didn't object. :-) Haven't missed anything we got rid of except some origami paper. Am much much happier for having less stuff in the house - less to stumble over, less to clean, more possessions that truly bring joy.
Hunted for more ideas on decluttering blogs, which led to finding simple living blogs, then the minimalist blogs, then the compact... All the time saying "right on! right on!" and being astonished that yes, there are a lot of people who think like I do, that there is just too much stuff, too much emphasis on stuff, not enough emphasis on time, on living your life. Stumbled upon the Frugalwoods blog and they mentioned MMM, so I clicked over, started reading... the sun came out of the clouds, and the angels sang, and life seemed worth living again :-) Binge-read the posts, upped my 401K as far as it could go, looking into setting up taxable Vanguard accounts for the rest, cutting spending.
So yeah, life-changing...
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I am a little late to the thread. Just wanted to add that this book has actually truly been life-changing for me, as it led me to MMM.
Back in October, I was feeling trapped and burned out at my job. It paid well, but I've never been much of a "stuff" person. We love traveling, and it seemed that was the only time our lives expanded - when we were in nature, seeing new things. We had money (which we mostly spent, aside from some retirement savings), but no time. Kept wondering if this is all there is to life - work, earn money to travel in small gasps, return to your work, retire when old, die?
Read the NY Times article on Marie Kondo's book, and became a person possessed. Went through a flurry of decluttering, getting rid of hundreds of dollars worth of stuff; cut 2/3 of my closet, even managed to trim my personal book collection by 30% (a hitherto-unimaginable feat). Realized could happily get rid of much more if my spouse didn't object. :-) Haven't missed anything we got rid of except some origami paper. Am much much happier for having less stuff in the house - less to stumble over, less to clean, more possessions that truly bring joy.
Hunted for more ideas on decluttering blogs, which led to finding simple living blogs, then the minimalist blogs, then the compact... All the time saying "right on! right on!" and being astonished that yes, there are a lot of people who think like I do, that there is just too much stuff, too much emphasis on stuff, not enough emphasis on time, on living your life. Stumbled upon the Frugalwoods blog and they mentioned MMM, so I clicked over, started reading... the sun came out of the clouds, and the angels sang, and life seemed worth living again :-) Binge-read the posts, upped my 401K as far as it could go, looking into setting up taxable Vanguard accounts for the rest, cutting spending.
So yeah, life-changing...
Fantastic Journey, thanks for sharing and WELCOME to the forums!
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I finally got the book from the library (126th in the queue), and I have read most of it.
She appears to be very much against any sort of stockpiling, yet stockpiling (when they are cheap) consumables that won't expire within the stockpiling period is very much part of mustashianism. I'm sure there are other cases where her philosophy is at loggerheads with MMM. How do you rationalize the book and MMM?
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I finally got the book from the library (126th in the queue), and I have read most of it.
She appears to be very much against any sort of stockpiling, yet stockpiling (when they are cheap) consumables that won't expire within the stockpiling period is very much part of mustashianism. I'm sure there are other cases where her philosophy is at loggerheads with MMM. How do you rationalize the book and MMM?
The same way I do everything else - take what suits me and ignore the rest.
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I finally got the book from the library (126th in the queue), and I have read most of it.
She appears to be very much against any sort of stockpiling, yet stockpiling (when they are cheap) consumables that won't expire within the stockpiling period is very much part of mustashianism. I'm sure there are other cases where her philosophy is at loggerheads with MMM. How do you rationalize the book and MMM?
The same way I do everything else - take what suits me and ignore the rest.
+1 you do have to keep in mind that she is coming at it from a different cultural perspective. The simple fact for a lot of Japanese households is there simply isn't room t stockpile consumables.
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I've always held a similar perspective to Kondo in terms of stockpiling.
I buy things in economical quantities (largest pack available to bring down the unit price) but I don't stockpile when things are on sale. The way the supermarkets are at the moment the sale cycle is pretty regular and provided I'm not brand loyal, chances are most weeks there will be a good deal somewhere on the product I want. I'm happy to pay a little bit extra to use the supermarket as storage rather than my reasonably small apartment. If I had the space or went through items faster (e.g. had kids) I might have a different perspective.
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I've always held a similar perspective to Kondo in terms of stockpiling.
I buy things in economical quantities (largest pack available to bring down the unit price) but I don't stockpile when things are on sale. The way the supermarkets are at the moment the sale cycle is pretty regular and provided I'm not brand loyal, chances are most weeks there will be a good deal somewhere on the product I want. I'm happy to pay a little bit extra to use the supermarket as storage rather than my reasonably small apartment. If I had the space or went through items faster (e.g. had kids) I might have a different perspective.
Me too. I feel you have too much house if you can stockpile a lot. If I had a house (vs current apartment) the only thing I might stockpile is dry food like rice, since I love to cook.
The only thing I do tend to stockpile is toilet paper - I don't know why but I hate running out of the stuff. And I'm not going paperless like others on this forum so don't even mention it!
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I've always held a similar perspective to Kondo in terms of stockpiling.
I buy things in economical quantities (largest pack available to bring down the unit price) but I don't stockpile when things are on sale. The way the supermarkets are at the moment the sale cycle is pretty regular and provided I'm not brand loyal, chances are most weeks there will be a good deal somewhere on the product I want. I'm happy to pay a little bit extra to use the supermarket as storage rather than my reasonably small apartment. If I had the space or went through items faster (e.g. had kids) I might have a different perspective.
Agreed. Plus, she specifically points out examples that are ridiculous: so much toothpaste you wouldn't use it in a lifetime, a hundred years' worth of cotton swabs. I don't think she means "don't get the three-pack" so much as "don't devote your space to becoming a mini-CostCo." I'm with her on that. It's one thing to have a couple of months' stock of toilet paper, but something else entirely to have a garage full of it.
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Oh man! I've been discussing this book over at the decluttering thread (which I'm cluttering up). It's a fun read. Taking each item in my hand has been much more helpful in getting rid of things than I thought. It mostly forces me to actually look at the item instead of glazing over it on a shelf or in a drawer.
I like her honest writing style. Feels like talking with a zany friend. I like that she comes across as nonjudgmental (more- I've been there/done that), but she doesn't pull the punches. When she wrote that most people who can't keep their houses tidy are lazy, I busted out laughing. Having someone confirm that I can get rid of an item without guilt has been freeing. Not sure why I feel the need for the confirmation.
One thing that really irked me was when she said women should buy elegant pajamas. She mentioned that what we wear in our home affects our self-image. I could not disagree more. I do not care about clothes beyond functionality and my self-image does not revolve around my physical appearance. This sort of advice can lead to feelings of self-consciousness and outward-in living. (Of course if you enjoy wearing elegant pajamas, then that's excellent. Keep on keeping on.)
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I just purchased the book because our library waitlist was too long, but have been reading articles about it for awhile. This weekend I was so fed up with my 5 year olds room overflowing with books, we enlisted the "put it all on the table" concept. My husband unloaded every book from his bookshelf onto the kitchen table. In 45 minutes we went through hundreds of books and got rid of a large box of duplicates, outgrown, don't read, and don't likes. His shelves actually look like they can breathe now! And his room is staying neater because it is easier to put books away. I had often flipped through the books while on the shelves and purged a few, but never would I have culled as many as we did by having to actually look at each and every book and touch every last one of them.
One book I would very much recommend is "Miss Minimalist". It is only available as an ebook and is only 99 cents. She originally wrote a blog and later converted it into this book. I like that it challenged me to think about societal conventions. For instance she and her husband don't own a couch because they personally never used one, but they did really like recliners. This book also "convinced" me that all of my dishes don't have to match just because "that's what everyone else does". Because of this I've been much more willing to take freebie dishes to replace broken ones from two kids.
Link to Miss Minimalist: http://www.amazon.com/Miss-Minimalist-Inspiration-Downsize-Declutter-ebook/dp/B0052UYJDC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434551827&sr=8-1&keywords=miss+minimalist&pebp=1434551829349&perid=0R6JSWPY50FBJZ9X6C6A
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My library copy is in transit! Yay! Glad I held off and didn't buy it on my Kindle. I'm bad about doing that. Can't wait to read it!
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My library copy is in transit! Yay! Glad I held off and didn't buy it on my Kindle. I'm bad about doing that. Can't wait to read it!
Oops........I read too quick. That was another book, The Joy of Less. Life-Changing Art is still 57......... :-(
I believe someone here mentioned The Joy of Less though, so I look forward to it.
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...So yeah, excitement! Now I suppose the real work begins :)
Last night Hubby and I went through our clothing. Admittedly, neither of us really care one whit about what we put on our bodies...so there wasn't tooo much to go through and it was a pretty easy process....except for those damn socks! I did find that talk to and thanking the things as it went made it much more enjoyable and easier. I did get rid of one of my favorite sweaters. It had some burn marks on the sleeves, was getting pretty thread bear, had a couple of moth holes - and has been faithfully serving me for over 15 years. I figured it was time to retire. The standing up method of cloth folding seems to be working very well too!
Hubs opened his sock drawer and exclaimed: "Now there is a thing of beauty!" I think he is more excited then I am :)
We decided on to completely tackle one category of items a night until we are finished. With work, we don't have time to do a massive marathon and if we don't do it together - it won't stick. Figured this was a good compromise...but it's hard to hold hubby back. We might get a big chunk done this weekend.
My sister called and asked what we were up to this weekend and he shouted: "Minimizing!" ...might have created a monster. He's the one who is a self-proclaimed "collector" :)
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Swick, that's fantastic! His exclamation at the socks is hilarious. It's been really easy for us to keep our socks Kondoed since it's functional and makes life easier. Your plan of one category a night is a good one.
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...So yeah, excitement! Now I suppose the real work begins :)
Last night Hubby and I went through our clothing. Admittedly, neither of us really care one whit about what we put on our bodies...so there wasn't tooo much to go through and it was a pretty easy process....except for those damn socks! I did find that talk to and thanking the things as it went made it much more enjoyable and easier. I did get rid of one of my favorite sweaters. It had some burn marks on the sleeves, was getting pretty thread bear, had a couple of moth holes - and has been faithfully serving me for over 15 years. I figured it was time to retire. The standing up method of cloth folding seems to be working very well too!
Hubs opened his sock drawer and exclaimed: "Now there is a thing of beauty!" I think he is more excited then I am :)
We decided on to completely tackle one category of items a night until we are finished. With work, we don't have time to do a massive marathon and if we don't do it together - it won't stick. Figured this was a good compromise...but it's hard to hold hubby back. We might get a big chunk done this weekend.
My sister called and asked what we were up to this weekend and he shouted: "Minimizing!" ...might have created a monster. He's the one who is a self-proclaimed "collector" :)
Excellent ! You and hub are on board together, how fabulous. Getting it done quick is a great plan .
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So I've done the clothing which was remarkably easy and even managed to keep my drawers looking tidy!
I'm not 100% convinced that I'll stick to it though as it has occurred to me that everything in the book except for the 'does it spark joy' mantra and storing things vertically, is exactly how I've always approached tidying. Every few years I gather everything up in the one place and sort through it all, discarding what is not needed and assigning new homes for everything else. Surely enough, as each month passes a little bit more chaos creeps in, until I'm back where I started and do it all over again. Will those two little extra bits make all the difference?
I want to take on my bathroom next but now that I've convinced myself I'm destined to fail, the motivation isn't there.
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I hear ya, Pancakes. I cleared out my bathroom some months ago, before I'd heard of the Kondo book, but essentially used her method. I got rid of so much stuff that there isn't enough left for there to be clutter. I think that's the key to her method. When you have enough, there is room for it all (and then some extra space to boot). Now I just have to catch the stuff creep as it happens, which is easy since it's usually one item at a time. Instead of putting something somewhere to deal with/think about at some fuzzy later time, I take the five seconds to consider if I need it/where to put it and move on. It helps that since we're mustachians we don't buy stuff, hence not a lot comes in. I think I'm a lot more mindful now and life is easier for it. I'm not sure if that helps you, but that's been my experience. Best of luck!
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18 holds on 5 copies at my library -- should only be a couple of weeks!
I wish! Hold number 157, lol. Thankfully, there are 92 copies in circulation so it should be too long of a way. A month to six weeks I think? Is good. Need to practice patience anyway. :P
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I also think that she is dealing with much smaller problems. In both the USA and Australia we tend to have much bigger houses than those in Japan (even our small houses), so we actually have a problem where whole rooms are not really used, and really collect stuff. As a result, her list of five types of things is very narrow.
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I hear ya, Pancakes. I cleared out my bathroom some months ago, before I'd heard of the Kondo book, but essentially used her method. I got rid of so much stuff that there isn't enough left for there to be clutter. I think that's the key to her method. When you have enough, there is room for it all (and then some extra space to boot). Now I just have to catch the stuff creep as it happens, which is easy since it's usually one item at a time. Instead of putting something somewhere to deal with/think about at some fuzzy later time, I take the five seconds to consider if I need it/where to put it and move on. It helps that since we're mustachians we don't buy stuff, hence not a lot comes in. I think I'm a lot more mindful now and life is easier for it. I'm not sure if that helps you, but that's been my experience. Best of luck!
Agreed. In the past, when I've done frequent "tosses" and reorganizations, it usually resulted in my buying new storage options (set of drawers, hanging shoe organizer) and filling those. The Kondo-style toss, though, had me getting RID of storage furniture, and all the endless crap I was "storing" in/on it. It will be much harder to get back to that level now, because if I started to go "hmm maybe I need a small dresser" I'm pretty sure I'd now think "wait, that's ridiculous, get rid of some crap."
I don't think it will be as self-sustaining as she claims (though, to be fair, probably because I kept too much, even while getting rid of tons and tons), but definitely easier to catch myself slipping back the other way.
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I also think that she is dealing with much smaller problems. In both the USA and Australia we tend to have much bigger houses than those in Japan (even our small houses), so we actually have a problem where whole rooms are not really used, and really collect stuff. As a result, her list of five types of things is very narrow.
I'm just considering all of the other clutter rooms as komono.
I'm only half-way through out paper, but I've made a huge amount of progress. Komono will be the worst. Sentimental keepsakes should be easy because I only have a few things, and I'm not sentimental.
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I just learned about this book yesterday from a friend on Facebook who posted about her neat and tidy bedroom closet. I looked it up and holy cow! 1032 holds at the public library!!! That is insane! I am thinking I am going to have to buy it on Kindle instead if I want to read it anytime soon. I get paid Friday so I am putting it in my budget. I do an OK job of keeping house fairly tidy but I can definitely do much much better.
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I just purchased the book because our library waitlist was too long, but have been reading articles about it for awhile. This weekend I was so fed up with my 5 year olds room overflowing with books, we enlisted the "put it all on the table" concept. My husband unloaded every book from his bookshelf onto the kitchen table. In 45 minutes we went through hundreds of books and got rid of a large box of duplicates, outgrown, don't read, and don't likes. His shelves actually look like they can breathe now! And his room is staying neater because it is easier to put books away. I had often flipped through the books while on the shelves and purged a few, but never would I have culled as many as we did by having to actually look at each and every book and touch every last one of them.
One book I would very much recommend is "Miss Minimalist". It is only available as an ebook and is only 99 cents. She originally wrote a blog and later converted it into this book. I like that it challenged me to think about societal conventions. For instance she and her husband don't own a couch because they personally never used one, but they did really like recliners. This book also "convinced" me that all of my dishes don't have to match just because "that's what everyone else does". Because of this I've been much more willing to take freebie dishes to replace broken ones from two kids.
Link to Miss Minimalist: http://www.amazon.com/Miss-Minimalist-Inspiration-Downsize-Declutter-ebook/dp/B0052UYJDC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434551827&sr=8-1&keywords=miss+minimalist&pebp=1434551829349&perid=0R6JSWPY50FBJZ9X6C6A
Ooh, thanks for this recommendation. There are over 1,000 holds at my library right now so I was going to buy from Amazon but have to wait until budget allows. Maybe friday... this one happens to be free for me as a prime member. So I will start here. Thanks!!! :)
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I've had a lot of people ask what I thought of it so I bought it for the Kindle last month and read it. It would be helpful to someone who wants to declutter things and is just starting or has problems getting rid of things. I've been a minimalist for over a decade now, just didn't find the name for it until a few years ago, leaning towards the Spartan side. I think it's strange that she thanks her things but if it works for her great. If anyone is interested in borrowing the Kindle book they can. The Amazon page on lending says it can only be loaned one time or I'd lend it out to everyone.
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Ok, so I read it yesterday and I can see how it can totally be life changing for some people. It was for me! Holy cow! So I moved about 9 months ago and when I moved I thought I got rid of the majority of my excess belongings. I'm not a minimalist, but I do try to not own a ton of stuff to create a lot of clutter. If you look at my house on the surface you might think I'm "very neat and organized". But open up closets, cupboards, drawers, etc... and you will still find lots of things. Nothing is "over flowing" or "filled to the brim". There's still extra space for things, but I have quite a bit of things.
How this book helped me:
It gave me the permission I needed to get rid of sooooo many items! It is so freeing to me! I can't believe how much stuff I own because I feel like I should, it's in perfectly good shape so I should use it, what if I might want it someday, or it was given to me and I feel obligated to have it.
She gets you past ALL of those things. Like my tennis shoes for example. I feel like I don't own a ton of shoes, but I do have about 6 pairs or so of tennis shoes. I wear maybe 2 pairs and they stay downstairs by the front door. On occasion, I go upstairs to my bedroom closet and pull out a different pair, only because I feel like I should because I own them and therefore, should wear them. I regularly clean out my shoes and toss them out, still keeping pairs because they are perfectly good pairs. This book motivated me to get rid of them. Pick out the pairs I definitely use, and donate or toss the rest.
My kitchen. stupid things like I own 3 crock pots. I knew I didn't need 3 crock pots but was talked in to keeping them by a friend because "what if you have a bunch of people over and want 3 crock pots". That makes sense... til now!!! OMG! If I need 3 crock pots I can borrow 2 from friends, How many people do I know that own a crock pot that I can borrow one from!?!?!?!
"maybe someday I will need it". Yes, or no. Get rid of it. If you need it someday, borrow it or buy it. I had items sitting in closets for years because they seemed like things I would someday use. Well, if I ever need it, I can obtain it then!!!
I dunno, sometimes I own things because I "have a decorative shelf and therefore something should sit on it" now it's bare. LOL.
I went in to 1 bedroom and came out with 1 large black garbage bag full, 1 smaller kitchen bag full, 1 medium sized box and 3 shopping bags. All full.
I thought I was a pretty neat person with minimal excess belongings and that's what I did in 1 room and I'm not even done with it yet. I seriously thought I'd find about 10 items total in my house, maybe a box of stuff and a bag of clothing! I still have about 1400 sq ft of living space I haven't gotten to yet!!!
I feel so free. Things that gave me anxiety and bothered me but for one reason or another I still owned. Candle sticks my mom gave me that I kept. I had no where to put them so they sat in a closet. "maybe someday I will find some shelf space for them and use them". Now they're gone.
It has been life changing for me and I highly recommend it. So much of my stuff is going out the door and I'm LOVING it!!!
I recommend this book to anyone who owns some excess stuff. Whether it be a few items or a ton of items. It helped me get past any emotions I had about items and get rid of them. She gives advice on what to do if it's a memento or family heirloom that you don't really want. Prom and Homecoming dresses. Anything that you keep because it was special at one time and created a memory, but really just taking up space. She tells you how to deal with all of that stuff. (I have photos from all my high school dances, I don't need all of those dresses!!!). Etc...
I loved it, I am so excited about cleaning out my house now! I can't believe all the excess stuff I own that I didn't even realize was excess!!! I feel so much freer already and I've barely begun.
This book is life changing for me. It may not be for everyone, but it has been for me.
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Ok, so I read it yesterday and I can see how it can totally be life changing for some people. It was for me! Holy cow!
Yup, that was totally my experience too! Congrats on the journey and have fun!
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I think I have too much stuff for this book - I think it is a book for advanced declutterers, rather than desperate declutterers!
However, I did get some stuff out of it (laughter for one - but that was not the only thing).
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As we go through the process, I can see how you might think so, deborah. Our solution is to really break it down into sub-sub-sub categories so we don't get overwhelmed and doing one little group at a time. Clothing was an easy first win for us because we didn't have a ton and neither of us really care, as was bathroom stuff...but moving into media and books and hobby/kitchen supplies...yeah the overwhelm is there for sure. the sub categories really help.
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I think that the book is suitable for desperate declutters but it is written from a Japanese perspective where homes tend to be a lot smaller. The bigger the home, obviously the longer picking up every item is going to take, and the more daunting the task will seem.
To even to start the process I had to convince myself to suspend making excuses and just try it. That said, I still haven't progressed past the clothing stage :/
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I thought I was a pretty neat person with minimal excess belongings
I thought the same about myself before reading the book.:P It's strange how some clutter becomes almost invisible if it's put away into cupboards or wardrobes.
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For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles.
Is the mini-drama available online? What is the link, please?
The one I'm aware of is actually a full-length movie in two parts.
Part 1: http://tinyurl.com/phnnmtr
Part 2: http://tinyurl.com/kh2f3gt
Thanks Malaprop & Secretly Saving!
The movie is no longer available at these links. Does anyone know if it is available anywhere else? I searched last night but could not find anything and I don't remember the title of the movie (I watched it when the links were active and wanted to watch it again with my daughter).
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I've progressed a little more and tackled my bathroom. Pleased with my effort and genuinely surprised by how much nail polish I had.
Now I'm wondering, has anyone applied the method to their social media? I've been paying a lot more attention to my interactions with things and people since reading the book and I've discovered that I 'hate read' my social media pages regularly. This isn't the kind of person I really want to be. Do I clean out my social media connections just as I've done my home?
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I've progressed a little more and tackled my bathroom. Pleased with my effort and genuinely surprised by how much nail polish I had.
Now I'm wondering, has anyone applied the method to their social media? I've been paying a lot more attention to my interactions with things and people since reading the book and I've discovered that I 'hate read' my social media pages regularly. This isn't the kind of person I really want to be. Do I clean out my social media connections just as I've done my home?
DH and I are preparing to FIRE at the end of this month - both leaving our jobs and even moving out of state the next day. Because of my job, I have over 1,300 Facebook friends. I honestly first started on Facebook about 10 years ago (back when reallly only college and high school kids were on it) because of my job. It was several years later before I started adding adult friends and work colleagues.
I have taken over 1,100 high school seniors to Washington, D.C. in the last 16 years - and I first got on Facebook to interact with them. I've been unfollowing all of them plus everyone affiliated with work (except those I consider true friends). Not unfriending them... just unfollowing them so they don't show up in my newsfeed. It's been pretty incredible to see the changes in my newsfeed.
I still care about many of the people I'm unfollowing... I just don't need to know what's going on in the lives on a daily basis. I don't even think I'll check Facebook all that much once retired but this is a step forward for me.
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I've progressed a little more and tackled my bathroom. Pleased with my effort and genuinely surprised by how much nail polish I had.
Now I'm wondering, has anyone applied the method to their social media? I've been paying a lot more attention to my interactions with things and people since reading the book and I've discovered that I 'hate read' my social media pages regularly. This isn't the kind of person I really want to be. Do I clean out my social media connections just as I've done my home?
Clean it all in one move: take the app off your phone.
The first few days, pretend it's just a short term detox. After a while, you won't miss it.
I did it a little over a year ago. At first it was a piecemeal thing in response to bullying. After about 10 minutes of purging the bully and mutual "friends" I realized that it would be an ongoing and never ending task. Opting out entirely was quicker. No need to unfriend or unfollow.....There's no requirement to actually look at the news feed, ever. I have no idea what any of my loved ones thought of Ferguson, Ice Bucket Challenge or Supreme Court decisions. I don't know which ones were the first to like or retweet something George Takei posted. And in the meantime, I racked up more hours on things that had lasting value to me. Social media is a time suck and frequently unethical. It's a free access cable channel in terms of content, and you would call yourself a complete loser if you sat home all day watching it. Just because you can carry the screen around in your pocket doesn't make the watching of every latest update any less pathetic.
I still have friends, still celebrate their milestones and see pictures & videos of their kids. But I get to miss their daily conversations on Trump, flags & what they are having to eat. It's even a depressing waste of time in a perfect echo chamber of like minded folks.
TL/dr
Don't rip pages out of your phonebook, but don't spend your life reading into the minds of everyone you know. Stop logging in for a while.
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Kite, how do you see pictures and videos of friends and their kids without logging in? Do you use another app that only pulls Facebook feeds of people you are interested in?
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I've progressed a little more and tackled my bathroom. Pleased with my effort and genuinely surprised by how much nail polish I had.
Now I'm wondering, has anyone applied the method to their social media? I've been paying a lot more attention to my interactions with things and people since reading the book and I've discovered that I 'hate read' my social media pages regularly. This isn't the kind of person I really want to be. Do I clean out my social media connections just as I've done my home?
First I unfriended about 200 ppl that I do not like . then I deactivated all social media because I really cannot stand it . I will call email or text anybody I want to communicate with.
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Kite, how do you see pictures and videos of friends and their kids without logging in? Do you use another app that only pulls Facebook feeds of people you are interested in?
Life. The actual physical, human, in person interaction is the app I'm talking about. FOMO has eyeballs glued to little screens to keep up with an endless stream of trivia. Cut the cord. Switch to the old flip phone in the back of your junk drawer for a few days. The world won't end and you won't have missed the good stuff, only the mindless drivel.
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Kite, how do you see pictures and videos of friends and their kids without logging in? Do you use another app that only pulls Facebook feeds of people you are interested in?
Life. The actual physical, human, in person interaction is the app I'm talking about. FOMO has eyeballs glued to little screens to keep up with an endless stream of trivia. Cut the cord. Switch to the old flip phone in the back of your junk drawer for a few days. The world won't end and you won't have missed the good stuff, only the mindless drivel.
I also receive photos through email and text. From actual friends and of course family. Majority I just browse and do not keep, a couple I save to drive/photo gallery.
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Kite, how do you see pictures and videos of friends and their kids without logging in? Do you use another app that only pulls Facebook feeds of people you are interested in?
Life. The actual physical, human, in person interaction is the app I'm talking about. FOMO has eyeballs glued to little screens to keep up with an endless stream of trivia. Cut the cord. Switch to the old flip phone in the back of your junk drawer for a few days. The world won't end and you won't have missed the good stuff, only the mindless drivel.
I also receive photos through email and text. From actual friends and of course family. Majority I just browse and do not keep, a couple I save to drive/photo gallery.
Yah. That too.
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Hubs is having a bit of a mental shift/crisis that is slowing us down quite a bit. As he is seeing everything we want to get rid of piling up he is horrified and wants to recycle/reuse as much as we can.
We have made multiple trips to the thrift store for anything people could use again, and recycling anything that can be - but a lot of his hobbies or ex-hobbies produce a lot of waste that can't easily be dealt with, and he is having a super hard time with it.
Things like used CD's and DVD's. Plastic DVD cases can be recycled, CD cases can't. The disks themselves can "In theory" be recycled, but only if you take them to a Future Shop or Best buy, and then they just ship them overseas.
So then he looks into what they do with them - which is poor workers use super, super toxic poisons to separate the tiny little bit of metal from the data layer and then either discard or burn the plastic.
After much discussion and thought, he decided it was better to box them up and take them to our land fill where the will at least stay inert, then to try and "recycle" them make them someone's toxic problem oversees.
He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
Luckily most of this is stuff that has been bought over the span of years and years, and we don't really buy much anymore. It does highlight that we are on the right path and need to be more conscious of what we buy.
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Hubs is having a bit of a mental shift/crisis that is slowing us down quite a bit. As he is seeing everything we want to get rid of piling up he is horrified and wants to recycle/reuse as much as we can.
We have made multiple trips to the thrift store for anything people could use again, and recycling anything that can be - but a lot of his hobbies or ex-hobbies produce a lot of waste that can't easily be dealt with, and he is having a super hard time with it.
Things like used CD's and DVD's. Plastic DVD cases can be recycled, CD cases can't. The disks themselves can "In theory" be recycled, but only if you take them to a Future Shop or Best buy, and then they just ship them overseas.
So then he looks into what they do with them - which is poor workers use super, super toxic poisons to separate the tiny little bit of metal from the data layer and then either discard or burn the plastic.
After much discussion and thought, he decided it was better to box them up and take them to our land fill where the will at least stay inert, then to try and "recycle" them make them someone's toxic problem oversees.
He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
Luckily most of this is stuff that has been bought over the span of years and years, and we don't really buy much anymore. It does highlight that we are on the right path and need to be more conscious of what we buy.
I've struggled with this in the past, too. You could try putting the stuff up on freecycle (or similar) - you'd be surprised what some people are looking for to use in art projects. I had a bag of books that I couldn't even give away to charity shops and whatever about anything else, I couldn't bring myself to just throw out books. A local art student took them though and although I only feel marginally better about books being used for that kind of thing than just throwing them out, at least someone got another use out of them. Might be worth a try.
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Hubs is having a bit of a mental shift/crisis that is slowing us down quite a bit. As he is seeing everything we want to get rid of piling up he is horrified and wants to recycle/reuse as much as we can.
We have made multiple trips to the thrift store for anything people could use again, and recycling anything that can be - but a lot of his hobbies or ex-hobbies produce a lot of waste that can't easily be dealt with, and he is having a super hard time with it.
Things like used CD's and DVD's. Plastic DVD cases can be recycled, CD cases can't. The disks themselves can "In theory" be recycled, but only if you take them to a Future Shop or Best buy, and then they just ship them overseas.
So then he looks into what they do with them - which is poor workers use super, super toxic poisons to separate the tiny little bit of metal from the data layer and then either discard or burn the plastic.
After much discussion and thought, he decided it was better to box them up and take them to our land fill where the will at least stay inert, then to try and "recycle" them make them someone's toxic problem oversees.
He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
Luckily most of this is stuff that has been bought over the span of years and years, and we don't really buy much anymore. It does highlight that we are on the right path and need to be more conscious of what we buy.
I've struggled with this in the past, too. You could try putting the stuff up on freecycle (or similar) - you'd be surprised what some people are looking for to use in art projects. I had a bag of books that I couldn't even give away to charity shops and whatever about anything else, I couldn't bring myself to just throw out books. A local art student took them though and although I only feel marginally better about books being used for that kind of thing than just throwing them out, at least someone got another use out of them. Might be worth a try.
Absolutely true . I use sheet plastic cardboard wood and fabric in my art . my mom uses dishes and paper in hers .
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good suggestions, we have been doing that as we can.
Unfortunately a ton of the stuff is other peoples cast-offs that were donated to us (I use to manage an art centre) that we couldn't use. I have been putting aside things I know might be able to go for free (a very tiny part of me wishes we were in our old town, I use to know what projects people were up to)
part of me wants to create a whole "consumption" series myself - but I know I have too many projects on the go and despite the best of intentions, it won't happen.
Our new town puts on a sculpture walk each year, and one of the pieces is really neat it is the form of a human made out of scrap metal and she is wearing a clear raincoat which was sewn from two clear sheets of plastic that had paper scraps sewn between them. All the pieces of paper were discarded notes - order forms - personal notes - love notes - grocery lists - kids school notes. Very neat! I spent a good half hour walking around the sculpture and reading all the little slices of life.
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good suggestions, we have been doing that as we can.
Unfortunately a ton of the stuff is other peoples cast-offs that were donated to us (I use to manage an art centre) that we couldn't use. I have been putting aside things I know might be able to go for free (a very tiny part of me wishes we were in our old town, I use to know what projects people were up to)
part of me wants to create a whole "consumption" series myself - but I know I have too many projects on the go and despite the best of intentions, it won't happen.
Our new town puts on a sculpture walk each year, and one of the pieces is really neat it is the form of a human made out of scrap metal and she is wearing a clear raincoat which was sewn from two clear sheets of plastic that had paper scraps sewn between them. All the pieces of paper were discarded notes - order forms - personal notes - love notes - grocery lists - kids school notes. Very neat! I spent a good half hour walking around the sculpture and reading all the little slices of life.
Super cool! I make dresses , wall hangings, and purses out of all recycled materials. It's a lot of fun! And free:)
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Swick, thanks for sharing your/your husband's experience. Not wanting to be wasteful is why I have items to declutter in the first place. My inclination is to find a new purpose for an item that is too broken down for its original purpose. However, it's not possible for me to upcycle everything, so I have to let them go in the most sustainable way possible. It's been hard.
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I read ALOT, and usually go thru a stack of library books, however I come across free books sometimes . I donate immediately upon completion most of the time . it's the rare book I hold onto .
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Books are my Achilles heel. Most of my books are hard scrounged or bought specialized non-fiction, so it hurts to contemplate going through them. I tend to collect free useful books too.
We lived in a town with no bookstore, and no practical way to get them shipped - for 4 years. I did manage to get rid of a room full when we moved (a literal room, I had them on ever surface, called everyone I knew and told them to come pick up some books) which was awesome because they don't have access to new books easily either.
But my bookcases are over flowing again...so do need to tackle it, but I have been putting it off.
I did manage to go through all of my canning jars! After a bug infestation when we were on holidays a few years ago I started to store everything in Mason jars...which worked wonderfully till we had to move and I had to empty them all. Haven't gotten around to unpacking and going through most of them. Now they are all neatly organized and I know what I have and have easy access. I may possibly have too many, but I'm not going to give them away until after I getan idea of canning season, now that we have access to fresh fruits and veggies again.
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For anyone who is interested, there is a two part mini-drama. It's definitely very japanese in style (we used to live in Japan so I found it entertaining on that level as well). It does have subtitles.
Is the mini-drama available online? What is the link, please?
The one I'm aware of is actually a full-length movie in two parts.
Part 1: http://tinyurl.com/phnnmtr
Part 2: http://tinyurl.com/kh2f3gt
Thanks Malaprop & Secretly Saving!
The movie is no longer available at these links. Does anyone know if it is available anywhere else? I searched last night but could not find anything and I don't remember the title of the movie (I watched it when the links were active and wanted to watch it again with my daughter).
Anyone know the name of this movie? Then at least I could try searching for it. Would be very curious to see some real examples after reading the book. Thanks!
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I spent some time searching (I don't remember the name) but it seems to be gone. I even check a couple of torrent sites - harder because I'm not sure of the name - seems like it was replaced by a promo spot for the book.
It wasn't really "real life" examples - I'm sure it was adapted from, but it was a lightly? fictionalized made for TV movie. There are lots and lots of real life example videos on youtube though.
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He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
The metal recycling center in our area takes these cables for scrap also. You might not get very much money for it, but they would be able to recycle it with the other "copper wire" types of things they also recycle. Hope that helps! We got rid of pounds of that not too long ago. Feels good :)
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Thanks to this thread (and everyone who has posted), I am currently listening to the book and love it! I am about halfway through, but found myself looking up some youtube videos on folding. I decided to fold my dish towels in the drawer like she suggests and can't believe the difference in how little space is really taken up! I can't wait to finish the book.
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Yes, I got a copy of the book too yesterday because of this thread. So far I love it and I am going to keep track of bags/boxes full of stuff I take to the thrift store. I am curious to see how much goes. Been really enjoying and feeling inspired by this thread!
Cheers, fellow Mustachians!
Pachnik
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I finally got this book from the library last week. I'm almost done with clothes, and along the way I decluttered a lot of papers lying around my room. Next up is bathroom supplies. I've also started cleaning more since that seems like an extension of tidying and taking care of things. I consider myself to be pretty minimalistic but I'm halfway through the book and her perspective is really helpful.
Thanks to the person that posted that Reddit AMA thread. I love what she wrote about learning to love what you have that you use a lot (for example, your one winter coat) even if you don't think it sparks joy.
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Swick, I feel for your husband. I have a very hard time throwing useful (or potentially useful) things in the garbage. Most things I feel okay taking to the local thrift shop, but of course they won't take everything.
At first I thought all of her instructions about how to properly fold clothes were silly, but I decided to follow those on faith just to try it out. Wow! It is amazingly better. I am making much better use of all of the clothes I have now as nothing hides on the bottom of a pile.
And my son seems on board with this whole process. When he wants something new, he now realizes his options are 1) wait for Christmas of his birthday, 2) raise the money somehow himself through work, or 3) sell something! Since he is currently in the long void until Christmas, and I don't pay him more for things like yard work than I think it's worth, selling something is highly on his radar. The catch is that I have to agree we should sell whatever it is, and he has to help me take pictures and write the Craigslist posting.
He has been wanting something for the past couple of weeks that costs about $100. He has only $5, so his creative juices are flowing. He suggested selling my dresser the other day, which I thought was hilarious. It is big, really nice, and would likely fetch a pile of cash, and the irony of the whole situation is that selling the entire bedroom set is on my to-do list once he goes off to college when I downsize my house. I laughed and noted that I actually use the dresser to store my clothes so he needed to look around, perhaps in his room, and think of something else. He then suggested an alternative of something that is more "his" (the late lizard's habitats), which he thought that would be easier to sell and it's just as likely to get the amount of money he needs. We'll probably have to sell the old fish tank, too, to make what he needs. Which means, alas, no more potential for future lizards or fish. It's a win-win, I tell you.
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Zamboni, your son is awesome :)
Our process is still ongoing, have had a couple of crazy weeks of relatives visiting and being out of town and hubby working late. Hoping to get a little more progress done this weekend.
New motivation: Been picking up more and more freelance work, so I actually need to use the office as, you know, an office instead of a dumping ground. I can't work in there with the clutter, I find it painful to be in. So ready to dig back in!
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I am likely going to be waiting quite awhile to check this out from the local library, both in hard copy or digital format, but in the meantime, I've read the articles and reviews that talk about some specific ideas. I have been on a purge spree the past two years to move as much stuff out as possible. I anticipate moving at some point to live in a multi-unit property that I own and want to move as little "junk" as possible.
I am encouraged by any method that helps move as much stuff out of my home as possible and it looks like a quick read. Today, I am working on getting surfaces cleared off and items put away that are worthy of keeping.
NDQ
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He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
The metal recycling center in our area takes these cables for scrap also. You might not get very much money for it, but they would be able to recycle it with the other "copper wire" types of things they also recycle. Hope that helps! We got rid of pounds of that not too long ago. Feels good :)
Best Buys in our area recycle a ton of old electronics - they have boxes outside for basic sorting of cables, chargers, and I believe a sign that says they can take other things, too, and you just need to go to customer service or something. Everything Swick mentions sounds like it would be free and definitely taken and recycled by Best Buy.
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He's also got boxes and boxes of old computer cables and phone cables and old technology, which is hard to dispose of in a responsible way. So he is stopping to research the best way to deal with everything - it is definitely slowing us down but I think it is worthwhile and the mental shift and awareness that it is causing in each of us is pretty profound.
The metal recycling center in our area takes these cables for scrap also. You might not get very much money for it, but they would be able to recycle it with the other "copper wire" types of things they also recycle. Hope that helps! We got rid of pounds of that not too long ago. Feels good :)
Best Buys in our area recycle a ton of old electronics - they have boxes outside for basic sorting of cables, chargers, and I believe a sign that says they can take other things, too, and you just need to go to customer service or something. Everything Swick mentions sounds like it would be free and definitely taken and recycled by Best Buy.
Hi NumberCruncher, yes BestBuy and the like can take electronics and buis and bobs. When Hubby was doing the research though, he found that they just ship them off to China where they are disposed of very irresponsibly. I didn't do the research myself though, I'll have to ask him where he found his info.
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I put stuff in the front yard with a free sign & it disappears quick. Of course you have to live on a road with a fair amount of traffic. You would be surprised the things that people take.
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I put stuff in the front yard with a free sign & it disappears quick. Of course you have to live on a road with a fair amount of traffic. You would be surprised the things that people take.
Same here. Except it's a condo complex. Everything's gone within an hour.
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
Depends how much you have. Pretty quick to go thru each piece though (at least for me). Really important to listen to that gut feeling though or may need to do another go thru. A maybe pile can help, as long as those don't all turn into yesses.many times, a "maybe" is really a "no"
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
I did. And I had a TON! The pile came up to my waist and nearly filled my living room floor. ... yeah. Anyway, I did it all in a couple of days. I went through quickly the first time and did a try it on pile and a donate pile. Then I went through the try it on pile the next day. And now all my clothes fit in the closet for the first time in 10 years. :)
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Out of curiosity, does anyone who's read this have children, or does the book address living with small children? Coming out of the holidays, I would dearly love to declutter some toys but honestly don't know where to start (probably partly because I can remember who gave what toy and feel like it would be insulting to toss gifts for my children).
Catomi, I haven't read this book yet but I have read "The Joy of Less" (mentioned up thread) and even more relevant to those of us parents out there "Simplicity Parenting". Both are great books for decluttering but the later really did a fabulous job of laying out the "Why" of having less for kids is more, and then provided a ton of great tips on keeping it manageable. Our kids have probably a dozen items around the house and they regularly play with all of them, get along better than other kids I observe with tons of toys (read: have learned to share because there are fewer things around), and can quickly clean up after themselves in just a few minutes because they don't have huge piles of toys everywhere. We aren't perfect but I'm a huge advocate for controlling what comes into the house for kids (we work with family around holidays/birthdays to get more experiences etc.., and if they do get toys they are more along the lines of the super useful, multiuse, creativity inducing toys that MMM talks about).
Anyway, my .02 on the topic. I'm going to grab the Life-Changing Art of Tidying Up to see what other ideas I can gleen.
onemorebike
I'm not a parent but LOVE all of this. It seems all the families I know have a tsunami of toys around the house and I was always worried I'd be too uptight to deal with that if I had kids of my own one day... imagining it was either having toys everywhere or having constant battles to get rid of toys. So it's amazing to read about these strategies for dealing with toys (especially Christmas gifts getting totally out of hand), and the positive effect on your kids.
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
I did it one day. I woke up early, had breakfast, and spent about 2 hours sorting. I spent about an hour putting things away. And an additional hour itemizing everything and taking stuff to Goodwill.
I was done before lunch, but I was very motivated to purge.
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
I did. And I had a TON! The pile came up to my waist and nearly filled my living room floor. ... yeah. Anyway, I did it all in a couple of days. I went through quickly the first time and did a try it on pile and a donate pile. Then I went through the try it on pile the next day. And now all my clothes fit in the closet for the first time in 10 years. :)
Nice! Great job!
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
I did it one day. I woke up early, had breakfast, and spent about 2 hours sorting. I spent about an hour putting things away. And an additional hour itemizing everything and taking stuff to Goodwill.
I was done before lunch, but I was very motivated to purge.
Nice work! Yes - being motivated is a huge help!
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
OK - update! I started at 8:00 a.m. But about 9:00 I had ALL my clothes from throughout the house (not counting the laundry hamper out). It is now 11:15 and I am about 2/3 the way done! I have 4 ginormous green bags in the car and half the entryway closet full of hanging formal wear, suits, etc. I was going to try to spread out my Goodwill donations but think I'm going to take it all today. I am trying to record things for the deduction, but this is becoming less important than just expeditiously getting rid of all this stuff. Feeling wonderful and motivated!
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I finally got the book from the library, and am about halfway through it. Even though I am not done reading, I'm feeling fired up to do my clothes. Has anyone done all their clothes in one session? I want to do them all except for accesories (like scarves, jewelry, bags) and coats/jackets.
How long will it take, do you think? All day today?
OK - update! I started at 8:00 a.m. But about 9:00 I had ALL my clothes from throughout the house (not counting the laundry hamper out). It is now 11:15 and I am about 2/3 the way done! I have 4 ginormous green bags in the car and half the entryway closet full of hanging formal wear, suits, etc. I was going to try to spread out my Goodwill donations but think I'm going to take it all today. I am trying to record things for the deduction, but this is becoming less important than just expeditiously getting rid of all this stuff. Feeling wonderful and motivated!
And now I am completely done. Finished at 4:30, have all the clothes folded in the "Kondo" way, and dropped off the stuff that doesn't bring me joy at Goodwill. All in all I think it took 7 or 8 hours (subtracting drive time to Goodwill and stopping at Walmart for a phone cord for my daughter). The only thing I did not fold in the stand up method was my silk scarves and shawls, which take up half a drawer.
This method really works! I am sold.
I have 6 empty rubbermaid storage totes, a 3 drawer rubbermaid, and I no longer have winter items stored upstairs. I even have one empty dresser drawer! Yay!
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Impressive, BriarRose! Keep it up!
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I even have one empty dresser drawer! Yay!
Yeah! This is one of the best parts. I ended up with 3 empty drawers out of 8.
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Wow, Briarrose, that really is impressive. I haven't quite gotten to the stage of actually doing it yet but I notice that I am being far more critical when just going about my normal stuff. So this weekend, I started putting one or two things aside to get rid of and I'm going to try and do the full thing one evening this week or next weekend. Don't want to start just accumulating a pile that sits there. But it's amazing how the shift in thinking works. Where before I'd think, well, I'll wear that t-shirt sometime I'm sure now I just think, "you know what, you have plenty of t-shirts, you don't like that this one has gotten shorter and no matter how much weight you lose, you're not going to get any shorter so it'll always annoy you" and out it goes. So when I've been sorting laundry, for example, I'm always thinking in the back of my head, "do I really want to have this?" - I even did it with some bedclothes, polycotten stuff that I hate and never use but didn't want to get rid of because it's "useful". I have plenty of bedclothes, I can live without one or two sheets.
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I read the free pages on Amazon and was so impressed with this book that I purchased the hardcover edition. I was not disappointed: Marie Kondo is amazing and her insights truly speak to you if you are willing to listen and think about what she says. I've been going through the book slowly and carefully, dog-earing important pages or information I need to work on later.
I wouldn't say I'm a hoarder, but I am definitely a "clutterer". I have unfiled papers, books, CD's, DVD's, cables, tools, PC parts and even keyboards strewn everywhere.
My "cluttering" has been bad enough that it's affecting both me and the DW in the ways that the book describes. If you feel affection for "your stuff" but you have an SO who doesn't, you owe it to yourself, and them, to read this book and improve your life.
It used to be important to my career to work with PC hardware, but that's not been true for at least a decade. After getting through the first 50 pages of this book, I realized I'm done with PC hardware and ready to move on to other things. That's been a big step for me to take and one I am excited to put into practice at the house.
DW and I have been through our clothes already in the manner in which the book speaks and we know the techniques described work - we just lucked up and did what's in the book when it came to clothes (we needed the Goodwill donation, too). While we could further improve our work on our clothing, I would say we've not fallen back into our old habits when it comes to clothing, so I know her ideas work, even with bad cases like me.
The real benefit of the book, besides the obvious one of decluttering, is how it challenges you to find the things that bring you joy and to visualize the way you want a room to be after you are done and what lifestyle you want to lead in your home. I can easily see how her clients do not have a "repeat rate".
I wonder to myself if Marie Kondo could ever be elected president of the USA. Then I realize it would age her prematurely and I really don't want that. She is a treasure to this tired, angry world!
I have to add that the ideas of decluttering she has in her book truly complement the ideas of MMM/ERE/Frugal living. Decluttering and cleanup of your physical space supports decluttering and cleanup of debt, budgets and consumption habits. I'm also doing the same with diet (I live "keto") and I'm beginning to see this strong theme in these pursuits emerging and unifying them all into a whole kind of "life pursuit" that is making me a very different and better person. Experiences and human interaction has become more important to me in ways it just could not have been in the past.
I remember even coming up with verbage to describe my "old ways": I used to say "I like to interact with machines much more than people - they are deterministic and people are random..." Now, that randomness and uncertainty doesn't bother me like it used to because I no longer see randomness and uncertainty as the "bringers of doom" that I used to perceive them as...
Whoa...that's pretty good stuff. I need to put that in another thread here.. :-) :-) :-)
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Thanks for all the positive feedback! The process really does work. I think I can understand now how this has an impact on your life too. I think by only keeping things that bring you joy, it is kind of a way of honoring yourself. So then you automatically give yourself permission to apply this in all areas of your life. You don't need to get mad or upset at things that don't bring you joy, just thank them for their service and move on! LOL
My next project, that I hope to work the next free weekend (which won't be for a few weeks), is BOOKS. That will be tougher than clothes for me, I think! Even just gathering them all from all over the house will be a real challenge. Let alone getting rid of large amounts of them. Little more scary than clothes. Though lately, I've taken the approach that if a book is available at my library consortium, I don't need to own a copy. Maybe that will help some.
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i got this book for Christmas, devoured over the holiday weekend, and then immediately gave the book to a friend (she suggests giving the book away in the book) I am MUCH better about parting with books now that I do the goodreads app. When i log a book in goodreads, i can pull it up a month later when i forgot the title and am trying to tell a friend about it. The good student in me wants "credit" for reading a book even as an adult so goodreads scratches that itch for me, then I can pass on the book to someone else. For some reason I can never remember book titles, even if i'm in the middle of a book i love. Can you tell i love and need goodreads. Since i've been using it for a few years now every book I've read over that period is now rated and in chronological order from when i read it. Highly suggested for book hoarders.
One thing that I would have liked Marie Kondo to address is digital clutter. Like, my google drive is full of years worth of unorganized crap. Wedding planning crap, weekend trip spreadsheets, homework and essays from classes. Don't get me started on all my never organized digital photos. With paper it's easy to shred and get over it (love that of course), but digital clutter is clutter too, and she doesn't seem to have a solution there, or even address it as a problem.
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i got this book for Christmas, devoured over the holiday weekend, and then immediately gave the book to a friend (she suggests giving the book away in the book) I am MUCH better about parting with books now that I do the goodreads app.
...good stuff here...
One thing that I would have liked Marie Kondo to address is digital clutter. Like, my google drive is full of years worth of unorganized crap. Wedding planning crap, weekend trip spreadsheets, homework and essays from classes. Don't get me started on all my never organized digital photos. With paper it's easy to shred and get over it (love that of course), but digital clutter is clutter too, and she doesn't seem to have a solution there, or even address it as a problem.
penguins4everyone!, I love your MMM name. DW is a lover of all things penguin and flamingo (and not a hoarder, which is cool)
There are apps which can help with digital clutter, and yes, I agree digital clutter is a problem - one that can become serious should the house burn down, because there are important docs which are all electronic nowadays that need to be duplicated and protected.
My photos, I pretty much upload all to Google Images because I take them with my Android phone. There are ways to organize there.
Here's a website that ranks photo organization apps. I've used "Picasa" before and it's OK - part of the Google suite of apps, it's pretty good.
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-digital-photo-organizer.htm
Also, here's a lifehacker link for good photo org apps, which also includes Picasa:
http://lifehacker.com/373220/five-best-digital-photo-organizers
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Thanks for all the positive feedback! The process really does work. I think I can understand now how this has an impact on your life too. I think by only keeping things that bring you joy, it is kind of a way of honoring yourself. So then you automatically give yourself permission to apply this in all areas of your life. You don't need to get mad or upset at things that don't bring you joy, just thank them for their service and move on! LOL
My next project, that I hope to work the next free weekend (which won't be for a few weeks), is BOOKS. That will be tougher than clothes for me, I think! Even just gathering them all from all over the house will be a real challenge. Let alone getting rid of large amounts of them. Little more scary than clothes. Though lately, I've taken the approach that if a book is available at my library consortium, I don't need to own a copy. Maybe that will help some.
I have "book troubles," too! However, I did just go through mine, and had a few surprises.
One: the act of actually pulling them off the shelves and organizing them in one place really reminded me of how HEAVY books are. I love my books on shelves, but I hate having to move them around, therefore, I only want to ever move the ones that are truly worth it.
Two: I thought that my worst problem would be keeping whole series of books that I loved in childhood (Redwall immediately comes to mind). However, when I really went through them, I realized that I definitely had favorites, and that the others were just there to "complete" the series. There were some that I downright didn't enjoy and never read a second time! I can therefore pass those along to a "new life," and treasure the favorites even more. Luckily I didn't encounter any sequential series; I don't think I'd have as easy of a time discarding books if I knew there would be a numerical gap on the shelf. :)
Best of luck! My next category is craft supplies... *shiver*
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80% through. I find some of her advice to be woo-woo (thanking your belongings), targeted towards women (took me the entire chapter on bags to figure out she meant purses), and targeted towards urban cities (don't buy in bulk). HOWEVER, the system she creates sounds perfect. The wife is going to be helping out some friends Saturday, so I may take the opportunity to discard and organize clothing, books, and magnetic media (CD's and DVD's).
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Has anyone konmaried relationships, like the 100s of friends on Facebook or that always-negative aunt? I'm looking for pointers.
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Has anyone konmaried relationships, like the 100s of friends on Facebook or that always-negative aunt? I'm looking for pointers.
Yrs. I began by deleting 200 fb "friends" then deactivated the account all together.
I've also let go of friends who are negative complaining sponge types who I felt obligated to see .
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I love this book. I read it halfway through my purging and it has been super useful. The main thing I am enjoying is the idea of working category by category. After separating all paper from other komono everything was much easier. I removed CDs, cords, boxes, books and everything got simpler.
Cutenila, I have Kondo-ed my social media and it is very freeing. I am going to give it another round soon. ( Not relationship related but: I also Kondo-ed my emails and most of my computer files. It feels just as freeing as the physical clutter to me if not more so).
Re Electronic clutter: I wonder whether a hash tag such as 2015OUT could be used to let one know that the given file has outlived its usefulness? Then one could pull up all the 2015OUT tags and delete the whole lot in January 2016. I hope I am explaining this clearly.
Re vertical clothes stacking: if the items are on a shelf instead of in a drawer doesn't everything come out/get messy when you pull one item out? Also, with too few items to fill a shelf is the next option to use a box on the shelf?
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Has anyone konmaried relationships, like the 100s of friends on Facebook or that always-negative aunt? I'm looking for pointers.
I started facebook to keep track of my kids. Unfortunately, now facebook keeps track of me...
So:
Every weekend, I un-friend at least 4 or 5. I'm almost down to actual friends. Then I deactivate the account "until next time" as I need it.
Keeping it deactivated is absolutely marvelous.
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I just don't check facebook often. When I do, I look at the updates area, which has family members prioritized (about 5). I don't understand why people have such issues with it.
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Re vertical clothes stacking: if the items are on a shelf instead of in a drawer doesn't everything come out/get messy when you pull one item out? Also, with too few items to fill a shelf is the next option to use a box on the shelf?
I have been wondering about this as well and had a plan to go and find myself some second-hand drawers to get around the fact that I don't have many and I didn't think vertical folding would work otherwise but yesterday I happened to come across this picture: http://rachellutz.com/2015/03/09/vertical-folding/ (http://rachellutz.com/2015/03/09/vertical-folding/) and decided that even though my wardrobe might not have drawers, I should at least give it a try before rushing out to buy some (which would actually be against the KonMari method anyway). Itching to get started on my clothes now.
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YOu could use bookends to hold it up.
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I decided to go through bedding tonight. I discovered we have 7 fitted Queen sized sheets, but we don't have any queen sized beds !
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I decided to go through bedding tonight. I discovered we have 7 fitted Queen sized sheets, but we don't have any queen sized beds !
Ha!
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AlwaysBeenASaver, that is hysterical!
Deborah, thanks I will test the book ends idea, that is new to me.
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Read complete! Gonna do clothing and maybe books too on Saturday. Woot woot!
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Has anyone konmaried relationships, like the 100s of friends on Facebook or that always-negative aunt? I'm looking for pointers.
Yes indeed. I stopped accepting lunch invites from folks who once were valuable as business networking but no longer.
We stopped accepting so many party invites on the grounds that time is better spent (in some cases).
I stopped reaching out to people who never reciprocate or initiate.
And eliminating social media use by 90 percent keeps me from being involved in the lives of people who don't really matter. Heck, if I've never been inspired to go to high school or college reunions, why the heck do I want to stay in touch via FB?
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Finally got the book from the library! I enjoyed it and found a lot of it did speak to me (I think items do have emotional "baggage" associated with them) but I will admit, some of it was a bit much for me... I'm probably not going to start telling my house that I'm home! And I'm certainly not going to empty my bag every single day when I come home so it can rest!!
But all that aside, I really think the book is super motivating and challenges you to rethink the way you look at your stuff. I for one am feeling ready to be a lot more brutal with my belongings, as most of what I own does not spark any joy whatsoever. Imagine a home filled with only the things that bring you joy... my packrat tendencies make it hard to even dream!
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I still haven't Kondoed my stuff but yesterday I signed up and paid for a stand at a local fleamarket. It's on the first weekend of September so now the pressure is on to get stuff moving. I'm still not convinced that anyone will be willing to pay for my baggy, misshapen, old t-shirts but apparently I would be amazed. So, it'll be priced to sell (something like 50c each, 5 for €2) and anything that doesn't sell will go straight to the donations bin on the way home. Once I got started thinking about it I started thinking I should really make the most of the opportunity and not just get rid of clothes so now that I have a deadline, I think a lot of time the next few weekends will be spent doing this. Even running through things in my head I find the idea of "does it bring me joy" constantly filtering everything.
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Okay! I gave in and read it!
And the brainwashing worked! I liked it! I'm like hell yeah I'm gonna go around my apartment having relationships with my things like I'm a character in a goddamn Studio Ghibli movie!
And I actually saw parallels to things I like in mustachianism, like building a practical chore around philosophical values, building a lifestyle of concurrent benefits, making what may seem like extreme decisions but are actually geared towards making your life more efficient and less of a struggle.
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Okay! I gave in and read it!
And the brainwashing worked! I liked it! I'm like hell yeah I'm gonna go around my apartment having relationships with my things like I'm a character in a goddamn Studio Ghibli movie!
And how cool is it to pretend you're in a Ghibli movie! I fo7nd it so much fun!
And I actually saw parallels to things I like in mustachianism, like building a practical chore around philosophical values, building a lifestyle of concurrent benefits, making what may seem like extreme decisions but are actually geared towards making your life more efficient and less of a struggle.
I have found laundry easier since I started folding all my clothes so I could see them and actually really enjoying doing it. The extra work made the overall job less work.
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Okay! I gave in and read it!
And the brainwashing worked! I liked it! I'm like hell yeah I'm gonna go around my apartment having relationships with my things like I'm a character in a goddamn Studio Ghibli movie!
And how cool is it to pretend you're in a Ghibli movie! I fo7nd it so much fun!
And I actually saw parallels to things I like in mustachianism, like building a practical chore around philosophical values, building a lifestyle of concurrent benefits, making what may seem like extreme decisions but are actually geared towards making your life more efficient and less of a struggle.
I have found laundry easier since I started folding all my clothes so I could see them and actually really enjoying doing it. The extra work made the overall job less work.
I enjoy doing laundry now too!
Besides the obviously great feeling of clean laundry and getting something done..I love holding laundry too!
I was always tidy and organized ( I thought? ), putting everything back in its place ( and everything has a place!), is very fulfilling .
It's a trip, but it really makes sense.
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Okay! I gave in and read it!
And the brainwashing worked! I liked it! I'm like hell yeah I'm gonna go around my apartment having relationships with my things like I'm a character in a goddamn Studio Ghibli movie!
And I actually saw parallels to things I like in mustachianism, like building a practical chore around philosophical values, building a lifestyle of concurrent benefits, making what may seem like extreme decisions but are actually geared towards making your life more efficient and less of a struggle.
I felt exactly the same about it. "I gave in and read it". I expected to be annoyed and not bother with doing anything. (Bad attitude I know). But I Kondo'd my bedroom closet and it looks great. Did part of the dresser too.
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I had to google Studio Ghibli....(did I say that out loud?) Maybe I should have been born in Japan. Apparently you can be a very rich person there with a fertile imagination.
Regardless, point well taken about the book vs. the Studio Ghibli reference. While I wouldn't say Marie's book is total fantasy, I would say some elements of it could mesh well with one of those kind of movies - "thanking your stuff for it's service", etc.
The bottom line is that this young lady took her incredible imagination everywhere she could find on the topic of tidying and ended up with a masterwork on the psychology of self-organization and coming to terms with your stuff. Her thoughts on why we have stuff and what it should be doing for us are pure genius, a concept most people quickly learn to forget in their rush to the store to buy more stuff.
Can anyone summarize the terms being invented from the book? Like "Kondo'ed", etc?
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Can anyone summarize the terms being invented from the book? Like "Kondo'ed", etc?
She calls her method the KonMari method - her name is Marie Kondo and KonMari is a nickname. But, in the way that often happens, people won't always use the word they're given and sometimes just find their own. In this case Kondo'ed is just the verb that has been made out of her name to denote following her method. :)
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Can anyone summarize the terms being invented from the book? Like "Kondo'ed", etc?
She calls her method the KonMari method - her name is Marie Kondo and KonMari is a nickname. But, in the way that often happens, people won't always use the word they're given and sometimes just find their own. In this case Kondo'ed is just the verb that has been made out of her name to denote following her method. :)
I've read the book and I already saw that one in this thread, so that one's obvious to me. What I'm asking is, if there are others. Is there a lexicon growing around the ideas in the book?
Essentially I'm asking if the book is spawning a spate of memes?
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I read this book while on a 26-day trip through 11 countries. It was interesting to read it while I was in the midst of living out of a very tiny backpack for a month and still living a life of abundance and privilege. I came back home and promptly got rid of about 30% of the stuff I own over the course of a few weeks of working after work and on the weekends, including a couch that lived in my bedroom (where I really don't need a couch and it barely fit) that I was holding on to for "my next apartment". The biggest benefit was making myself stop holding on to things out of guilt because someone gave them to me or because some future life I was imagining might use them.
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I just read this today and am eager to get started. But I feel like I have a number of questions that aren't really answered or addressed.
Like, what do I do with my kids' stuff? My daughter is 4, and never met an article of clothing, toy, or book she didn't like. My son is 1 1/2 and is too little to care. When I'm shopping for clothes for them (especially for him, since he doesn't care what he wears), I try to look for what gives me joy and I look forward to pulling out of their drawer every day. But do I need to make sure a pair of shorts that will be worn for 1 season resonates with my kid's soul? And what about the boxes in the basement of clothes for them to grow into, or clothes they've grown out of that may be worn by an (as yet hypothetical) sibling? And that's saying nothing of toys... can I try to sneak out the toys *I* hate that they never play with?
If I do this, will I have any clothes left? I have a sneaking suspicion I don't much like most of my wardrobe. I don't know if I want to devote the $ to buying new clothes once I get rid of 75% of mine. What about utilitarian clothes? A fair % of my maternity clothes are not thrilling, but same question as before, they'll only be worn for one season, can I just brazen it out? (I'm not pregnant, but may be in the future.)
How does this square with frugality? I have two winter coats. I don't like either of them. They were given to me and aren't my style. But they're perfectly serviceable. If I dump them, I'm forced to buy another. I can envision the coats I'd like to replace them with, but I'm not sure that's where I want to put $300.
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I have a one year old and can totally relate to you about clothes and toys. Here is my take on it:
* baby clothes: I buy only the ones that I love wearing for her (easy to wear ones, comfortable ones, pretty ones) and the ones her dad likes as well. Same with hand me downs. I'm ruthless in not having clothes that don't fit her (too small or too long ones) in her closet. This makes dressing her up super easy!
* baby toys: I throw anything that I didn't like (blaring sounds, annoying lights, small pieces, etc) or that I'm sure she won't grow into. Her favorites are out for her to play and the rest are in a box so they can come visit her when she is bored of her favorites.
* clothes/toys for next kid: I have a small tub of it for the next kid (try to keep it gender neutral and have only clean and favorite clothes). Anything more and I toss it - I can always buy second hand ones if needed when the next kid comes around. You can choose how much you wish to keep based on how much space you have.
* maternity clothes: I chose to keep my jeans (found these after a lot of tries - not going to go through that pain again) and a few tops (some special ones that I particularly loved) but gave away the rest. I can always buy more or get from my friends if needed.
* current closet: I chose to keep all my favorites and a few pieces that, though I didn't like much, found myself wearing all the time. Eg: I have a black cardigan I don't particularly like but its used almost every few days. I still have it in my closet but I'm on the hunt for a good one I like - till then I'm hanging on to that one. But again, if you don't like 75% of your closet, do you still wear that 75% all the time? If you never wear it or have to force yourself to wear it, wouldn't it be better to be out of your closet than to be in and be clutter? Same with coats. Keep the ones you like but be on the lookout for the one you really want. When you find it at an affordable price, let these go.
In short, don't worry about replacing everything now. Just start with obvious ones you hate and as time goes, you'll know which ones you like enough to replace with better ones.
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I read that most people only wear about 20% of what is in their closet. After I semi-retired I got ruthless & probably got rid of half or more of my clothes. I did buy a few new ones. Now all though my hanging space is half empty i like everything in there. When I was in the child bearing phase I kept maternity clothes until I knew I was done having kids. I also kept the hand me down clothes & gave them away as the 3rd child out grew them. I did the same with the toys.
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Do to periodic influx of very stylish clothing from coworkers closets, I had no qualms about downsizing my wardrobe to a minimum. I usually have: 2 dresses ( cannot stand dresses ), 2 pants, 2 pj's, 2 skirts, 2 t-shirts ( for exercise, sleep, or painting ), and around a dozen tops, 4 coats, 2 hoodies. Variation in my outfits comes from tops, coats, and jewelry, not to mention lipstick color. Maybe not minimal to some standards... I purge regularly as castoffs I like come in .
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Well, I went through the clothes (except the downstairs coat closet and the shoes). 2 trash bags full to trash, about another trash bag full that seems to be in good enough condition to donate or give away, and a few "sentimental" items I can't quite bring myself to part with yet. Might I make a throw quilt out of my old T-shirts from college? Maybe... don't know what I'd do with it once I had it. Can I bring myself to throw out sweaters I knit myself that I don't wear? I don't know. (I did throw out some hand-knit socks that were falling apart though.) So I stuck it all to one side and I'll deal with it later. I'll keep the one of two pairs of work-suitable pants that I have, even though I don't much like them, but if I find a replacement, or if I lose 5 lbs and can fit back into the other 3 pairs that I really like, I'll get rid of them.
I got rid of a lot of kind of old, tired stuff and I still have plenty of casual stuff left! It was dragging me down to have such a high percentage of my wardrobe be "still wearable but kind of bleh".
My daughter is not receptive to the idea of letting go of stuff. We've had a plastic shoe on our counter for months now that belongs to some doll we don't even have. My husband says he thinks we got it in a box of blocks we got secondhand like 5 years ago. (He should have just thrown it out! I thought it went to a doll we actually have.) My daughter went to pieces when I threw this in the trash, even though if I'd asked her yesterday I guarantee she wouldn't have even known we had it.
My husband isn't opposed to the idea of decluttering a little, but he says he doesn't feel dragged down by stuff the way I do. Oh well. I'll work on my stuff and the papers, since I manage 98% of the financial/practical stuff for both of us. Anything left over I'll stick in his office and pretend it doesn't exist. LOL. I think I can convince him to let me organize the kitchen and family room without too much trouble.
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Threw out 17 garbage bags and 5 car loads to Goodwill with this purge. After reading, I still feel like there's too much in my house too!
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My daughter is not receptive to the idea of letting go of stuff. We've had a plastic shoe on our counter for months now that belongs to some doll we don't even have. My husband says he thinks we got it in a box of blocks we got secondhand like 5 years ago. (He should have just thrown it out! I thought it went to a doll we actually have.) My daughter went to pieces when I threw this in the trash, even though if I'd asked her yesterday I guarantee she wouldn't have even known we had it.
As someone who struggles mightily with letting go of things, I can only recommend that you really try to put some time into dealing with this now. Obviously my issues colour my perception of this, though. Part of my problem is the fact that my step-mother used to frequently just throw stuff out. I was a teenager at that stage and not just a kid so perhaps my hormonal self just reacted very badly although my younger brother and sister also became quite bad at hoarding. Anyway, The Frugal Girl did a few posts on how to declutter with kids (http://) a while back that you might find interesting.
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Does anyone else still have a messy house after doing this purge? I don't seem to have that much around anymore- I think I might just be lazy...
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Does anyone else still have a messy house after doing this purge? I don't seem to have that much around anymore- I think I might just be lazy...
When I am incredibly busy or ill for several days in a row, yes. But as soon as I'm able, I tidy (&it takes virtually no time at all) promptly. However, I don't have a live-in husband (yet) or kids.
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One thing that might help is each night before going to bed, go into each room in the house and look for things that aren't where they belong, and put them away. It should take less than 10 minutes if you started the day with everything in its place, and prevents messes from building up. This may not work as well for people with kids, but it works pretty well at my kid-less house.
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Page 1:
"Start by discarding."
I do admit, I have too much stuff. That includes too much furniture, too many books, too many old boxes of papers/bills, too many things that we never use and don't love. I need to get ruthless about this.
NDQ
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I read this book and then followed the principles with very good results. I did in fact get rid of a lot of crap- sold it I mean. It was an effective method for deciding whether to get rid of something especially gifts others gave (but I didn't like). I actually made about $500 from selling everything which went right into my 'stache. Most of it I didn't even remember that I had.
Another nice side-effect is that it's easier to clean my house b/c I'm not having to find a place for all that stuff.
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I read this book over a month ago and didn't capitalize on the momentum. Now I have to start all over again.
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I read this book and then followed the principles with very good results. I did in fact get rid of a lot of crap- sold it I mean. It was an effective method for deciding whether to get rid of something especially gifts others gave (but I didn't like). I actually made about $500 from selling everything which went right into my 'stache. Most of it I didn't even remember that I had.
Another nice side-effect is that it's easier to clean my house b/c I'm not having to find a place for all that stuff.
That is the one thing I've totally been procrastinating on- SELLING. I hav several valuables I hav ready to go, but hav made otherwise no effort. I really just need to get on with it. My worry is always that I'll get ripped off. But truly I can do the research, there's certainly plenty available. Also, if I make anything, really its better than continuing to hold onto these things, not making money, and having that nagging feeling.... :)
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I am still plugging away at this. The author says that once your space is perfectly tidied and filled solely with things that give you joy, you won't want to rebound and will naturally want to keep it so nice. I get that. Which is why my living space is partly things that are organized great, and partly piles of other crap. I really want to get this all done now, but it is hard doing it living with little kids and working full-time. My daughter (4) has actually been pretty helpful as far as helping me sort items, talk about them, put unwanted stuff in the trash, etc. but I can't leave piles of stuff out with my son (19 months) around, he'll just destroy things, so each decluttering event has to be started and finished promptly and typically when he is in bed.
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Replying to follow.
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Marie Kondo is coming out with another book!
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/1607749726/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1DVVPREDF9G9RQTTNSCK&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2079475242&pf_rd_i=desktop (http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/1607749726/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1DVVPREDF9G9RQTTNSCK&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2079475242&pf_rd_i=desktop)
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Replying to follow.
Hitting the "notify" button will also follow the thread for you without the need for a message.
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I started sorting our books into type today. It will help when we can see how many of each category we have to work out which give us joy, because it's too overwhelming otherwise. Our house has been tidy for over a week since we sorted the junk room. It doesn't exist anymore! In its place we have a lovely airy playroom!
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I just moved last weekend after having Kondo'd everything I own about 4 months back- and I haven't had this easy of a packing process since I lived in a 100-square-foot dome! My partner also had to move, and a week later has over 15 boxes of stuff left to unpack (with nowhere to put them in this 1-bedroom apartment) plus a chunk of stuff to move into storage at one of his rental houses and I'm completely unpacked and relaxed. I even stacked all of my fabric stash vertically like books :-)
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I did my clothes months ago and nothing has rebounded. I really like the way of storing tshirts and tank tops in drawers so they can all be seen.
This book really helped me with that. I need to get back to the process of discarding, which is really hard for me even though some (most?) of this stuff is just worthless.
Another thing I have learned from this process is that I like rooms fairly empty and sparsely furnished.
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I will be buying hardcover copies of this book for 2 different White Elephant gift exchanges and a copy for my mom who has hoarder-tendencies (grew up poor).
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Sold a coffee storage that we really liked but ended up cluttering our living space. Now the living room looks big and open.
Also folded all my clothes in konmari style and now have a half closet totally empty... And has stayed empty for 3+ months.
Now I'm eyeing our TV stand but that would be a bigger push.
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I finally bought myself a copy as a treat when we were on holidays in Oct/Nov. Am reading it slowly, enjoying it like good chocolate.
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I haven't read the book yet - it's on my library list but I have a long time before it gets to me in the queue.
I saw some pictures of people's drawers so I took some time a few weeks ago, went through my clothes, and rolled them up as described in the book and holy cow! It is just so much better to be able to see all of your clothes at once in your drawers, and it makes your clothes selection look so much more appealing. I am using shirts that I had forgotten about because they had migrated under other clothes. I also pared my wardrobe down of stuff that I never really wore.
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So maybe I should post this in 'ask a mustachian', but papers. . .
Since none of them bring me joy, I thought the best way to go thorough this was with a must keep list, does anyone have a checklist for items that should be kept? I looked on-line and haven't found one that seems to make sense.
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So maybe I should post this in 'ask a mustachian', but papers. . .
Since none of them bring me joy, I thought the best way to go thorough this was with a must keep list, does anyone have a checklist for items that should be kept? I looked on-line and haven't found one that seems to make sense.
Anything related to property, insurance, or taxes can be scanned and stored on the cloud (e.g. Google Drive, DropBox, etc.)
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Anything related to property, insurance, or taxes can be scanned and stored on the cloud (e.g. Google Drive, DropBox, etc.)
Maybe it is just me, but having a mess of documents on the cloud isn't any better to me than having them in a manila folder.
In other news, while going thorough my books, I did a quick amazon search to see if any of them were worth anything and it turned out that one of them was and I made ~$75 by selling one in about 2 days!
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I like Suze Orman's list (igsbase/igstemplate.cfm?SRC=MD012&SRCN=aoedetails&GnavID=84&SnavID=20&TnavID&AreasofExpertiseID=17)
I try to keep them on the cloud as much as possible
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Topic at the Thanksgiving dinner table was the volume of laundry my Mom & siblings do in each of their houses. I realized how much less we have to do now that we've pared our belongings via Kondo.
I'm not done downsizing. Still have books, papers & mementos to purge.
But flinging excess clothes and dishes did quite a number on our efficiency. We basically have a single bowl, plate, mug & drinking glass per person. If it's not washed as soon as you eat, it's not available for the next meal, so clean-up is automatic. A sink full of dirty dishes or mile high piles of dirty laundry are impossible even if everything we owned were dirty.
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I pulled all our books of the shelves and into one room today, then DH and I did a first pass over them, picking the books we wanted to keep and the ones we thought should go into two piles. The ones at least one person wanted to keep all fit on one bookshelf. The other pile, "at least one person didn't want it", we'll go through again tomorrow. I think we'll end up getting rid of 1/5 of our books now, and then continually reduce as we get used to it, probably down another 1/5.
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I'm throwing away my Hopi ear candles today as I was reading last night that they have little value.
Marie Kondo is coming out with another book!
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/1607749726/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1DVVPREDF9G9RQTTNSCK&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2079475242&pf_rd_i=desktop (http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/1607749726/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1DVVPREDF9G9RQTTNSCK&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2079475242&pf_rd_i=desktop)
Do you think it will be the same as the first one?
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Do you think it will be the same as the first one?
My understanding is that it goes in-depth into some specific areas of the house, whereas the first book talked about the general ideas.
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Now that she's had a baby, I'm interested to see if she has any tips for handling kids related stuff
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Do you think it will be the same as the first one?
My understanding is that it goes in-depth into some specific areas of the house, whereas the first book talked about the general ideas.
Oh, okay.:) I put it on my wishlist on Amazon to see what the reviews are like. I follow this thread and a few others so I keep thinking people will probably buy it and then pass on any new information.
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I understand she's actually written about 4 books, but they're slowly being translated to English, so this one may have been written pre-baby. I bought the first but I think I'll just read others thoughts on the second like you're planning, Londoner38
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At my digital library! Psyched, on hold for months though. Doesn't matter, my Kindle reminds me; life is good.
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Finally put up our TV on the wall so we can sell/donate our TV stand. Bonus: I also cleared out all the junk that was in the stand's storage areas (four shelves and a drawer). I'm still finding places for some (DVDs and wires) but the rest are gone. Now to actually sell the TV stand.
My husband's comments: the family room looks bigger and more posh! Yays!!
We also hung up some artwork - with each of these changes done, I'm realizing I'm loving this room more and more. Thanks to konmari, our house (2 bed,2 bath) looks very spacious and we use half our storage space. I'm wondering if it would make sense to move to a smaller house but we love our open spaces :)
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We are moving cross country this summer so I'm in major purge mode. Reading online about her ideas and I think they'll help.
My only problem is I'd like to try to sell most of the stuff which makes it a very slow trickle out rather than clearing out everything we've ear marked to go. I'd really like the potential money as it'll help us replace some things when we move. Just want things as cleared out as possible before we list our house for sale in the spring.
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Does anyone else have the "problem" that they purge so much that the room looks a bit too empty? I have an Expedit from Ikea and used to have books in it (color coded like the nerd that I am) and some other nice stuff. I got rid off (well, it's still in the home, figuring out what to do with it, sell or donate) approximately 40 books but now it looks less nice (with about 20 books). So I like to be only surrounded by the stuff that brings me joy but now the look of the Expedit brings me less joy?
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Does anyone else have the "problem" that they purge so much that the room looks a bit too empty? I have an Expedit from Ikea and used to have books in it (color coded like the nerd that I am) and some other nice stuff. I got rid off (well, it's still in the home, figuring out what to do with it, sell or donate) approximately 40 books but now it looks less nice (with about 20 books). So I like to be only surrounded by the stuff that brings me joy but now the look of the Expedit brings me less joy?
Try arranging the books artistically (think magazine photo). You can have the covers of your favorites front and center, or arrange with other objects that are stored too tightly somewhere else. Something to give it the pop you're used to.
Signed, a serial bookshelf rearranger.
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Does anyone else have the "problem" that they purge so much that the room looks a bit too empty? I have an Expedit from Ikea and used to have books in it (color coded like the nerd that I am) and some other nice stuff. I got rid off (well, it's still in the home, figuring out what to do with it, sell or donate) approximately 40 books but now it looks less nice (with about 20 books). So I like to be only surrounded by the stuff that brings me joy but now the look of the Expedit brings me less joy?
You could use the extra space to put a picture frame or a small flower pot.
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Something like this, perhaps:
http://www.thesunnysideupblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/pottery-barn-striped-chair.jpg
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Thanks for all the suggestions!
The thing is, there wasn't a lot of stuff in it to begin with and it was neatly organized and rearranged like the pictures but now I got rid of a lot of stuff and it's even emptier. And the addition of books looked nice, I already have some other things in the other spaces. I love the idea for the picture frames and I even have some left. I will purge the other categories and will see if something comes up to put there.
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I think I need to actually read the book. I'm having so much trouble with my inner hoarder thinking I might need it later or that I may be able to get some money for it if I could sell it, have a garage sale.
And need tips for getting the kids to get rid of things.
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I think I need to actually read the book. I'm having so much trouble with my inner hoarder thinking I might need it later or that I may be able to get some money for it if I could sell it, have a garage sale.
And need tips for getting the kids to get rid of things.
Do read it--it might help you liberate yourself from some of those unneeded possessions.
There was not really anything in there about working with kids except leading by example, but here are a couple of helpful blog posts:
http://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2015/02/10-tips-for-decluttering-with-kids/
http://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2015/02/why-i-declutter-with-my-kids-instead-of-for-them/
My kids are 3 and 4 and we're not really making much headway yet, but Big Brother did set aside some books for donation.
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I think I need to actually read the book. I'm having so much trouble with my inner hoarder thinking I might need it later or that I may be able to get some money for it if I could sell it, have a garage sale.
And need tips for getting the kids to get rid of things.
Do read it--it might help you liberate yourself from some of those unneeded possessions.
There was not really anything in there about working with kids except leading by example, but here are a couple of helpful blog posts:
http://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2015/02/10-tips-for-decluttering-with-kids/
http://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2015/02/why-i-declutter-with-my-kids-instead-of-for-them/
My kids are 3 and 4 and we're not really making much headway yet, but Big Brother did set aside some books for donation.
Mine are nearly 2 and 4.5. The 4.5 is having a hard time with the idea of getting rid of stuff. The 2 is easy. Disappear and it's gone. I'm working in the little people garage at the moment. The minute I listes it for sale he started playing with it.
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Mine are the same age as yours, Maya, and my older one is ridiculously attached to every little scrap of trash and paper she scribbled on. I hope it's an age thing and over time we can make some progress. I think she'd consent to getting rid of stuff that she finds too babyish, but her younger brother is still playing with that stuff. Maybe down the line we can make more headway.
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When my kids were younger I gave them each a 'precious' box where they could keep all their rocks, scraps of paper, etc. Anything special to them that didn't have a particular place to belong. Once the box was full they had to decide what to get rid of before adding more. It has worked really well for us. I can cope with a box of stuff (as it isn't scattered all over the place, it is of a fixed size, etc), and it has allowed them to develop skills to decide what is really important to them. I think it probably also helps that they aren't having to make the decision about they paper scrap at the time it is important to them. By the time they look at getting rid of it some time has passed and they wonder why they kept it.
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I saw this today.
http://tidyingup.com/excerpt
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I liked most of the book. I think this book has a lot of uses for a mustachian. Having very few belongings is an easy way to avoid consumerism.
Personally the book has helped me to let go of things I had trouble parting with. A gift that I would never use, a pair of jeans that was only worn twice but just didn't feel right. I always feel wasting things is wrong and therefore I have trouble throwing things out that can be repaired or might be usefull at one point.
The MMM post about storing things on craigslist and retrieving them for money also helped me to get rid of stuff. If I ever need those items again I can just purchase them for very little money. Ofcourse of all the items that I have "stored" this way I have not needed a single one.
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The idea from this book that helped me part with things was the idea that if you get rid of something that you feel doesn't spark joy, but then you regret it, you'll be okay. And that has been the case. I have gotten rid of a few things that I looked back and was like... oh, I wish I'd saved that. Like I took her directive not to keep no-longer-presentable clothes as loungewear, and got rid of a bunch of things. And there was one top that I subsequently wished I'd kept because I legitimately liked it. But ... you know, it's okay. I do wish I had kept the top but the regret has not ruined my life. I learned from it and moved on.
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I liked most of the book. I think this book has a lot of uses for a mustachian. Having very few belongings is an easy way to avoid consumerism.
Personally the book has helped me to let go of things I had trouble parting with. A gift that I would never use, a pair of jeans that was only worn twice but just didn't feel right. I always feel wasting things is wrong and therefore I have trouble throwing things out that can be repaired or might be usefull at one point.
The MMM post about storing things on craigslist and retrieving them for money also helped me to get rid of stuff. If I ever need those items again I can just purchase them for very little money. Ofcourse of all the items that I have "stored" this way I have not needed a single one.
Yep the MMM post on craiglist storage has helped me a lot. We're still hoping to have another baby, but the reality is, it's not going to be born here (if we're lucky enough) so time to liquidate all of the baby stuff, and buy more 2nd hand later in our new home cross-country if necessary. I've kept a few favorites, but that fits in 2 bins, down from about 10. It's so exciting every time somthing heads out of the house and a bit more money enters :)
Got DS to get rid of his train table. So excited about that one! Bought it for $40 with a bunch of trains and tracks. Kept the trains and tracks and sold the table with the tracks that didn't fit well with the main table for $40! So basically ended up with a bunch of free trains. Promised DS we can use that money to buy another type of toy he's currently obsessed with.
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(I'd like to repost what I wrote in another forum)
Can I share my experience? I discovered this book mid 2014. I applied the results starting December 25, 2015.
Renegade is correct. It's a hit & miss book. Either you'll love it, or you'll hate it. I'm willing to try anything new, as long as I can benefit from it. Here are the things which i applied and the results.
#1 Decluttered My Closet
I didn't exactly follow what was written in her book. I gathered all my work clothes, house clothes, and undies. I put it on a pile. Asked "joy" for every item. It took me 3 hours. I ended up giving 2 large bags of clothes. one bag weighed 5-8 kgs.
I have yet to declutter my bags and shoes and other things I wear. Clothes are easy to retrieve now. I don't have to worry a lot. They don't eat up closet space, because of number 4.
Marie Kondo, IMO, is correct. Discard before you organize.
#2 Donated my collection of Books, Children's Books & (gasp!) manga collections, anime & gaming magazines
I loved them dearly. But some of my books have been sitting inside the bookshelves, unread and dusty.It made me guilty. Plus, my books were accumulating. I didn't like it. I didn't like to maintain a lot of stuff. Adulthood changes you. You go from less to more, then more to less.
"The purpose of a book is to be read"
"A half-read book means it was probably meant to be half-read"
Those phrases were my battle cry as I decided to take my books from the shelves and decide. You see, I went to a coffeeshop here in my place. They had mangas, and I planned to donate my collection. Then the cashier told me "we have a book drive for children in boulevard area". Bingo.
I still have a lot of books to give away. Reading this book made me realized I just want to be surrounded by books that I love and would like to reread. No wonder I am attracted to ebooks--- they offer me the luxury to read without taking up space.
However, I still have physical books. My favorites though.
#3 Emptied my Bag & Put the contents in a box
Before this book came into my life, I always had a problem with my bag and its contents. Once I arrived home, I left my bag on the couch. Its contents intact. Sometimes, I actually forgot what I put inside the bag. I've misplaced my keys,wallet and ID inside my house many times. It can be frustrating. It doesn't help that I used to share a bedroom with my mom. our bedroom was messy. my mess seemed to blend with the background. She was ok with it. I became ok with it. I was surprised that I had a bag which I last used in 2010. The items inside were still intact!
So I just did what was written. It was tedious. but I never regret it.
I'm surprised how easy it is after a couple of days. I don't lose my important items anymore. I'm actually happy because of it.
And my bag? It's resting after a long day of carrying my stuff!
#4 Fold the Clothes Konmari style
This one changed my life. No, really! this is even more important than number 3! I didn't know how to fold. I piled my clothes horizontally, "on top of each other". It was such a hassle.But ever since this book came.... it has been such a lifechanger!
I might publish photos of my drawers, but I'm amazed how I was able to maintain my drawers with neatly folded clothes!
It has become a source of pride and joy for me. It's been 2 months since I've applied this. I feel so different now!
#5 I hate my mom's clutter because I also have clutter I don't want to deal with
There's a chapter that mentions "If you're mad at your family, your room may be the cause". Hm. good point. I don't have a room of my own. well, I do have one, but it was converted into a storage room for my mom's clutter.
For years, I've lived in clutter. I still do. I share a bedroom with my mom. To her, the clutter seems to have blended into the background. It doesn't bother her as it bothers me. I disposed some of her items, and she got mad (well, who wouldn't?). She told me to tell her everything I dispose, because there might be some items she will use.
Yeah,right.
This was the reason why I couldn't dispose some items in our room. Because it's hers.
So this book came along. this chapter came along. After months of thinking, I decided to transfer to my room. I reclaimed it.
I removed traces of my mom's stuff (though she tried to give me stuff... because I might need them. I just kept them in a corner.... never used them)
I intentionally surrounded myself with stuff I only need...and you know what? Something strange happened.
when I enter our her bedroom, I'm no longer mad. I just look around and hope she'll find it in her heart to clean. I just focused on my cleaning & discarding my items.
And another strange thing happened as well.
My mom has started to pare down as well. How? Well, she gave dozens of her chickens for free!
I liked the eggs those chickens produced, but I never liked their manure. Our backyard stank chicken coop.
so there!
those were my experiences.
The Folding is a success with me, as well as "Emptying the Bag" thing too.
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http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/observations/2016/01/marie-kondo-more-tidying-guru-she-has-perfected-radical-theory
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(I'd like to repost what I wrote in another forum)
Thanks for sharing. :)
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(I'd like to repost what I wrote in another forum)
Thanks for sharing. :)
You're welcome!
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I haven't been able to stick with it. I did it all for a couple of months but no longer.
I do think the book has changed my life in that I have less now and am generally more tidy but I just can't be bothered to fold my clothes every week or to empty my bag every evening...
I do it now and again and love the result but I can't stick to a routine with it.
Am I alone? Who else has relapsed? Maybe I need to reread it as I want to be bothered but I just can't.
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I'm always pretty put off by stuff like "Everyone who's followed my method has had awesome success, except the people who did it wrong."
I haven't relapsed on clothes. Okay, I do sometimes leave a couple of things on the floor, but mostly they are all still organized and I haven't accumulated a bunch of new crap. In fact, now I want to get rid of more. However, I did my desk and it's still a mess. HOWEVER, I feel like it's because the organizational systems I have set up do not go far enough. Stuff is landing on my desk and staying there because I do not have a good place set up for it to live.
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Relapse? I think if you're finding that you are 'relapsing' you probably aren't done yet, maybe you don't have a place for everything (and still have more things that could go).
But I think of relapsing as when you have piles of stuff lying about and you're starting to re-accumulate. I don't see failing to empty the purse as a relapse myself...I don't do the purse thing and won't be. I don't always fold all my stuff right away, but my drawers are still folded and everything that goes in them gets folded.
I also don't do the bathroom thing, because I'm not seeing the slime problem she describes, even though I live in relatively humid Vancouver (makes me wonder about humidity and bathroom fans in Japan).
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I had been heading down the Kondo route for some time any way. She is kind of weird though, but in a way that would appeal to Japanese Shinto where talking to inanimate objects as if they had a spirit is culturally ok.
That aside I was lucky enough to read this book before moving house which gave the perfect oppurtunity to Kondo my possessions.
The main difference I see with Mustachianism is that there is less emphaisis on frugality and more on the joy objects bring. This can, and should lead to having fewer possessions. But it is a different approach.
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OK, I realize the book is about minimalism, not tidying. But here's my actual tip on the art of tidying up:
Set up waypoints. I live in a tri-level so I'll use that as an example. At various times I may have stuff on the top floor that needs to go to the garage, stuff on the bottom floor that needs to go to the upstairs closet, and stuff in the middle floor that needs to go upstairs or downstaird.
What I do is every time I go from the top level to the middle level, I carry something that needs to go to the garage, but I'm only going to the kitchen. I leave it in my middle-level waypoint.
Similarly, if I'm tidying up the middle level, I don't carry each thing piecemeal upstairs or downstairs, I cache it in the central waypoint. Then, when I finally go upstairs (say, to bed), I just grab all the things at the waypoint and bring them with me and put them in the upstairs waypoint (for example, on top of the dresser). Then, the next day I put everything on the dresser away. This prevents me from having to walk up and down stairs for each item.
When I'm going to work, I bring things down to the garage. Same concept there.
This can be summarized as: whenever you go somewhere, carry something that needs to go in that direction -- even if you aren't going the entire distance. Each time you pass that thing in the direction it needs to go, you move it closer to it's destination.
With this approach, I keep the whole house tidy without ever going out of my way.
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The main difference I see with Mustachianism is that there is less emphaisis on frugality and more on the joy objects bring. This can, and should lead to having fewer possessions. But it is a different approach.
I can see it aligning with Mustachianism as well.
The thing that I most enjoy about Mr MM's philosophy is that it is also focused on bringing joy into your life and the lives of other people. So many money saving/accumulating texts & strategies focus only on the numbers and disregard the human spirit.
Incidentally I'm back on the wagon. I had the afternoon off work since it got to 43C (109F) outside, I opted to spend it indoors which included folding and tidying (I am dreading our power bill though as I couldn't get anything done without the AC on). I'm very grateful for the ground work I put in after reading the book as tidying would normally take a lot longer.
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Oh wow. I've spent the last few days working on our filing cabinet. This was a big job. I haven't touched it since our last child was born in 2007! I've only added to it in that time.
Our filing cabinet is (was) a 4 drawer cabinet made out of some sort of laminated, compressed wood-type of material. We've had it for about 12 years and have been very naughty and moved house 4 times with it remaining completely filled. We've just taped the drawers closed. This had made it very rickety. Luckily, I managed to get a sturdy, lockable replacement filing cabinet from our local version of Craigslist. It cost about $20 and I didn't look inside when I picked it up....just loaded it into the back of the car. That was about a year ago....
Anyway, I tackled the old cabinet. I began with the top drawer, which held things like our most recent bills, bank statements, degrees, etc. This was an easy drawer, though I did keep more than Marie Kondo would suggest. I still have our tax returns back to 1998, and bank statements and payslips dating back 7 years. :)
The next drawer was older bank statements, bills and the like. I got rid of everything that was pre-2009.
Into the third drawer (on the third day) and for the first time in all of my KonMarie-ing I felt my heart squeeze in dread at what I faced working on - it was the drawer full of our old letters and cards. There were cards dating back to my 4th birthday (Birth - 3 yrs are stored elsewhere...). There were letters from my grandmother who passed 4 years ago and I still cry over. But I did it. I turned that entire (fully stuffed) drawer into a small pile of things that would fit in an envelope.
The fourth drawer is half filled with my husband's things. He will work on it this weekend when he gets home from working away, but I know he will be even more ruthless than me. :)
All of this culling was lucky. I managed to fit the remains of the first three drawers of the old filing cabinet into the TOP DRAWER of the new one. Despite everything I kept.... Then I opened the second drawer to store my husband's papers until he arrives home and realised that there are no file runners in the bottom drawer!
Here's hoping he doesn't want to keep more than one envelope of papers himself! :)
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This is inspiring.
I have a four drawer wood file cabinet (legal size) and a 2 drawer metal one (letter size). I just shifted all my bank statements from paper to e-statements and am in the process of downloading them (they disappear after 7 years, and I am downloading the old ones, just in case). I am starting to shred old bank statements. What a feeling! There have been just enough times that I needed old statements that I was glad I had saved them (separation and and divorce issues) but I hated having all the paper.
Next is shifting to e-statements for Hydro. Phone bills have been electronic for years, ever since I dropped Bell and went with Fido's second number plan for the home phone.
I had the book out of the library last spring and cleared out a lot, but the paper mess totally defeated me.
Oh wow. I've spent the last few days working on our filing cabinet. This was a big job. I haven't touched it since our last child was born in 2007! I've only added to it in that time.
Our filing cabinet is (was) a 4 drawer cabinet made out of some sort of laminated, compressed wood-type of material. We've had it for about 12 years and have been very naughty and moved house 4 times with it remaining completely filled. We've just taped the drawers closed. This had made it very rickety. Luckily, I managed to get a sturdy, lockable replacement filing cabinet from our local version of Craigslist. It cost about $20 and I didn't look inside when I picked it up....just loaded it into the back of the car. That was about a year ago....
Anyway, I tackled the old cabinet. I began with the top drawer, which held things like our most recent bills, bank statements, degrees, etc. This was an easy drawer, though I did keep more than Marie Kondo would suggest. I still have our tax returns back to 1998, and bank statements and payslips dating back 7 years. :)
The next drawer was older bank statements, bills and the like. I got rid of everything that was pre-2009.
Into the third drawer (on the third day) and for the first time in all of my KonMarie-ing I felt my heart squeeze in dread at what I faced working on - it was the drawer full of our old letters and cards. There were cards dating back to my 4th birthday (Birth - 3 yrs are stored elsewhere...). There were letters from my grandmother who passed 4 years ago and I still cry over. But I did it. I turned that entire (fully stuffed) drawer into a small pile of things that would fit in an envelope.
The fourth drawer is half filled with my husband's things. He will work on it this weekend when he gets home from working away, but I know he will be even more ruthless than me. :)
All of this culling was lucky. I managed to fit the remains of the first three drawers of the old filing cabinet into the TOP DRAWER of the new one. Despite everything I kept.... Then I opened the second drawer to store my husband's papers until he arrives home and realised that there are no file runners in the bottom drawer!
Here's hoping he doesn't want to keep more than one envelope of papers himself! :)
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Thatbrowncat,
I know what you mean about folding clothes knomari style- revolutionary! The real shock is that I am still doing it months later. And recently I started keeping my socks in a shallow drawer and standing them up so they are all visible like the shirts and knickers. When I open the drawer and see my socks my heart feels a burst of joy. Weird, right?
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Re: the handbag emptying.
Are a lot of folks doing that? It makes no sense to me to add that chore to my day. I remove receipts, tissues and things I only needed for one day and then my bag is ready for the next day.
Recently I have been revisiting places that got cluttered again. One place was my closet which accumulated all the mending, sewing and darning projects. I am pleased that this time around I tossed many of them. But, until I actually complete those projects they are taking up room.
I tried committing to mending three things a week but no luck.
Almost every area that gets cluttered now is due to some incomplete repairs, mending or unfinished clean out.
Anyone else in this boat?
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Re: the handbag emptying.
Are a lot of folks doing that? It makes no sense to me to add that chore to my day. I remove receipts, tissues and things I only needed for one day and then my bag is ready for the next day.
Recently I have been revisiting places that got cluttered again. One place was my closet which accumulated all the mending, sewing and darning projects. I am pleased that this time around I tossed many of them. But, until I actually complete those projects they are taking up room.
I tried committing to mending three things a week but no luck.
Almost every area that gets cluttered now is due to some incomplete repairs, mending or unfinished clean out.
Anyone else in this boat?
I'm around the same place as you, Wintersun. I clear out my bags at the end of the week, not every day. It helps me remember where things are on Monday morning, as I use a backpack, handbag and sometimes just grab keys and phone over the course of a week and weekend.
I'm still folding all the clothes and, oddly, even underwear! Never thought I'd do that.
My mending basket gets pulled out every couple of weeks and I don't try to do X pieces, I just do it for a certain amount of time.arealso treat it like a craft project, because it takes time I'd otherwise spend on new crafts.
Note my only messy areas are where we leave housework half-finished, and our study as we aren't quite through the CDs and paperwork. It's amazing how much less effort it is to DO housework, though! I can tidy in 10 minutes, instead of an hour or more!
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Re: the handbag emptying.
Are a lot of folks doing that? It makes no sense to me to add that chore to my day. I remove receipts, tissues and things I only needed for one day and then my bag is ready for the next day.
I think this tip is aimed at people who have lots of bags and switch between them? I only use one bag so it doesn't make sense for me to take things out and put them back if their place is in the bag.
Like you, I do find it useful to empty stuff from my bag that doesn't need to be there everyday. I don't necessarily wear the same lipstick everyday, don't need to keep receipts in there, etc. It helps to keep the bag tidy.
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I've read the book several times, and am just starting on my KM process. I've done my wardrobe, next is my shoes and bags.
I think often the initial message is missed by people. That is, why are you doing this? Delving down into your deepest most inner motivation for starting the process has been key for me to keep me going this time. I've started the process several times as well (each time I've read the book, in fact!) and have stopped before getting all the way through.
This time I did the exercise she suggests about investigating your motivation first, before you start. Don't dive in and just do it or you'll fizzle out. I have it all written down (some deeply personal stuff which I'm not happy to share) but doing this really makes it all a lot easier, because your mind will tell you one way or the other whether you should keep or discard a piece. It all just flows.
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I read this a few months ago. I definitely used the motivation it gave me to get rid of a bunch of clothes (I had about 45 sundresses/skirts, apparently. Ridiculous.), but after the clothes and the filing cabinet, I ran out of steam. The biggest problem I had was that I felt like I didn't finish the "clothes" portion correctly. I'm pregnant with our first kid, due at the end of May, and I have absolutely no idea what my body will change to be like after delivery and breastfeeding. There are definitely clothes that I love that I'm worried will never fit again, and clothes that are so-so that I don't want to get rid of in case nothing else fits right.
Overall, though, I really enjoyed the premise of the book. Only keeping things that bring you joy is an amazing idea. I have so many knick-knacks and decorations that I keep because they have sentimental value, but I actually don't like to display them that much. There are other things that I'd far rather look at. DH is totally down with the "get rid of all of your paper" idea, too. He hates things cluttering up counters and workspaces.
DH is out of town for a few days, though, so I think I'll revisit some problem areas like our basement storage and the office. If nothing else I can fold all of my maternity clothes nicely :)
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I think some of the areas I'm going to have problems with, trying out her method, are:
1: Things I'm keeping because I'll definitely use them some day. For example, I have way too many socks - they don't even fit in my large drawer. However, socks eventually wear out so I can't see throwing out perfectly good ones just because I have too many right now. Anyone have any ideas about this type of thing?
After decluttering my dresser I had too many socks/underwear but plenty of space in another drawer. I took some of the socks/underwear (still newish/and that I liked) and put it in a shoe box in another drawer. As things get worn out I have replacements ready to go but don't need to buy any for quite some time.
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I read this a few months ago. I definitely used the motivation it gave me to get rid of a bunch of clothes (I had about 45 sundresses/skirts, apparently. Ridiculous.), but after the clothes and the filing cabinet, I ran out of steam. The biggest problem I had was that I felt like I didn't finish the "clothes" portion correctly. I'm pregnant with our first kid, due at the end of May, and I have absolutely no idea what my body will change to be like after delivery and breastfeeding. There are definitely clothes that I love that I'm worried will never fit again, and clothes that are so-so that I don't want to get rid of in case nothing else fits right.
Go though the clothes and get rid of any you hate and store the maybe clothes you like elsewhere? And label and date those box? That way they aren't taking up space and you can revisit those clothes next year. In in the process of losing weight and went though all the too small stuff and got rid of anything I wouldn't wear if I magically became that size overnight. The stuff that I think I would wear are in boxes under my bed and dated. If I can't fit into those clothes by that date (or are really close) then they'll be donated.