That shirt with the absolute worst green. You've never worn it. You will never wear it. The tags are still on it.
Liberate the garment but first, thank it.
That, in essence, is the Marie Kondo organizing way. Kondo, author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, adds an unusual anthropomorphic element to her cleaning style.
Find everything that does not 'spark joy,' tags or not. Thank them for their service and what they taught you. Then discard or donate. Keep only the objects that do give you joy.
When you find the items that spark joy, fold them, give them a chance to relax and store them with respect. Like socks. Kondo famously writes that socks get stressed when you ball them up.
Kondo has inspired millions of people to clean up and find joy, among them dozens of daunted and bemused writers.
Writing in GQ, Nicole Silverberg admits she is a 'TLC camera crew away from being a hoarder.' But, taking the Kondo challenge, one day she filled six 30-gallon trash bags with no-joy clothes. In the end, she did not think her clothes were alive, but she did end up with joy: "I didn't follow the book to the letter, but my crowded dust cave has been converted into a minimalist safe haven."
The New York Times' Penelope Green also tried the method:
"After 10 or 12 hours of this, you get a bit silly. You forget to thank your discards. (Country music can help. Try George Jones and Lucinda Williams.) By 9 p.m., I had lost Ms. Kondo's book in the layers of clothing, hangers and shoe boxes. And my glasses, too."
Green found Kondo's instructions on paper the most liberating: Just throw them all away. Buttons too.
At the New Yorker, writer Molly Young prepared for an interview with Kondo by folding all her stuff in the Kondo way.
"Throughout the day I returned to my drawers, opening them to admire the now-orderly jeans and socks. I felt the pride of a parent on an airplane with a well-behaved child. How polite and agreeable my socks were being! They deserved a cookie." 1116-125.txt
