What I Learned From Marie Kondo
The name, Marie Kondo, came up in conversation the other day with my family and I have to admit, I had never heard of her. One week after this conversation, I feel like I’m on a first name basis with this sweet lady as now I see her everywhere!
So a few nights ago, I turned on Netflix and watched two episodes that were very entertaining and informative. But as I’ve thought about those episodes, I realized that I got more of a life lesson than an organizational lesson.
First let me say that her methods are brilliant. I love organization. I love things to be in order and everything in its place. I hate clutter. Well, unless it’s MY clutter because I know exactly what my clutter is and why it’s there. Just last night I saw my clothes clutter area. You know what I’m talking about, right? I’m certain you have one. The clothes that are on your chair, your unused workout equipment or worse, the floor. Mine is in a basket and it contains an outfit or four that I wore once and definitely isn’t dirty but I may wear again soon. Well even my husband who is the king of clutter had to raise his eyebrows at my pile.
Anyway, back to Marie Kondo. She has turned an idea into a brand, two books and now her own show. Brilliant! She comes in and assesses a house or living space and comes up with a plan on how to tidy up, her famous catch word. She has tips and tricks on how to organize, well, everything. But before she starts, she does something a bit unorthodox. She kneels on the floor and bends over as she begins to thank the home for all its been to its owners. Now I have to admit, that was pretty weird the first time I saw her do it. But what came next was the family’s reaction to her doing this. They actually became very emotional at the sight of a stranger showing more gratitude towards their home than they did. Honestly it was a powerful moment.
Going on in her process, she instructed them to take every single piece of clothing out of their closets and dresser drawers and put them in a pile. Their task was to put every piece in their hands and decide if it brought them joy. She did go on to say that if they decided to part with any articles of clothing, to thank them too. Yeah, I’m not so sure about that one but I understand what she’s doing and why.
As a society, we are so ungrateful. Really, we are. We have so many clothes and things and gadgets and more than we could possibly use in a lifetime. I know this firsthand because I went through this when we moved from Louisiana to California. We had the difficult task of going through every single thing we owned and deciding what to keep, what to sell, what to give away and what we really loved but couldn’t bring with us to our new place and had to store.
As the episode went on, the producers interviewed the family individually. This was a young family with toddlers so the house was in disarray and it was causing strife in their marriage. Interestingly, it was the husband who was struggling with the chaos, even more then the wife. As he began his portion of the interview, he described his frustration with his wife’s lack of tidiness and her solution was to pay someone to do their laundry, which was putting a financial strain on them. I watched as he was talking about his frustrations with her and an interesting thing happened. In the middle of this interview, he started talking about what a wonderful wife and mother she was and then randomly said, “But those eyes. Wow, those eyes.” It was like watching this man fall in love with his wife all over again.
I haven’t been able to get this episode out of my mind. The idea of being grateful for the things you own, the things you take advantage of every day. I don’t particularly think we need to bow down to our home but try sitting quietly in your home this week and look around. Go back to the day you found that home, whether you bought or you rent, and remember how excited and grateful you were.
I’ll never forget the day we bought our house. We had bought a trailer first when we got on our feet financially as a young couple but we sold it when we bought the house. Everything we owned from the trailer fit in our new living room. We had fallen in love with the house but during the approval process, Bud was laid off from his job and I was making less than $18,000 a year at mine. But miraculously, without a co-signer, we got approved! When we had to leave the house, it was truly difficult.
What I was reminded of as I watched the Marie Kondo episode, is like so many of us, my house was filled to overflowing with things we didn’t use or even need. How did this happen! It was awful at first to see such waste but as I said, it was also freeing. We gave away so much to people who could really use it, which was wonderful.
So here are the two important life lessons that I learned from Marie Kondo.
As I suggested earlier, sit quietly in your house, look around and thank God for all that He has provided. Thank Him for your home, your family, your job, everything. Put Him in the highest place of priority in your life because as the Bible says, all good and perfect gifts come from God. We all feel harried and stressed at times. For some, it may be because our lives are cluttered. Now that could mean your physical life, as Marie Kondo excels in helping to organize. And frankly I believe that there is great merit in pursuing a less cluttered life. But also consider that your mental and emotional life may be cluttered as well. Cluttered with fear and anxiety, busyness and chaos. You may need to say no to some social invitations and just spend some time alone. Quiet your mind and just get into God’s presence. Whenever I start to feel like I’m about to come unglued, I realize, every single time, that it’s because I’ve neglected that one on one time with my Creator. He always puts my clutter in its place, removes what serves no purpose in my life, and reminds me of what is really important.
Go back to the beginning with your spouse and remember why you fell in love with them in the first place. Write down (yes this is important so you don’t forget again!) everything you love about them. Every little thing that makes you smile. Every quality, everything in their personality that you love, every gift they have. And then plan a date night and read this list to them and thank them for all that they mean to you. Tell them how grateful you are for the things they do for you and your family. Then when you’re alone, take them by the hand (this is important), look them in the eyes and tell them how much you love them, how grateful you are to have them and then pray for them. Yes, I said pray for them, out loud. I PROMISE your marriage will never be the same again.
As you do these things, you’ll find a real freedom in your life. You’ll find what things brings you true joy, like your relationship with God and your family. I really believe that Marie Kondo would approve!
