Image credit: Marie “Konmari” Kondo
My Facebook feed slowly started to be inundated with photos of junk, stacks of books, heaps of garbage, and fancifully folded socks. These odd pictures were most always accompanied by a #konmari, which made exactly zero sense to me (not like the pictures made any sense alone anyway). Once a blogger I respect posted #konmari on her random food pantry picture, I decided I, at the very least, needed to figure out why everyone was posting such random pictures of their stuff.
Enter “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing.” AKA: KonMari. I promptly bought the book, and while waiting though my girls’ 1.5 hour gymnastics class one week, I read the first third of the book. I was hooked and couldn’t wait to get home and follow her advice.
So what is Konmari? Basically, in my own words, it’s learning to get rid of anything you don’t need, love, or find joy from, and then organizing your spaces. It’s living clutter free, and freeing up your time from needing to always clean and organize your stuff. I’m great at organizing things, but I’m learning that I don’t have to clean and organize nearly as much if I have less non essential stuff in my home.
Now, I’d consider myself a regular get-ridder of stuff. I hate clutter. I hate nick-nacs. I’m not sentimental and I can get rid of almost anything without a second thought. I clear out and donate my kids toys on the regular. I typically make 1-2 donation drop offs per month (and have done so for the past two years…I don’t even understand how I can consistently donate that much stuff). BUT. KonMari opened my eyes. I can do SO much more! AND, now that I have learned some of her methods, I have totally revolutionized the way I think about my stuff. Life changing, folks.
I’ve been following her advice, and by doing so even inspired my husband to follow suit. Our closets are fantastic. We rid ourselves of tons of clothing that we really didn’t need. We rid ourselves of TUBS of books, keeping for ourselves just a select few that we really love and use. I’ve made three car loads of stuff from my house for donation, and numerous bags of garbage into my trashcans. It feels SO good.
My biggest challenge has come from being frugal. Wanting to stockpile great deals or save kids clothing for future years or saving curriculums for school is something that I am choosing to continue to do. I’m finding a balance for the things I actually should save to keep my budget down, while still keeping the “stuff” at a minimum in my house. This is hard!
I’m not done. I have more work to do. But I will get there! My inspiration comes from my bedroom-the one place that is pretty much Konmari’d. Even when it gets “messy” now, it is 10x faster to clean than before Konmari. If every area of my house could be Konmari’d, just imagine how much time I’ll save when I need to clean up!
And while most hardcore Konmari people may have awesome pictures of their crap and clutter, I don’t have any. Because I still think that’s weird and random. We’ll just call it Konmari’ing my photos and keeping my phone clear of nonsense pictures 
Konmari…check it out. It might change your life.