Roll Over, Marie Kondo: The Irritation Method

Daylight Savings time, combined with unseasonably warm weather, seems to have put many of us in a spring-cleaning mood.

I just talked to a friend, let’s call her Amy, who was inspired last weekend to deep clean her kitchen cabinet interiors. This meant removing pots, pans and food stuffs, vacuuming, and disinfecting everything (since there was evidence of pesky rodents). This last discovery also meant researching then executing on blocking all the places where furry friends could gain access. In other words – it turned in to a BIG project!

If you’re like me, you hesitate to even start spring cleaning, because – as Amy discovered – one thing leads to another and, very quickly, it’s July and you’re still stuck in the bathroom miscellany drawer.

So, I’m sharing my newest spring-cleaning hack – one that you can use any time of year and that is psychologically satisfying. It’s a variation on the Marie Kondo “KonMari” method. Instead of looking for items that bring you joy, you look for items that irritate you. I’m talking about the sorts of things that take root like weeds throughout your house, popping up to rankle you like oxalis in the flower bed.

Here’s a list of irritants I’ve recently discarded or recycled:

• A tiny decorative candy-cap mushroom bauble on a stick, inserted in the soil of a potted plant
• A candle with an overwhelming artificial aroma, purchased on impulse at Home Goods
• “Quality” fake flowers (also an impulse buy) from Ross Dress for Less
• A cache of gift-bouquet flower vases that had congregated under the utility sink
• A non-functioning egg timer
• A plastic squeegee with a broken handle
• A white portable fan faded to dull yellow
• A cylinder of tall fireplace matches containing 3 broken stragglers
• A head scratcher gadget
• A back scratcher
• Lone coasters whose set mates have gone missing
• A bedraggled bathrobe that’s been hanging on the back of a closet door for years
• Gifted tea from France in a flavor nobody likes, in a box that doesn’t fit anywhere
• Half a dozen doormats in various styles and states of disintegration
• A potted prayer plant hanging on by a prayer
• A pair of red, heart-shaped plastic sunglasses from Valentine’s Day 2023

I could go on and on, because there’s probably a dumpster’s worth of irritants in my home. But you get the idea. Give it a try. You can go room by room, drawer by drawer, or just attune yourself to any sensation of “Oh, s**t, that thing!” as you go about your business. It’s a low-stakes way to exercise your minimalist muscle and lighten your psychological load of too much stuff.

Happy springing into spring!

by Cynthia Cummins