22 January 2016

The Zen of Tidy, a book review

I just finished my second read of this much-touted “life-changing” organizational book.
I still can’t quite get on board with her over-anthropomorphism (your clothes “feel better” if you fold them the “right” way? Um, okay. *backs away slowly*)
BUT, overall I like her almost-minimalist approach to purging clutter and I think she has a lot of good points and an overall method that could really work for some people.
I’m probably going to break one of her very first rules by adopting *some* of her methods into my own approach. (I get why she says not to modify: It’s like giving someone a recipe and they come back and say hey that cake totally sucked and then they admit they substituted soy for milk and only used half the baking soda. Well, yeah, that’s not the cake I recommended to you! But, hey, I’m a rebel. If my application of her philosophy doesn’t have the promised “magic” end, I won’t hold her responsible.) ;)
Overall, I’d recommend this book above most “organizing” books/articles I’ve read. Even if - like me - you can’t embrace her entire “art of tidying up”, it’s a quick read (which, honestly could have been an even shorter read if she’d had a better editor: There was a lot of repetition. But I suppose that was intentional.) and I think most people can take away something of value.
3.5 of 5 stars

Zen