Frequently Asked Questions

The KonMari Method emphasizes starting with your vision. We believe beginning with your vision for your lifestyle and the way your home supports you to fulfill that vision, greatly reduces the likelihood or relapsing into clutter, and the need to tidy up over and over again.

In the KonMari Method your feelings are the criterion for determining what brings you joy or “sparks joy”. You may wonder about the effectiveness of such a simple criterion. However, only you truly know if an item brings you feelings of joy. In Marie’s words, you are to “pick up each object one at a time, and ask yourself quietly, “does this spark joy?” Be attentive to your body’s response. Everyone will recognize their own personal feeling of joy. Marie describes it as “a little thrill, as if the cells in your body are slowly rising.”

There are various ways to approach this task.

Think about your “ideal” day from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to bed. What are you doing in your day that brings you pleasure and joy? What things allow you to live your life with passion and purpose? Who is helping to make your day enjoyable? What activities are part of your day that would make it an ideal day?

If you’re a more visual person, you could make a story or Pinterest board, or a collage of the things, activities, places and people that bring you joy. Don’t hold back. Dream! What things really “spark joy”? It can even include colors or and scents.

If you love to sketch or paint, create a picture of things that make your day fulfilling.

Some people love to write. I had one client who wrote out her dream lifestyle as story. She described the feeling as she entered her home, and the experience guests would have in her home. She described colors and the atmosphere in each room.

You could also verbally tell a story about your dream lifestyle and record it. The voice memo on a mobile phone can facilitate this task.

Which ever way you approach this task, take some time to think about how you experience joy. Your ideal vision is a key part of the KonMari Method.

In most homes people don’t keep similar items in the same location. For example, you might have books in the bedroom, living room and in your home office. Items that fall into the same category are scattered around the home, making it difficult to know exactly how many of that item you actually have. Another example: electrical charging cords. You may have one in the bedroom in a drawer and another at a charging station. If the cord at the charging station is defective, you might go and purchase another one, forgetting that you already had one in the bedroom that you could have used. When you tidy a category of items and they are scattered all over, you end up repeating the process. Plus, when we tidy by category this provides an order and structure and we tend to stay focused and get less frustrated.

Practicing gratitude is one of the unique principles of the KonMari Method. While sorting and decluttering, we appreciate the ways that an item has been useful and served us. Research in the field of positive psychology, shows that practicing gratitude is associated with greater happiness, greater emotional and physical well-being and greater resilience. Grateful people are also more likely to be happy and successful. In a nutshell gratitude has the power to heal, energize and change our lives.

If you’ve committed to doing a tidying festival, the first step is to get in touch for the complimentary consultation. During this time, we discuss your vision, goals and challenges you face. After our chat, you’ll receive a questionnaire. Your responses help me to understand you and your unique situation and come up with a plan. You do not have to do any tidying up or discarding before we begin the first session. Some people may have read the book, “The Life-changing Magic of Tidying Up”, but it is not critical to read the book before we begin the first session.

The length of a tidying festival depends on the size of your home, the number of items you have, and the pace at which you sort. If you would like to progress more quickly through the tidying festival, you can do part or all of the homework that I assign after each session. Each client is different. Some prefer to sort and joy-check with me present to guide them. Others are comfortable doing part of the sorting on their own.

When we work together, I will have a list of places that accept donated items. Or if you prefer, you can sell items that you no longer need. There are websites where items can be uploaded for sale. Another option is to take items that are in good condition to local consignment stores.

Some people erroneously equate the KonMari Method with minimalism. The KonMari Method is not advocating that you discard things to adopt a minimalistic lifestyle. It might well be that a person desires this type of lifestyle, but the overall goal is not to get you to live a minimalistic lifestyle. The main criterion for keeping an item is “does it spark joy”? If it does, you will keep it.

Personal coaching sessions are typically an hour. They can be longer if we are using the MBTI Tool for coaching and personal development.

It is. The instrument’s reliability has been proven statistically and its validity established in numerous studies.

It is a concept developed by Swiss psychologist Carl Jung . He used it to describe patterns of normal behavior. The term personality type refers to the pattern of behavior that you tend to show. In the MBTI, your type is indicated by your preferences.

No. Each type has its strengths and areas of opportunity for growth and improvement. There are no good or bad types. We find all the types in work and in relationships.

Your MBTI results will suggest your type based on your responses to an assessment. Ultimately you are the final judge of your psychological type. However, type does not explain everything, as humans are complex beings. By learning about type and your type, you become aware of your biases and can avoid stereotyping people.