Spark Joy: An Illustrated Guide to the Japanese Art of Tidying

Once you have dealt properly with the current phase of your life, the next will come to you naturally.

To put your house in order is to put your life in order and prepare for the next step.

We can only transform our lives if we sincerely want to.

As a child, I used to enjoy pushing the little globules of oil floating in my ramen bowl into one big blob after all the noodles were gone. The sense of rightness that comes when like materials are stored in one place is similar to the satisfaction I felt when that oily ‘continent’ formed in the sea of ramen.

THE LIVING ROOM’S role is to provide a space for the family to gather and enjoy each other’s company. Always keep in mind that it’s the centre of family life.

He takes out all the implements and ingredients before he starts to reduce any unnecessary movement during the cooking

By intuiting and searching for those connections and storing like things near each other, the gradation will become more obvious. In that sense, storing your possessions is like weaving a beautiful rainbow in your home.

A simple design that puts you at ease, a high degree of functionality that makes life simpler, a sense of rightness, or the recognition that a possession is useful in our daily lives – these, too, indicate joy.

cloth carrying bag.

Don’t throw away things that bring you joy simply because you aren’t using them. You could end up taking all the joy out of your home. Instead, get creative and find ways to utilize those seemingly useless things.