KonMari: Lessons Learned Beyond De-Cluttering

(Also featured on Medium at: https://medium.com/@sarah.saccomanno/konmari-lessons-learned-beyond-de-cluttering-a7d73bcde68d)

Tidying for the soul is a serious understatement.

As someone who has been chronically messy with mild hoarding tendencies, I think deep down I wanted to prove to myself that people like me can’t be fixed.

After searching through the book store for a good audiobook, I came across a book- the title of you which you are probably already familiar with based on the title of this entry. I have no idea why I bought this book without hesitation, but I did. As someone who has been chronically messy with mild hoarding tendencies, I think deep down I wanted to prove to myself that people like me can’t be fixed. It seems silly to think that way, but after many years of attempting to tidy up my life through my cluttered possessions and living spaces, I truly thought there was no hope for me.

Until I met Marie Kondo.

I commute a lot as a full time student with a job, so I recently decided that instead of letting my joy of reading fall to the wayside, I would try audiobooks. My boyfriend is a huge lover of audiobooks, although the idea of going this route for my reading seemed odd to me. No matter, I decided to try it. I decided that instead of listening to the same ten or eleven metal albums over and over, or listening to mind numbing radio, that I would use this personal time in the car to learn.

When I first started delving into this book, I was shocked at the encouraging nature of the dialogue, so much so that I couldn’t put it down or turn it off. Normally books about organizing and tidying are telling you how wrong you’ve been doing things and by using rules, they attempt to restructure your life. This book is different because it’s surprisingly simple. As someone who has attempted pretty much all the solutions and mindsets I could think of to declutter my life, I’m used to hearing things like “do a little bit everyday”, or “if you have more storage, you’ll feel more organized and able to keep more things”. I kept wondering why nothing worked for me for all these years. Even as a young girl, I struggled to keep my room clean and piled stuff everywhere. The people in my life could never understand why I was incapable of living without clutter. I didn’t understand it myself, until now.

Gratitude and Respect: Master the art of saying thank you.

I felt like I was being disrespectful to the item I owned by simply throwing it away to rot somewhere.

When Marie introduced the concept of thanking your possessions, I was shocked that I hadn’t thought of it. As someone who believes in daily gratitude and the Law of Attraction, it never once occurred to me to thank inanimate objects. I would thank moments and lessons and people, but never the old perfume bottle stashed in the back of my bathroom cupboard.

I discovered that one of the reasons I was unable to throw things away was because I felt guilty. I felt like I was being disrespectful to the item I owned by simply throwing it away to rot somewhere. I felt that I was creating waste in landfills and being disrespectful to the planet. I felt like after a long run of ignoring the object, it was the final massive blow of disrespect to throw it away. After all, it was my responsibility to give it a home and if I couldn’t find a use for it, it was up to me to prevent it from winding up in a landfill. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I was approaching this at the opposite end of the spectrum- through guilt and blame.

Instead of thanking the objects for their service and sending them off in a positive manner, every time I looked at something looking to rid myself of it, I would feel a pang of guilt. “I can’t throw this away” I would think to myself. “I’m being so disrespectful”. Marie teaches us that everything comes to us to serve a purpose, and once that purpose has been met, you should not keep it unless it sparks joy.

Thoughts of Status and Privilege: You are not mocking those who cannot afford certain items by discarding your own.

I thought that I was disrespecting those of a lower status by getting rid of the excess of my own.

I am fully aware of the privilege I have as a young woman raised in an upper class family. I never went without anything, and always had my needs met. When I think about throwing something away that had been purchased or gifted to me, I used to think that I was not being aware of my privilege and that throwing items away meant I didn’t appreciate them. I thought throwing things away or removing old items I didn’t use was a sign of being spoiled. A sign that I didn’t care about an item that someone in a less privileged financial situation may have had to work months to save up for. I thought that I was disrespecting those of a lower status with fewer things by getting rid of the excess of my own.

Instead, the KonMari method has taught me otherwise. It has taught me that it is not a sign of disrespect, but a sign of self care and love to pass on items that you do not want or use. Marie mentions the concept of donation often in the book, and it is clear to me now that it is kinder to pass those items on to someone who can use them and will bring them joy. Without realizing, I was being selfish by holding onto those things, even though my intentions were kind.

Distraction: Cluttered space and self security.

I avoided dealing with personal feelings and placated myself with the pacifying nature of feeling surrounded by nice things.

Cluttered space makes me feel comforted- albeit, not in a good way. When I walked into a minimalistic or very tidy room, I was not distracted by all the things around me. This made me focus inward- something I was afraid of. As someone who has dealt with mental illness since I was a pre-teen, the act of looking inwards brought dark thoughts. Looking inwards meant looking into a black hole, and it made me feel even more empty. I thought if my space was filled with things to keep my mind occupied, I could avoid that pit of emptiness. I avoided dealing with personal feelings and placated myself with the pacifying nature of feeling surrounded by nice things. To me, it felt like I was hiding in a burrow. With that being said, I didn’t realize how toxic that mentality was. By drowning in things and not allowing myself to think inward, it made those deep set issues become larger- like a tumour. If you don’t remove the tumour when it is small, it will continue to grow and grow until it has nowhere else to go but burst out of your skin.

“When your room is clean and uncluttered, you have no choice but to examine your inner state” — Marie Kondo

The KonMari method made me realize that things are often used as this, and the distraction is actually dangerous. When one cleans their space thoroughly through discarding, they are cleansing themselves. Marie attributes it to something of a detox for the body and mind. By detoxifying and removing the extra “weight” of items that do not spark joy, you are not living your life to its fullest potential.

Marie Kondo’s method teaches us how to approach items and most importantly, it teaches us how to let go in a healthy way.

Although I am still very much in the beginning stages of tidying and discarding, I feel a sense of relief through this new found understanding. I feel ready to completely reinvent my space and myself.