Marie Kondo is a Japanese author specializing in tidying up. She even wrote her sociology thesis on the topic! Her website, KonMari.com, is a rich source of organization tips and tricks, so here are some KonMari hacks you need to try this week.

1. Declutter your books

Self-help book here, romance novels there, and a user guide in that drawer – we’re buried in books we don’t even notice. Marie Kondo recommends piling up all your books and sifting through them in search of those you can throw away right now. Sort the rest by genre and store each genre in a separate spot.

2. Store clothes vertically

The most common way of storing clothes is on top of each other. This means pulling everything out if you need what’s at the very bottom of the stack. So instead, store your clothes vertically, which will allow you to see what you’ve got and pull whatever you need out in an instant, without making a mess.

3. Keep items that spark joy

Keep only those things that spark joy in you. Over time, you’ll notice that you have all sorts of junk in your cupboards, closets, and drawers. We kind of get used to this clutter around us, but it eventually makes us cluttered in our heads. So find things that spark joy and keep them and then get rid of everything else.

4. Use plastic containers for small things

We’ve all got a drawer filled with batteries, pens, chargers, and other assorted items. So instead of rummaging through the drawer, put these things into see-through plastic containers, which will let you take them out one by one and examine if what you’re looking for is in this or that one.

5. Put everything in its place

When we’re in the same space for a long time, we tend to move things around. So instead of leaving random tidbits lying on your tables and chairs, find a place for everything around you and put it in its place.

6. Get your papers in order

Almost all of us have that stack of bills, invoices, and instruction manuals dating back 10 years. Yeah, you’ll never need them again so just start dealing with them and throw them out. If you combine what you learned using tips 1-5, you’ll be ready to tackle the piles of paper cluttering your space.

Also, a way you can easily organize your papers is:

• Papers that need your immediate attention.
• Papers for the short term.
• Papers you’ll always need.

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Tidying up clears the mind and opens up the living space. And thanks to Marie Kondo, we have a whole new approach to tidying up that can make our life so much more enjoyable.