Can you really ask all your possessions, do you spark joy? And have a life changing experience?
Read on and I'll tell you all about it.
helping people, worldwide, to sort their lives out.
I brought the book for myself 6 months ago because I wanted a peaceful home,
making myself and husband happy.
But I wasn't ready.
I needed the right time to take on the huge task.
I am naturally untidy and a hoarder.
My husband is super neat and ordered and hates matter out of place.
He's a lovely patient man, but I push the messiness too far and he cracks, occasionally.
I made it one of my January missions to read and put into action The Life Changing Magic of Tidying, to leave my studio, sort the loft, ridding myself of clothes I'll never wear again
and close the door on the craft cupboard.
It's been quite a feat and Marie is right, it has brought about a life changing and magical effect.
Marie Kondo's 'KondoMari' method of tidying is harsh. You look at every item, question 'do you spark joy?' then discard everything that doesn't make you happy. The book leads you through her philosophy and history of tidying. The idea that everything should spark joy is fascinating and all her storage ideas are ingenious.
After reading the book I felt ready for my endeavour and wanting change.
So I started with my studio, a massive mission which I've been putting off for ages.
For the last couple of years the only time I've been there is to pay the rent! What an idiot.
I've been busy full time mumming Gloria, she is amazing!
The studio is a small room in a central Brighton location, it's pretty tiny but quite cute.
I have had busy moments there, but mainly it's been a storage room.
I've accumulated a lot, tons of fabric I'd been saving (just in case), lots of leather, folders full of past projects, bags full of unfinished bags, a long rail of stuff, a big folder of my bag patterns, a heavy industrial sewing machine, shelves, trims, glitter and sequins all over the floor.
It was a total mess.
I just couldn't face it. It was easier to pay the rent than sort it out,
but that couldn't continue..
The process of going through each and every item and asking if it sparks joy has been very interesting, especially the failed projects (which I will talk about, one day, as there are quite a few and funny/sad/annoying/etc).
I have never been successful in my cazza.com project. If cazza was a real company, it would be bankrupt years ago, had it not been for some very generous benefactors.
I've owned the website since 2001 when I started making bags and it's never really worked.
I am proud of my creations, made by hand, mostly by me.
There are lots of cazza products out there, many gifts from me and I have a few fans, here are tara, Chloe and friends, keeping themselves cool at Burning Man 2013, I have a new product, cazza fans of the world, where I'd like fan owners to take their fans and on holiday and instagram a picture for me.
Yes I made cazza fans, I have some left...
I am proud of what I've made, they spark joy.
I went through everything in the studio.
Looked at every button, trim and fabric scrap etc.
I had 5 categories; bin, charity, school, sell, keep. I gave lots of full laundry bags to charity,
30 bags to the textile departments in two secondary schools in Brighton.
One teacher asked 'Would my students be able to make little iphone cases with your donation?'
I like the idea that they could go into production and sell them on etsy as a textile project.
I worked out what I want to keep,
neatly wrapped in plastic or stored in 5 x 84L really useful boxes.
I still have loads of really cool sequin fabric, a huge and heavy roll of Japanese vintage denim,
buttery leathers and some bits and bobs.
Then it was clothes. 'KondoMari' suggests you collect together all your clothes, every last one from everywhere in your home. You put them into categories, tops, dresses, capes etc and you ask each item 'do you spark joy, do you make me happy?'. So one Saturday, I got all the clothes out of my wardrobe and the loft as I like to rest my clothes up there (I may want to wear them in the future). I had so many bags of clothes in the loft, they were piled high. I did list everything in named bags, winter '13 resting, sparkle resting, pink, etc etc but there was too much.
I rarely wear any of it and I need more room in the loft.
I went through every bag and asked if it sparked joy.
It was amazingly and liberating. I have loads of crazy outfits and dresses and shoes and boots and capes and hats and fancy dress.
Dividing ones clothes is actually quite easy and starts off as good fun.
Clearly knowing one would never wear that again.
What the hell was going on here?
(Camp Bestival 08)
I can't image wearing this down to Chez Sam
( St Robert reference; future posts)
(Nic and Damian's 40th, Ibiza 11)
There are some great pieces; Nic brought this for my 40th birthday.
It looked amazing when I was 6 months pregnant, but doesn't really work now.
So I thanked that lovely Vivienne Westwood dress and put it in the sell pile.
Here are my sell bags.
I've given 16 bin bags to The Marlet's in Hove, they do brilliant work.
Keeping a third, neatly stored in my wardrobe
Check this amazing Marie idea.
More useful boxes and you can see the loft floor!
This Kondo Mari idea is genius!
It did take me 14 hours to work through my clothes and I did want to break my dry January.
I haven't KondoMari'ed books as I need them to become knowledgeable and inspired.
Books are beautiful.
The top of my wardrobe is untouched.
I still have the gigantic chore of sorting out my thousands of photo's across
two hard drives and 4 iphoto's, eek!
Just look at the craft cupboard!
Everything is now neatly stored. No more over flowing tapes and buttons and trims.
The floor used to be full, packed high with bags of stuff; fabric, half finished headbands, balloons, led wire lights, you get the picture, a total state.
Now, there's so many drawers, some are empty! My biggest praise was to impress my very neat and tidy friend, Kelley Ralph, yes the craft cupboard is quite a place.
And I am happy and Nic is very happy.
There is an issue with KondoMari's method, unless I missed it.
Marie doesn't suggest ways to recycle your clothes and things, she just says to bin everything. I'm proud that out of the colossal amount of stuff sorted through only 4 bin bags were thrown out in the rubbish. I tried to recycle everything, it was important to me.
Has the Marie Kondo book changed my life?
I feel streamlined and the heavy weight of baggage lifted, with a clear vision for the future.
Last week, I spent hours on my own in my studio, packing up the last bits. This allowed me to have a massive word with myself about my creative life and the new cazza.com, things became clear.
I am happy and I want to be happy.
That got me thinking, can you 'spark joy' in all areas of your life?
I am interested in mediation, visualisation, the power of positive thought and manifestation.
See post Monkey monkey, what do you see?
Can one really manifest a happy life?
What would make me happy? For me and my family to be healthy, happy and inspired.
To make enough money to have an amazing life.
I want cazza.com to be successful with beautiful photos and a cool design.
Documenting what I do to make me happy with a brilliant new camera.
The highly recommended Olympus pen e-pl7.
I love photography and have a degree it.
I want to fill cazza.com with wonderful pictures and videos, to make people happy and inspired and have an amazing life too.
I have said happy about 400 times in this post, I need to get better at writing.
Sell Selection
And what would make me really happy is to sell my 14 bags of cool clothes on ebay. The bags are making my neat loft look messy! All items area buy it now price with a make me an offer feature, photographed with my great new camera and make it a photography project. ( visualisation)
Share this post or a future post and get your friends to follow my cazzasellselection ebay shop and they could bag a great bargain. I want to make some money and if it goes crazy and I make loads of money, I will of course give some to charity, let's see what happens.
I have only been blogging since 1st Jan 2016.
I jumped in at the deep end, failed to prepare, like I always do.
I have started Sarah Awisombe's brilliant No Bull Blog School.
Sarah should write a book on blogging, it would be a international best seller!
This week's homework; to work out your niche in the big wide world of blogging.
So I've decided the new cazza.com, blue print is
'Investigating for you, manifesting a happy life.'
What do you think? Have I gone mad or am I on to something??
You'll have to wait and see or try it for yourself, what would make you happy?
I highly recommend reading Marie's Kondo's The Life Changing Magic of Tidying,
it won't take long and is written very simply with clear chapters and lots of great tips.
Embrace her method.
I am so happy I read it, it has inspired me beyond tidying,
it has opened up new doors to me.
Please share this post with your friends that might be interested in stuff I like
or vintage dresses and gorgeous designer shoes, that are too small for my fat feet.
It would make me happy.
Follow me on social media for updates or subscribe.
Have a great day.
Love love,
Cxxx
P.s you do know the underlined words link to cool source stuff, Cxx
And I wish I could add comments onto single posts but I don't know how.
I'm looking into Square Space this afternoon.