Why I Just Purged 70% of My Closet
Who: A Marie Kondo & me closet showdown
What: Intentionally organizing, reconsidering and analyzing your belongings
When: Currently an ongoing process
Where: First my closet, then the world. JK, this is confined to my own belongings
WHY?!: Reducing my unnecessary possessions, creating a more organized way of life, establish a more intentional spending habit (quality > quantity), realigning my Feng shui.
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I’m sure you’ve heard of Marie Kondo and her new Netflix special, Tidying Up. She also has books about her lifestyle, too. If you have no idea who I’m talking about, I’ll catch you up. If you already know, skip ahead.
Marie Kondo Cliff Notes (this is highly simplified): She’s a Japanese consultant who has conquered and capitalized on her ability to organize her belongings. It’s a lifestyle and it’s called KonMari. She recommends evaluating your belongings and assessing each item’s worth by the amount of joy it brings you. Her process includes piling all of your s**t and taking a good hard look at all of the things you own. Then you decide what to purge, item by item, until you reach a satisfactory level of ownership.
Ever since I can remember, I have LOVED clothing. Being able to change the outfits for my dolls was the best part of having different dolls (and I had a lot). Once I was old enough to pick out my own clothes, it was all over. My first job was a retail job at Abercrombie. I’m a sucker for online window shopping. I look through almost every promotional email that features clothing. Sometimes I go to stores just to touch the textiles and materials. I have numerous clothing Pinterest boards. Hell, half of my blogs are solely about clothing I recently bought.
And I just decided to void the majority of my closet.
So how did I go from a clothing-hoarder to a ruthless purger overnight? Marie freaking Kondo. It wasn’t so much the fact that she transformed TLC-caliber hoarders lives. It was mainly about how our possessions can create real anxiety. Step one of her process revealed that. It includes the process of piling all of your clothing into a single pile. I think this is her sweet, passive way of saying, “Look how much s**t you have that you don’t need and have no where to store.”
So I did it. The pile of clothing that loomed over gave me a real pit.* I was faced with an unreasonable amount of clothing that I a) didn’t need and b) probably wasn’t even wearing. I thought about how many people need socks or coats or whatever and I had this ungodly amount of unnecessary fabrics. It was gross.
I began purging. If it didn’t spark joy, it was gone. I definitely didn’t do this with as much grace as Marie, but nonetheless it was essentially the same process. I put some of the things that I thought still had potential joy (just not for me) on Poshmark. I separated different piles: one for clothing that just needed to be recycled into a new life, one for shelters, one for clothing drives, and one for trash (just like old socks and underwear, chill).
The outcome was more than 100 items listed on my Poshmark and almost an equal amount for donation. Think about that. One-hundred items. I couldn’t let it get this bad again. I didn’t realize I had any anxiety about this until I realized how much I had. It was getting more and more difficult to store, to organize, to keep up with laundry and even to pick out an outfit.
From now on, my wardrobe (and many other facets of life) is going to be heavily considered. Here’s how I decided to tackle it:
The Foundation layer consists of things you “need” and/or things you always gravitate to. But here’s the twist: just because you gravitate to an item or need it, doesn’t mean you need it in excess. For example, I love denim. I could wear it everyday, all year round. Does this mean I need 17 pairs of denim? No. Don’t even try to justify it, just say no. So to apply my new lifestyle (thanks to Marie and that handy little graphic I made ^) I invest in a small number of high-quality denim (in various styles and colors) and be done. Don’t even look at denim again. Same thing with neutrals (like, how many beige sweaters do you really need? we all know there’s a favorite we wear anyway.)
The Accessory layer is where I (you) can individualize your Foundation later. Here is where you can add in your scarves, jewelry, hats, etc. It’s obviously named after its contents: accessories. Again, try to limit your quantity here, think about quality.
The Exception layer is where you just have to have some of those items that you may only wear once a year, but are so glad you have it ready to go. Here’s where I categorize winter coats, cocktail/event dresses, rain boots, etc. If we come back to the quality > quantity mentality, we can achieve a humble level of ownership. Have a few cocktail dresses (maybe one for each season) and stop there.
Now as someone who enjoys mixing up their wardrobe and typically evolves their style, how do we stick to this lifestyle? Be intentional. Despite how much I love trying new outfits/ trends, I always go back to my solid base of neutrals and street style ensembles. So when considering whether or not to buy an item, think about how many ways you can use it with your Foundation layer of items. Is it a unique printed neck scarf? Great, you can wear that with many different outfits and it takes up little space. Is it another grey sweater that has a slightly different hem? Maybe it’s not necessary because you’ve already established your favorite grey sweater and you don’t really need another.
If you’re hellbent on adding to your wardrobe, check to see if there’s anything you haven’t worn in a while and try to sell it as a secondhand item before getting something new. That way the item still has life and you may get a few bucks for it.
Financially, it may be hard to invest in a $120 pair of denim. Understandable. But let’s put it in perspective. How many times did you buy something because it was less than $20 and it was “cute” or trendy? If you don’t buy 6 of those $20 items (which probably aren’t going to last more than a couple months anyway i.e. most things I’ve gotten from Forever 21 for under $20), you can now buy one really great pair of jeans that will last years.
It’s not an overnight accomplishment. The mentality is quick to adopt, but the process is grueling. Look at me, I’m surrounded by 6 different piles of clothes I need to get rid of and am wanting to restock my closet with more expensive items. I’m a lunatic. It’s not easy. You can purge your closet in phases to help with the transition. So you don’t feel like you have 5 items and no money to buy new ones. Research your purchases. Really decide on what you want to add to your wardrobe and why. Is it worth it? Will I want it in 6 months, a year? Will it last?
I’ll report back with my wardrobe updates and lifestyle changes. I’ll outline what I think the benefits are. In the meantime, wish me luck.
*Pit means you have an uneasy feeling. See: The Morning Toast