In the book, Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up Marie Kondo tells us to envision our ideal lifestyle. To really understand why we want (need!) to tidy up. Understanding the why will help us power through when things get tough. And things will get tough. But then they will get so much better.
Some people, myself included, find it hard to see the why in the beginning. We know we want to tidy and we can come up with superficial reasons like “It would be nice for things to be well organized” but we can’t see deeper than that. Follow your heart and the answer will materialize at some point. This is what happened to me.
I was obsessed with tidying but at some point, I started asking myself “Why?”. Why was it so important to put every paperclip in its place, to donate every book I knew I would never reread, to ditch every cord that didn’t fit anything I owned (well that one seems obvious)? The answer came when I was going through sentimental items.
First, I was pained to notice that I had a lot of duplicate paper photos. A lot. Next, I was relieved to just toss some photos in the garbage. In fact, this felt really liberating.
And then, when I had nothing else left, except for one little box, I suddenly knew exactly why I had to tidy.
The box included documents, hospital bracelets, and a tiny hat. Earthly reminders of my firstborn baby. Born too early and lost. I avoided touching that box for months. I cried over it again and again. Finally, I braced myself and opened the box. I was prepared to cry the whole afternoon but there were no tears left. I chose a few items that I wanted to keep and let go of the rest.
It was like a heavy rain cloud had shifted. I felt at peace.
Tidying was a way to move forward. It would take years to find gratitude in all this. But everything in life comes with a silver lining. It may take a lot of time to see it but there it still is.
And perhaps all you truly want and need is that things are well organized. Tidying will help with that too but it may also change the way you live your life.