Organising, Reusing and Books

This past month I read 'The life changing magic of tidying up' by Marie Kondo, it must be popular as I have had it on order for ages at the library.  I thought I would give it a go even though I find it difficult to see magic in that subject.

I sat and read the whole book early one Saturday morning, not because I was so riveted but rather I was busy looking for the magic.  For me sadly there wasn't any but I did pick up a few tips which is always good.

The books goes through Marie's life from  early childhood and how she has always loved organising and tidying for all of her family. I have to say I am impressed that she has made such a huge success from something that she loves,  for it to have taken root in her childhood and she has built on that enjoyment with a business and a writing career.  If you watch any of her organising videos she is big on rolling clothes and items to maximise storage space, this is something I have taken on board as I was having issues with finding tights and t-shirts in my wardrobe because I kept them stacked on a hanging shelf unit. 

In this case it has made life easier if not exactly magic.

The good thing about the book is that Marie admits over the years  she has tried may methods of storage but the best thing to use is boxes, shoe boxes if you have them.  I loved that as so often we are told that if we want to get on top of things we just need to buy a certain object to solve all our problems.  When all you really need to do is utilise what you already have on hand.  So with that in mind I went my wardrobe pulled out all of my tops and tights and grabbed a few boxes.. A couple would not fit back on the shelf unit without a bit of a snip so I  cut them down and taped them back together.. Long sleeved t-shirts were rolled and put on one box, tights rolled and placed in two others and strappy tops in the last, and they al fit neatly back on the hanging shelf.

Bobbly tights!

If I need these items now I just slide the box out to get what I need and I can see clearly what is there, whereas when you stack items you have to hunt through the pile.  Marie does have some slightly odd ideas about thanking your clothes for their service as you put them away, I wont be doing that but it doesn't hurt to feel gratitude when so many have so little.

Overall there are some common sense ideas that we just fail to see or use sometimes and it is a nice little reminder that freeing the clutter does make your mind more peaceful, again all respect to Marie for finding her passion and calling but is it magic?   I really feel that we are always learning something and I did learn some new strategies here.

My next book 'Mindset Matters Most' I read over the last few days, I felt this promised a lot more than it delivered.  After reading the reviews for this book and some saying it was the best book they had ever read I felt excited when it arrived.

I love books on mind matters and positivity and while many present the same ideas  they are often in a new way with new little gems thrown in.  I thought this was going to be like that, it wasn't.  The first half of the book keeps repeating what it is not going to tell you to do, how it is not self hypnosis, thinking good things into being etc. Right near the end you are given the tips on what you should do each day to reach your potential and they are exactly that, visualising, writing a script, self talk  and so on, all the stuff the book claimed it wasn't.  The only disclaimer being that of course you need to take action, you can't just will success your way.  Not wanting to be negative though,  if this is the first book of this style that you are going to read then you will probably find lots of useful insights, it is just that I have read a few that are almost identical.