When you begin your tidying festival, it’s important to decide what you want to do about donating and recycling the items that no longer spark joy. I’ve seen it countless times with my clients – they get so bogged down deciding what is the right thing to do with items that don’t spark joy that they get side-tracked from sorting the things that DO spark joy!
I don’t want to be wasteful!
A top critique that Certified KonMari Consultants hear about the KonMari Method® is that Marie Kondo encourages us to be wasteful and throw away all our things so that we have room . . . to buy more things. This is so completely inaccurate! We’re not focusing on what we’re getting rid of, we’re focusing on what is bringing us joy. By orienting the process around the things you will keep, you are changing your own relationship with “stuff,” an extremely important part of the process. Moving forward, you won’t want to bring things into your home that don’t spark joy. The KonMari Method is not about creating space to “buy more stuff,” let’s just go ahead and get that notion out of our heads!Discarding feels wasteful. What about donating and recycling?
Just as the phrase “spark joy” is placeholder language for whatever it is that will fulfill your vision for your life, “discard” is the term we use for anything that is leaving your house. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s leaving in a trash can – there are LOTS of ways to discard things in a respectful way, both to the item as well as to the planet, through donating and recycling. Some of the questions I like to bring up when we discard things include:Is it yours to discard?
Before discarding an item, you must determine if it is yours to sort in the first place. A common challenge is to say “well, my things are not that disorganized – it’s really my partner/children/etc. who need to declutter.” It is not our place to make decisions for items that do not belong to us – it is up to the owner of that item to determine if it is time to discard that item. Just because the assortment of rocks and sticks on your child’s dresser seems like trash to you doesn’t mean they aren’t meaningful to your child. Allow others to have the opportunity to learn what sparks joy for them, and demonstrate how to make discarding decisions with your own items.
Could this spark joy for someone else?
Often, the items that no longer spark joy for us may still have life left in them – gently used clothing, furniture, books, etc. Consider donating these items to a nonprofit equipped to handle these donations. Some locations, such as local charity thrift stores, may be able to take many different kinds of items. Others, such as a local furniture bank or library, may only take specific items. If you are in the Atlanta area, I have compiled a list of organizations who accept donations of various kinds in our area.
A note of caution: it can be very tempting to say something along the lines of “I don’t want this any more, maybe my sister will want it.” This is a dangerous line of thinking! When faced with this scenario, Marie Kondo realized that “I was simply transferring my guilt at not being able to discard [items] onto [my sister].”[1] Only “gift” your discards when you know it’s something that person has been wanting!
Has this item reached the end of its life?
When an item has truly lived out its full potential, what is the most environmentally-conscious way to dispose of it? Proper disposal sparks a lot of joy for me personally, and I have an entire rack dedicated to sorting my discards in my garage! Certain drug stores can dispose of expired medications, UPS Stores can reuse packing materials, and my favorite local resource is the Center for Hard to Recycle Materials (CHaRM) – they are able to process so many different items to be reused, repurposed or recycled. For more recycling resources, both in Atlanta and nationwide, check out my list of resources. If you know of an awesome resource that is missing from my list, please contact me and let me know.
Interested in learning more about how I can help you declutter and discard items that no longer spark joy? Schedule a complimentary phone consultation today!
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[1] The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Marie Kondo, page 56 (emphasis mine).
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