It’s the life-changing ingredient makes it different from other ways of decluttering
Does the idea of “tidying” bring back the feeling you had when your mom told you to clean up your room when you were a kid? It can seem like an unpleasant and even dreadful task to think about doing.
At the same time, you may feel that you’d really enjoy living in an uncluttered living space.
There’s the rub, right?
So how to move from dread to joy?
If you’re wondering how tidying could possibly bring you joy given how you feel about it, the answer is this:
It’s the way that you go about it that will create the shift from a tedious task to a joyful life-changing way of relating to your things.
The KonMari Method—developed by best-selling author Marie Kondo, author of “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up” and “Sparky Joy”—provides a different kind of road map. The guiding principle is captured in the one question used in deciding what to keep, which is, “Does it spark joy?” If the answer is yes, you keep it. If the answer is no, you thank it for the part if played in your life, and you let it go.
As a result, it’s much easier to figure out what to keep. And since you keep only things that bring you joy, it actually feels really good to do.
It makes getting rid of clutter a refreshing and satisfying experience.
It’s like shedding old skin that has been weighing you down and discovering underneath a new skin that is more reflective of what you want, of what you appreciate, of what you value.
Making your “joy meter” stronger
“Does this spark joy?” Such an important question, don’t you think? How often do you ask it about anything, much less a shirt you haven’t worn in years or a coffee mug? If you’re like most people, you’re probably somewhat out of practice with using what I like to call your “joy meter”. You may be on automatic pilot about your choices in a way that you don’t even realize.
If you don’t allow yourself to check in about whether something or someone sparks joy, you may very well be like the frog who is placed in a pot of cold water on a stove while the heat underneath is gradually turned up. The water ends up getting unbearably hot, but the frog doesn’t jump out because he has gradually become accustomed to it. He gets more and more miserable and more and more drained, without realizing why.
We forget that we have a choice, and that there is a hugely important guiding question when it comes to our life choices is, which is: “Does this spark joy?”
You already know how to do it! You just need to re-find that muscle.
Children are really good at knowing what sparks joy. You used to be really good at it! It’s just that your joy meter may have gotten weak from lack of use.
Life is here to be enjoyed. Our joy meter is our built-in way of knowing if we’re living our lives in a way that makes us happy. It is there to guide us toward what is good for us!
The KonMari Method will put you back in touch with the ability to choose joy. And that is well-worth the journey!
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