graveexcitement: amami rantarou (ndrv3) (amami)
grave ([personal profile] graveexcitement) wrote2019-03-17 03:04 am

konmari

so after a month or so (more? i don't know, time is fake) of reading various hot takes about Marie Kondo, i've been curious about what her actual teachings are, so i decided to seek out a copy of her book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. turns out my mom had a copy, so i gave it a read.

now, i haven't cleaned my room in at least a year, probably closer to two. and it's probably been much longer since i really made an attempt to organize, or to decide what i wanted to keep and what i didn't want any longer.

there are some things about the book that intuitively appeal to me. for instance, in the introduction Kondo mentions (in regard to advice to tidy up "a little bit at a time"), "I am not the type of person who likes to plug away at something, one step at a time. For people like me, who do their assignments on the very last day right before the deadline, this approach just doesn't work," and then, "If, like me, you are not the diligent, persevering type, then I recommend aiming for perfection just once." this appeals to me because i find trying to build slow & steady habits very difficult; i tend to read a book or write an essay all at once rather than a little bit at a time.

however, i also view this with skepticism in this case; it seems too good to be true, that if i can tidy up in one go, i will be changed enough by the experience / by my new environment that i will not simply accumulate clutter and mess once more after a few days/weeks. that said, i am willing to give it the benefit of the doubt here, having not tried it yet, and even in the case that i do start cluttering again after, it still seems like a useful thing to have tried.

the core philosophy also makes sense to me. the things we surround ourselves with should make us happy. it doesn't make sense to keep something just because you feel guilty / feel like you should use it, even when you don't.

unfortunately, for the same reason, i am apprehensive about actually trying this myself. there's a lot of junk in my room that i think i'd be able to part with pretty easily. same with a lot of the stuff in my closet. but there's some stuff, especially books, that i have guilt about not having read yet, that i would be guilty and anxious about donating or throwing away. so in order to actually undertake this project, i would end up having to confront that anxiety, or do a poor job at actually following the philosophy's rules.

i'm not sure if i can do that.

that said, i'm sure even the poor/anxiety-avoidant version of this tactic would have some results. maybe not the "your life will be changed!" results, but at least the "you have less stuff that you've kept for absolutely no reason" results.

there's other stuff that appeals to me about this method as well. for instance, her insistence that when sorting a category of items, you take all your items of that category out of the closet, out of the shelves, etc. and put them on the floor before sorting. she says that if you leave books on the shelf and try to sort from there, you find that they are "invisible," hard to think about. this is one of the reasons my space becomes cluttered; i put down an item, and while i notice it the next few times i look at it, after a little while my brain decides "okay, i guess that item belongs there?" and stops noticing that it is at all out of place. i once completely forgot i owned a jacket for close to a year because it was left on the back of a chair that i didn't look at much. so it makes sense to me that it's hard to judge items when they're in their usual places.

kondo also stresses that "Tidying is a tool, not the final destination. The true goal should be to establish the lifestyle you want most once your house has been put in order." this is a useful thing to keep in mind, especially since i don't really care about being organized just for organization's sake.

i guess i'm still hesitant to try, because anxiety, but... to be honest, this book makes more sense to me than any advice on staying organized that i've ever read or heard. so i think it'd be a disservice to myself if i didn't at least try. also, i still live at home right now, so i've only got my room and my desk (in the common room) to deal with. anything else is not my problem.

i also watched an episode of marie kondo's show, which was all right.

...oh man, if i did this, i'd have to go through all my stuffed animals... man... .n.

i guess it's worth thinking about why i'd want to do this / what i'd be hoping to get out of it?

i don't know. it looks promising but idk if i have it in me to confront that anxiety. so maybe i just won't. i guess i'll think about it for now, since tomorrow i'll probably be too busy anyway.


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