Big Love

Seeking inner calm? Try this

The dust has yet to settle in my life since it was kicked up and then stirred round and round. Moving multiple times also contributed to disorder and a need for organization of, well, everything.

So seeking inner order, I have tended to my outer world. This includes my clothes, papers, kitchen, children’s toys, and as the Japanese tidying expert and author Marie Kondo calls the rest of the stuff – the “Komono.”

To remove clutter, Kondo asks people to hold individual items in their hands and ask themselves “Does this spark joy?” If it does, it isn’t clutter. Similarly, tidying expert and author Denise Linn has people notice without holding an item (she believes that holding things makes one more likely to want to keep it) in regard to an item “Is this energy up or energy down?”

I have practiced both methods. Though not as sexy as “sparking joy,” my preferred method is to notice if something is energy up or energy down. I find this method easier to work with. I can just imagine the item and I usually know how it impacts me. Example 1: Sheepskin from the small farm at the farmer’s market? Energy up. Example 2: A cute pair of jeans hanging in my closet that no longer fits? Energy down.

THE CLOSET

In fact, clothes that don’t fit now but might fit down the road is a big category that most of us face at some point. Tidying expert and author Karen Kingston describes aspirational clutter on her blog. https://www.karenkingston.com/blog/aspirational-clutter/ Aspirational clutter is something that you are keeping because you are aspiring to be that or to use it one day, but in actuality these items are energy down if not actualized. And it can add up subconsciously. I find that I feel better not keeping clothes that are too small or too big. I also let unflattering items go, along with those that hold negative memories or associations. These are all energy “down” for me.

Karen Kingston recommended working with a color expert to help streamline your closet and find your power colors. Hers is red. I did try to find a color expert but was unsuccessful in finding one in the Bay Area. Instead I was told of the personal styling app Style DNA, which does an AI color analysis of you and recommends your best colors. This actually helped me immensely to know that I am a true fall and it made shopping more fun once I knew to just shop my colors, the fall palette. I’m still figuring out my power color though. https://styledna.ai

Whole chapters are written on how to tidy your closet. The more you do it the easier it becomes. A few times a year I will intentionally sort through the closet and dresser. If needed, I will try something on or hold it up to me and look at myself in the mirror, then note my energy. I also have a smaller wardrobe, so this is doable for me.

PAPERWORK, PHOTOS, ETC.

“Komono” is the toughest category tidy for most people, myself included. Komono includes memorabilia, photographs, paperwork. It can be daunting. This past year I picked up some portable file holders, hanging file folders, and files in attractive prints from the container store. Then I got out old files, and one by one, I sorted them. I had a recycle bag, a bag to be shredded, and then arranged what I keep into a new file. In David Allen’s book Getting Things Done, he recommends having all the supplies you need on hand (at home or the office) to organize. An item he recommends is a label maker for your files.

THE CAR

One sneaky area to keep tidy is the car. My children and I recently returned from a road trip and the car was a mess. My method for cleaning the car to is to take everything out of it, whether it is trash or useful items. I sort through it and then I only return to the car what I absolutely need. For me this year, keeping the trunk area free of clutter proved challenging. I had put a bag of paper to be shredded that I later drove around for over half a year. Once I dropped it to be shredded I did feel the weight finally lift!

MY PURSE

My purse and wallet are deserving of weekly tending. Marie Kondo empties her purse of all items each time she returns home from an outing! I tried that once but it didn’t stick for me. Money advisor Suze Orman recommends keeping your wallet well organized, and clean, with all dollar bills facing the same way even. I find that keeping both my purse and wallet clutter free is a short task with high reward.

“Take out your wallet and look at the way your bills are organized. Are the ones mixed in with the tens? Are they all stuffed in there, facing different ways? How you actually keep your money is where respect for it starts. When you care for your cash in the same way you care for other important things in your life, you’ll remember that both you and your money deserve respect.”

Suze Orman, FaceBook, 2018