It’s safe to say I was late to jump onto the KonMari Method bandwagon! So if you’re clueless about this method (as I was), let me give you a brief intro. In short, this is the powerful decluttering/tidying method that Marie Kondo shares in her wildly popular book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. But what does this have to do with Bullet Journaling you may ask? I had the same thoughts. Until I realized how long it can take to ‘Marie Kondo’ your home! So what better way to make it happen than plan your strategy for the KonMari Method in the bullet journal.

It’s what this article is designed to help you do.

As well as a brief look at the KonMari Method itself, we’ll also explore how you can use your bullet journal as a tool to plan your decluttering strategy so it actually happens (and doesn’t get too confusing or stressful).

So let’s dive in…

What is the KonMari Method – a quick overview

The overall premise of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up is to tidy your home so you surround yourself by only things that bring you joy. The idea is that this will help you live a more joyful life. But achieving this is NOT easy! Most of us hoard stuff because we say it’s too nice to throw out, cost a lot of money, or it holds sentimental meaning.

As a result, we live surrounded by disorganized clutter. But Marie Kondo has a solution! She invites you to ‘purge’ your way through your belongings in a way you may never have considered before — by category, instead of by room.

It’s effective tidying where you make a decision about each item. You either:

Discard it – if it no longer brings you joy OR You decide where to store it – if it does bring you joy

When I first heard this I was very skeptical. I have similar items in almost every room of my home and the idea of pulling them all together seemed like more work than it was worth! I couldn’t imagine jumping from room to room. It felt over complicated and far too time-consuming.

However, you can’t deny the results and feedback from other KonMari fans, so I was willing to give it a go.

From the few categories I’ve completed so far, I have indeed found it to be much more efficient than going room by room. You can see a post where I tackled my office supplies using the KonMari Method, here.

However, I do have to say that I found the thanking part tricky! I could not get past thanking my items for the purpose they did serve or the joy they did bring at one point. So kudos to you if you enjoy that step, but it’s not for this lady!

How to use your bullet journal to Konmari Method your home

Since many of us in the Bullet Journal community are big fans of list making and organizing, I wanted to share a few ways people (including myself) capture the KonMari method list (or KonMari based) in the pages of their bujo! So check out the example pics and spreads coming up.

In addition, we also created a tidying template you can download and print off to use with your BuJo. You can even make it into a sticker if you print at 55%.

This KonMari inspired decluttering checklist lays out all the categories to declutter – there are five in total:

Clothes Books Papers Sentimental Misc (including everything from DVDs to valuables to kitchen stuff)

Each category is broken down into a series of subcategories (they’re all listed on the template) — so you can tackle small chunks of items at a time.

To grab your FREE checklist, share your details below.

Don’t have a bullet journal yet or don’t know what it is? Check out this page.

KonMari and BuJo — a perfect match?

With your checklist in hand, you can create all kinds of spreads to get organized. For example:

A master checklist – where you check off each category when its done

A scheduler – to plan days and timeslots where you’ll get busy tidying a category

A list of things you want to keep (and things that fill you with joy)

A reminder of all the new homes you decide

The choice is entirely yours 🙂

My own KonMari spread got messed up quickly, as I found I needed to add more categories and did in fact want to “cluster” by room – but please know I still go by category through the process. Thank goodness for washi tape and printer paper to save my mistakes!

I’ve found this entire process incredibly worthwhile — and I’m curious to know how you’ve been marrying up your BuJo with the KonMari Method.

If you’ve captured the list in your bullet journal, please share the link to your blog post / pin / Instagram pic in the comments below! I’d love to see what you got.

This blog post was originally published in May 2018 and has since been updated and republished.