This year couldn’t have started better with the release of Netflix’ “Tidying Up With Marie Kondo”. Have you watched or started watching the show yet?
If yes, how did you like it? Did it inspire you to start tidying? If not, SPOILER ALERT – as I will be talking about my takeaways of the show & clear up some confusion in the following post.
Intro To The Method
I think that overall the show did a fantastic job of introducing the KonMari Method™️ and philosophy to a worldwide audience. Of course, the show doesn’t provide a guide for how to “konmari” your home – it’s a highly edited TV production after all. But it does a great job of getting across key aspects.
It Takes Time
Viewers got a sense of how long a KonMari tidying festival can actually take due to the frequent display of a day counter symbol on the top right corner of the screen. I really liked that this was included as it shows that tidying can take time.
Keep in mind though that real-life tidying can stretch over many more weeks or months even if you have other commitments (eg. work during the week) and are unable to do a tidying marathon. The show participants were on a TV production schedule. So they were “forced” to tidy up in a certain amount of time and I’m assuming that some probably took some time off work to finish timely.
Category (Order)
Not all of the categories were equally represented in the show (e.g., you didn’t see people work on their books or papers if I recall correctly). I would have wished that categories would have been represented more equally. But again, it’s a TV show and you can’t show everything that has been going on over weeks or months in 45 minutes. Be assured though that the families on the show followed the correct category order. They had Marie Kondo and two KonMari Certified Consultants behind the scenes guiding and helping them every step along the way.
Diversity
I really loved that the series showed such great diversity regarding the casted families and their situation. Kudos to the production team! The variety of life circumstances and people was a great plus to the show.
Life Changes
There were many occasions where the viewer could see and hear the people talk about how going through the KonMari process changed a thing or two in their life. It was quite profound to watch and just reinforces that tidying up can indeed be life-changing magic!
Behind-The-Scenes
What wasn’t shown on the show was that two KonMari Certified Consultants were supporting the people on the show tidy in-between Marie’s visits. Now you might have gotten the impression that the bulk of the tidying work was done by the families alone. The truth is that they were supported and guided along the way by two of my colleagues (listen to an interview with them HERE).
Waste
I’ve heard people mention that in the show it comes across as if things are being treated mindlessly. This couldn’t be further from the truth. I think those critics might have misunderstood something – possibly because discarded items were put into trash bags.
First of all, the method places great importance on treating all things with respect and showing gratitude towards them. It’s encouraged that people thank their items before they pass them on.
Also, usually nothing that can be donated or sold goes into the landfill. Rather it is being donated. I always encourage my clients to do that and I’m certain fellow consultants do this as well. In one episode (with the widow), they actually showed how the woman brought clothes to a donation store.
Do you have any other questions regarding the show or things that are unclear? Let me know in the comments below!
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