The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up (FREE Digestible Checklist)

Have you ever met someone who blamed their environment for their situation?

This was me.

I used to say, “The only reason I’m so messy is because my room is too small to fit everything and the pressure my parents place on me to keep things in certain places. When I’m old enough to have my own freedom, everything will be clean!”

Then, I had that freedom in college, and although it’s tough to admit, my room remained a pig sty.

Plus, I met people with smaller rooms than I ever had who were super tidy. That was me.

Today, you’ll learn how to truly stay organized and why it’s so important from Marie Kondo, an organization consultant who has been on Ellen and written a book on the subject (The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up) that has sold millions of copies. All the following content is organized into a neat outline checklist you can reference at a glance. Enjoy!

• Why is always staying organized important?
  1. you can increase your productivity:
     1. You know where everything is
     2. When you get dressed and you have clothes organized into buckets – chinos, dress shirts, belts, etc. (link to teaching mens fashion youtube video), you can go: “I want that, that, and that” and you’re done.
     3. Ever had the urge to procrastinate before an exam by tidying up? Part of that is because you could do a lot more work if it was organized to begin wtih.
  2. Increases your focus/mind
  3. No one (even messy people) wishes to live in a messy place. They prefer somewhere organized if they could choose because it helps them know where things are.
• “I’m too old to learn/change”
  1. Many of her successful clients are in their 40s and 50s
  2. It’s about knowing the right system
  3. Very few of us are born natural tidyers
• Avoid “baby steps”
  1. Don’t listen  to the advice that says “just tidy one tiny thing a day, you don’t have to be perfect”
     1. It’s in every other  organization book and every magazine articles
• Say no to storage centers
  1. The author bought every type of storage you could think of (cabinets, drawers, etc.)
  2. Realized it didn’t fix anything. It just was a way to store and hide the things you don’t need.
• To begin proper tidying, you need to start with throwing/getting rid of stuff, not organizing/storing stuff
• Treat tidying like a holiday/special event. That means:
  1. Only do it occasionally (not every day or every week)
     1. What you do every day is simply using and replacing items
  2. Make it a fun event
  3. Don’t look at it as a chore
  4. Go big when you do it
• Don’t tidy up by location/rooms
  1. You end up doing the same things
  2. Tidy by category instead
  3. Took her three years to learn this
  4. Clothes for instance are organized in different places throughout different rooms
  5. Order to tidy:
     1. Clothes first always
     2. Books
     3. Documents
     4. The rest (electronics, cosmetics, etc.)
     5. Always memorabilia last
• Tidy EVERYTHING of one category when you do it. Commit
  1. Get ALL your clothes out and lay them out when you decide to tidy clothes
• Fold clothes rather than hang them
  1. You can fit up to 4 times more clothes in the same space
• Make folding clothing into something FUN
  1. All her clients have now loved the process of folding
     1. Many used to hate it
• How to fold clothes
  1. Goal: fold it into a rectangle.
  2. Start by folding in the sides
     1. For example, left and right sleeves
  3. Fold the short ends of the rectangle towards each other
     1. Fold in halves or thirds
  4. Size should be adjusted to fit the size of your drawer when standing on edge
  5. (a diagram or gif would be great here)
• How to decide what to keep and throw away
  1. Ask yourself “does this bring me joy?”
  2. The point of tidying/organizing is to be happy
  3. She argues everything we do in life is to be happier
  4. Therefore, ask yourself “does this bring me happiness?” If so keep it
  5. It’s fine to keep things that have deep meaning to you
  6. It’s not about throwing everything away. It’s about deciding what’s valuable to us
• NEVER tell or show your parents or relatives what you’re throwing out
  1. They have a tendency to hoard/stockpile needless things
  2. Story: one client was about to throw out a dozen bags of garbage when her mother came in and noticed the yoga mat that would be thrown out… then she noticed something else… she eventually took back tons of clothings and items… even though she hadn’t been to yoga in years
  3. They have a tough time because of the “memories” they want to have with their child
• How to organize clothes
  1. Organize by category (shoes, chinos, etc.)
  2. Organize with an upward rightward movement
     1. Heaviest stuff at bottom left of closet
     2. Lightest stuff at the top right
     3. Keep it organized by category in this way
     4. This progression works because it makes you feel lighter and better (upward movement)
  3. Never fold up socks or stockings (rolled up)
     1. Takes up a lot more room
     2. Stresses your socks unnecessarily
        • This is their only time to relax
     3. Fold them and stack them
• How to organize books
  1. Lay everything out on the floor (even if it’s organized already on a shelf)
     1. Because you miss books when they’re organized on a shelf. They’re hidden and you forget you have them
     2. Sometimes means never
        • If you aren’t going to read it now, throw it out
        • She had a client who had this heap of business books and said he would “one day read them”. He never did and it took up a lot of space
     3. If you’ve only read books partially, that’s all you will read of them. They didn’t suck you in enough to read the whole thing and you never will.
• How to organize documents/forms
  1. General rule: throw everything out
  2. If you have to keep stuff, only keep forms you need in the immediate future
  3. The hardest client she had were lawyers who kept everything. She ended up getting them to get rid of a lot of the forms. If they can do it so can you
• Boxes, cords, and manuals
  1. Boxes take up a ton of unnecessary space. Throw them out.
  2. Throw out manuals
  3. You can learn what you want online if you need instructions
  4. Almost always you have a duplicate of the same cord lying around
  5. Rule of thumb: if you can’t easily tell what the cord is for, throw it out. You probably won’t use it.
• How to throw out mementos
  1. Realize that no material possession is the only way of holding memories. Your mind can hold all memories
  2. Take out each picture from a frame and consider it one by one to  decide if it’s worth keeping
     1. Ask “does it bring me joy”?
• Count it out with math
  1. Many people stockpile a lot more stuff than they could ever use because they never count it out mathematically how long it’ll last
     1. She had clients with months and years worth of cotton swabs and toilet paper
     2. Don’t have so much. You can always go to the store for more
• You don’t have a “space” issue, you have more than you need
  1. It’s never a lack of space issue. It’s always a having more than you should need or want
  2. A good benchmark is to get to a third or quarter of what you originally have
• When in doubt, throw it out (even if it “wastes money”)
  1. It may seem like you’re wasting money by throwing things out but the peace of mind and freedom/clarity you’ll get is worth it
• Talk to your house and possessions
  1. Say hi when you arrive home
  2. Say thank you when you use your house or items
  3. It may seem weird but she says that in time, your house will tell you where it needs cleaning

Marie Kondo’s Resources

You can grab Marie Kondo’s book or her audiobook on Amazon (affiliate link).

If you’re not someone who enjoys reading, the author has released a high-rated video course on Udemy you can take as well. If you go through my affiliate link and purchase, I get a commission at no extra cost to you.

Conclusion and Book Review

Is tidying up as important as meditation or exercise? No, but it will improve your productivity, clarity of mind, and efficiency. I think the “does this bring me joy?” criteria can be a bit vague at times, and can lead to people to still stockpile useless stuff through faulty reasoning. That said, I have used the tactic effectively. I love the book, and believe it deserves its place in rankings. It hasn’t helped me rid my life of all junk, but it’s gotten me far.

Incorporating the teachings of this book with practices of minimalism or essentialism can boost your peace of mind, while making your house, rooms, and wardrobe look cooler. When there’s less stuff to keep track of, there’s less stuff to make your place look messy and ugly.

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