the stars are not enough

I’ll lay odds that a fair number of the people who decided to mock and pillory her “you can only have 30 books” idea (myself included) had no idea who she was, what nationality she was, or even what she looked like. Her name isn’t particularly obviously Asian, and it’s not like the various articles of comment specified her ethnicity in the headline, which let’s be honest, is all any of us read before w started crafting our comedy.

All I knew was there was another tidiness guru trying to tell us to simplify.

And Henry David Thoreau notwithstanding, the whole modern minimalist movement is aimed at the wealthy.  They’re the ones who make claims like “You don’t need to have all these plates, just keep a few, and if you’re having a big party, buy more”.  It all centers on the idea of you’re rich enough not to have to hang on to all this stuff till you need it, you can just buy more.  

Well,no, sorry, that ain’t the case.  And so us poor and middle class people hang on to that half a bottle of antibiotics we didn’t finish, cause they cost money, and maybe the next time we get sick we can take those and save the cost of going to the doctor.

And we keep all those books and DVDs because, again, they cost money, and maybe we won’t watch that movie again for a couple years, but we don’t have the money (or the interest to spend the money we have) to throw it out and buy it again when we want to have it, just so we can have room on our shelves for one more Longaberger basket filled with potpourri.

So put your faux offense away, stop trying to get us to apologize for things that weren’t even under consideration, and let us have our rage about one more person who telling us to get rid of our stuff.

First of all, she never said “you can only have 30 books.” She said that if having BOOKSHELVES UPON BOOKSHELVES of books sparks joy, leave it be. HER PERSONAL bookshelf has 30 books.

Secondly, Marie Kondo’s advice has NEVER been about getting rid of plates and dvds for the sake of having less. Plates have use. They spark joy by being there when you need them. A DVD or a book sparks joy for a poor person because it’s there, and you don’t have to spend any more money than you already did for a little R&R. Antibiotics, under her philosphy, would spark joy for you the same way as plates: by being there when you need them (even though your stance on antibiotics is medically unsafe and dangerous for both you and those you meet AT BEST).

You obviously don’t know shit about Marie Kondo because if you did, you would know that she literally isn’t anything you described. Her method is tailored to the person she’s helping. If you can find any reason an object is useful to you, including “it makes me feel secure to know its there” or “i cant afford another one so i need this one” you keep it. The fact that you hate her so much is a product of you buying into the media shitstorm that has surrounded her and distorted her message.

Kondo isn’t trying to tell poor people to eat off of one fucking plate and own one plant and thats it. She’s helping hoarders and people who feel guilty about getting rid of things. She’s helping people get rid of gifts they never used, shirts they never wore, and above all she is helping people who WANT to declutter. For fuck’s sake, she’s not holding a gun to your head and telling you to keep a single spaghetti noodle in your pantry.

All you’re “raging” at is a woman who genuinely wants people to feel less overwhelmed in their life and to develop healthy levels of attachment and inattachment. If you don’t feel overwhelmed or want to declutter, she’s not asking you to. The media is twisting her words so heavily as an act of racism, and decrying her cultural reasons behind her philsophy as “asian woo woo”. By mindlessly buying into her recharacterization as a stupid western minimalist, you’re buying into everything else as well.

Marie Kondo is straight up not a minimalist. She doesn’t focus on getting rid of stuff. She doesn’t focus on having particular numbers of books or plates. 

She has a background as a Shinto shrine maiden, and her approach to objects is heavily informed by the animism of that background. She believes that any object you own should be cared for and respected. It should have a use, even if that use is just making you happy, and in return YOU treat it with care by having a place for it. 

That’s it. She NEVER tells anyone how much or little they should keep, and she NEVER shames anyone for keeping a lot. She helps people look at the mountains of clutter and gives them the tools to make choices on whether or not those things are useful.

There’s one episode of her show with a husband who collects sneakers. Has collected sneakers since he was a little kid. He has literally HUNDREDS of pairs of them, some of them literally falling apart in their boxes and never worn. In the end, I think that guy still kept about 80 pairs. Got rid of a lot, yes, but 80 pairs. And Marie was happy for him, because he sat down and decided which ones he really wanted to keep and care for. 

One episode is about a couple who’s kids are all in college. The husband has thousands of baseball cards. He collected them with their kids. They are on old, yellowing boxes, stacked to the ceiling in a side room. In the end? I think he kept ALL of them, but he got some nicer boxes for them to keep them from being damaged and found a better way to display them. They all sparked joy for him, so he found a way to care for them better. And Marie told him that she was happy and proud of him for that. 

It’s not about what you get rid of. It’s about what objects you want in your life and treating them as such. 

“I painted somebody’s mom”

“Took a while and not perfect, but i painted the guy who painted the other guy’s mom”

“I painted the girl who painted the guy who painted the other guy’s mom who painted an egret”

“I painted the guy who painted the girl who painted the guy who painted the mom who painted a bird”

“When it sinks in that I stayed up most of the night to paint a meme for internet points…”

Bit wonky, but I painted the woman who painted the guy who painted the lady who painted the swan.

Bit shitty, but I painted the woman who painted the woman who painted the guy who painted the lady who painted the swan

I painted u/Shitty_WaterColour who painted the woman who painted the woman who painted the guy who painted the lady who painted the swan

I painted u/color_on_a_page who painted u/Shitty_WaterColour who painted the woman who painted the woman who painted the guy who painted someone’s mom who painted a swan

Oh well, here’s yet another layer

Another branch, starting from the girl with the white background:

Took an hour or so but I painted the girl who painted the guy who painted the other guys mom

I didn’t like how reddit treated the iPad guy so I painted the guy that painted the girl that who painted the guy who painted the other guys mom on my iPad.

Continue from OP’s branch:

I haven’t painted in two years and I’m glad for the inspiration!!

A painting of the guy who hasn’t painted in years painting the guy who painted the girl who painted the guy who painted the girl who painted the other girl who painted the guy who painted the other guys mom

Same ‘level’ as the one above:

Usually lurking but not today…plaid was a great challenge!

Continue! With a cat!

We painted the guy that painted the other guy who hadn’t painted in 2 years who painted the other guy who painted the girl that painted the guy who painted the girl that painted the guy that painted some guy’s mother who painted a swan whilst making them all an NPC in the process

Honorary mentioned:

Cheep cheep cheep cheep cheep!!!

And finally, The Great Family Tree (some branch is not in the picture, pls click the link below for the full list:

This seems necessary…

https://nubleh.github.io/i_painted/

Herbal Hands

Amanda Herzman on Tumblr