Can you apply Marie Kondo's Konmari method to the people in your life?

I say YES! Find out how to declutter the friends who are not 'sparking joy' for you.

This is episode four of the Busy Mum. Balanced Life. podcast.

Hey, this is Mim Jenkinson and you're listening to the Busy Mum Balance Life Podcast.

Welcome back, and today I wanted to talk about a subject that's really close to my heart, and if you've been following along with my blog for a little while, or if you've been checking out Netflix recently, you will have all heard about Marie Kondo and the KonMari Method.

I'll hold my hands up and say I'm quite obsessed with that amazing woman. I just think she's awesome. She's so gorgeous, and I just love her outlook that you can simplify your life, and to be happier, and she uses the term "spark joy," which I'm sure you've heard, and probably seen in 1001 memes on the internet. But this term she uses to talk about the things that we own. She'll talk you through the process of going through your house in a very systematic way, and discarding and decluttering, and simplifying everything you have in your home so that everything has a place. Everything's really tidy, and you're living with only the things that you need, and not excess stuff.

The idea of that is that you only keep the things that spark joy to you, and life is awesome then, and so much easier. I am in the process of decluttering my house. We're nearly done. We don't actually have a great deal of excess stuff, but we struggle with storage, so it's something that we're doing at the moment. I completely feel the joy and the benefit of doing that. But I'm not talking about your stuff today. I wanna talk about your people, my people. So family, friends, colleagues, just those people who are in our lives at the moment, and taking some time to think about whether or not they should be in our lives any longer.

I wrote an article, which I will link in the description, but I wrote an article on this a little while ago. I was reading through it again recently, and someone had commented on it. It made me realize that this is a system that I need to go through probably quite frequently, and it's actually a very liberating thing. What I'm talking about is applying the KonMari Method to the people in your life. Although that probably sounds completely nutty and weird, bear with me, and I'll explain what I mean.

I think it's really healthy for us to have a think every now and again about whether the people in our life are really sparking joy for us. Are they helping our lives? Are they enhancing them? Are they the right people? What's their impact on us? You know when some people just are a bit of a drain, or whether they are a bit toxic, or if they bring your mood down.

We're at the point, I think, where we're all adults, and we're not on the playground anymore. We don't have to play nice with everyone. We do have to if they're our colleagues, clearly, and we do need to be civil with each other, but we don't have to be friends with everyone. And that is liberating. I think when you do leave kind of school, college, uni, or some workplaces, that's one of the biggest benefits isn't it? That you realize that we're all adults now, and we can pick and choose to a large extent who we stay friends with, who we hang out with, and who we give our time to.

It used to be the case that when people came and went from my life, whether I kind of ended relationships and friendships, or whether they did, I would still feel quite a lot of sadness and mourning, especially if a friend had walked away from me, and I felt very sad because they were no longer in my life. That's definitely a thing with this whole trend, I think, of ghosting at the moment, where people just disappear, and they don't give you any reason, do they, why they're leaving your life. They just no longer reply to your messages or calls or emails, and they ghost you. Whilst I'm not particularly suggesting ghosting people, I think that you can actually take some of the power back into your life by deciding who we do and who we don't want to keep in it.

I want to talk about how you might be able to look at your circle of family and friends, and kind of spend some time thinking about whether those people are sparking joy in your life, or whether you need to discard them. I don't think that some people are supposed to be in our lives forever. I think that not all relationships with friends, lovers, marriages, colleagues, they're not all supposed to be longterm. Some people are supposed to come into your life for a certain period to benefit you, or to have a great time enjoying that friendship, and then perhaps the friendship comes to an end because maybe you no longer have things in common, maybe you've changed, maybe you're going in different directions.

Whilst I think it's sad that you might not have the life together that you thought you were going to have, I still think you're able to think back and hold onto the memories that you do have, and really appreciate them, and still hopefully with joy think back to the times where you did have a really great friendship, and you both did find mutually beneficial joys in the relationship that you had with each other. But you can now put that friendship to one side potentially, and focus on other more joyful friendships that you have.

The great thing about decluttering the people in your life is that the less time that you give to the people who aren't worth it, for whatever reason, the more time you have for you to be able to devote to yourself, time for yourself, or to the people who are more beneficial and worthwhile to you. When I say beneficial, I don't mean that it's all about taking from others. I just mean those people who you really enjoy spending time with, who give a lot to you, who you want to give a lot to, who make you happy and joyful, and at ease. You can be yourself with them. So whether it's friends or family, I think you know those people. You know the ones who you look forward to spending time with. They're the ones who you want to create more time for.

So what I like to do is just have a think about the relationships I have, particularly with friends because it's a little bit trickier to discard family, right? But with friends, I'll have a think, and there's three questions that I ask myself, and three questions that you can ask yourself if you have someone in your mind that you're considering at the moment.

The first question is: Does this person spark joy in my life? So do you really enjoy spending time with them? When you think about them, do you get a bit of buzz when their name lights up on your phone? Are you excited to take their call, or see what they've got to say? Do you love spending time with them?

The second question is: What are you gaining from being friends with that person? Whilst it isn't all about taking, but you do need to get something positive from any relationship. So have a think about what you're actually gaining from the time and the investment that you put into being friends with that person, and is that worthwhile?

Then, finally, ask yourself, "Is this friendship still valuable to me?" So just because you have had a great relationship with someone in the past, perhaps now you're at a crossroads where you're going in a different direction, or they are, and you're just not aligned anymore. Maybe you've really changed as a person, and they're no longer part of the person and the life that you want to lead for yourself going forward. Maybe they've gone in a completely different direction, and they're no longer aligned with you, or not right for you.

I find that just asking myself these three questions means that I can really think properly about, do I need to keep investing my time and energy and effort into this relationship, or am I now in the position where I should be discarding it, to use Marie Kondo's terminology, and walk away? I think that that really doesn't detract from the memories that you've shared with each other, and the fun times that you've had, and how you have helped that person, and how they have maybe really helped you in the past. You can be really thankful of the memories, and the time that you've spent together in a really positive way.

This has just really helped me to walk away from relationships without feeling that real negative, whether it's guilt or hurt or heartache, or even anger sometimes. I can look back and think, well, this person isn't adding to my life in a really positive way now. In fact, it's the opposite of that. However, it doesn't take away from the fact that when I needed them three years ago, or 10 years ago, they were really there for me. I'm so thankful, and so appreciative of that. However, it's no longer worth my investment now. It's no longer worth theirs potentially either. But now I feel strong enough to say, "Thank you for the memories," and walk away from there.

I hope this makes sense to you because it's a big decision isn't it, to walk away from a relationship, one that you've invested in. I don't know whether it's a female trait, but it's certainly something that I have. I always have the feeling of, what if, when it comes to relationships. Should I walk away? Should I quit on this person because what if I need them in the future, or what if they really need me? Or what if it's the wrong decision?

So, does this resonate with you? Are there people in your life who are no longer serving you anymore? Are you no longer really gaining much from the friendship? Do you feel that they're dragging you down, or that they're a toxic influence in your life? I'd be really interested to know how you deal with that kind of situation and relationship. Have you decided to KonMari them? Have you actually decided to declutter and discard the friendship? Are you able now to look back on the relationship that you had with joy, and be thankful of the memories? How have things ended for you? Have you ghosted someone, or has somebody ghosted you?

Do let me know because I've been in a situation a couple of times where I've been ghosted, and to this day still don't really know why. But I've also ghosted people as well, and I know why, and I just haven't felt that it's gonna really benefit anyone by putting the cards on the table. So guess I sit on the fence a little bit about whether ghosting is a good thing to do or not. I think if I'm really pushed, it probably isn't. It probably is worth telling people why you no longer want to speak to them, or be in a relationship with them.

I'd be really interested to know what you're thoughts are though, so please do comment, and let me know. I will also link the article that I wrote on KonMari-ing friends. I hope that helps you as well, and maybe, I don't know, gives you some ideas, if you're reaching the end of a friendship, on how to be able to walk away from that in a positive way.

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