Lighten Up by Agnes R. Howard

View

Lighten Up

Agnes R. Howard Says, Marie Kondo Does Not Spark My Joy

Japanese de-cluttering expert Marie Kondo, avatar of the neatly packed suitcase and the well-folded shirt, refreshes Americans’ resolutions for a better life with her Netflix series, Tidying Up with Marie Kondo. In the show, the heroine knocks on doors of personages drowning in stuff and helps them to banish it. By mid-January, thrift shops were reporting themselves drowned in donations inspired by Kondo’s clean-outs. Yet despite her whimsy and cheer, Kondo has never appealed to me. I am not immune to the charms of the organized life, but living fruitfully with a loose hand on worldly goods calls for a different sort of approach.

To be fair, in the show Kondo is respectful of the neatness-needy persons she assists. She doesn’t just fling everything in the trash. She recognizes the complex status of possessions as carriers of emotion and memory. And she is right that some things deserve to be cherished, mostly because of the associations they carry with beloved people or pivotal experiences.

THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:


Agnes R. Howard is adjunct assistant professor of humanities in Christ College, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, Indiana, and author of Showing: What Pregnancy Tells Us about Being Human (Eerdmans, 2020).

subscription options

Order
Print/Online
Subscription

Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!

Order
Online Only
Subscription

Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!

bulk subscriptions

Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.

Transactions will be processed on a secure server.


more on culture from the online archives

33.4—July/August 2020

No Option

Clear Out the Rubble & Rebuild! by Anthony Esolen

23.2—March/April 2010

Job’s Progress

on Maturity for a Rising Generation by Peter J. Leithart

34.1—January/February 2021

Jeremiah Revisited

Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents by Rod Dreher by Hans Boersma


more from the online archives

18.4—May 2005

Of Weeds & Fairy Tales

The Idylls, Idols & Devils That Corrupt the Moral Imagination by Vigen Guroian

32.4—July/August 2019

Pastor Prime

on a Steady Presence in an Unsteady World by Preston Jones

30.3—May/June 2017

Known Trespassing

on the Misuse of Property Rights to Justify Slavery & Abortion by Robert Hart

calling all readers

Please Donate

"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand

"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor

Support Touchstone

00