Speaking Volumes | Keep calm and get organized

Have you ever gazed at pictures of those meticulously organized closets and wondered if they're actually attainable? (You know the ones with matching hangers with a uniform gap between them as if it was measured.) Are you concerned that your kitchen counters look like a display table at a flea market? Does the area around your bathroom sink look like someone walked through the cosmetics aisle with a leaf blower? If so, there are several titles at the library that may help you tidy up and organize.

Marie Kondo's best-selling "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: the Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing," is not your typical approach to organizing. While many professional organizers lead you down the color-coded storage containers and label maker path, Kondo urges you to evaluate which items actually bring you joy. Only when you have discarded all the excess, should you move on to the topic of storage.

Joy is the keyword. Closet doors straining at the hinges? Kondo advises putting all clothing in the center of the room and discarding any item that does not "spark joy," Initially, I was concerned that I would be left with nothing but an old bowling shirt and my Halloween fairy wings, but I actually eliminated nearly 1/3 of the clothing I own. And I don't miss a thing.

Kondo stresses the importance of living in harmony with our belongings and appreciating the service they provide. This title is also available as an audiobook using the database, Hoopla, available on the library website.

The library now has Kondo's second book, appropriately titled "Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the Art of Organizing and Tidying Up." A companion to her first book, it features room-by-room tips for filling your home with joy. This book actually made me change the way I fold T-shirts and sweaters and freed up an entire dresser drawer in the process.

If you prefer eBooks, check out Meryl Starr's "The Home Organizing Workbook: Clearing Your Clutter, Step by Step," available on the library's OverDrive database. Each chapter tackles a different room in the house, and each begins with a questionnaire that will help you identify the roadblocks to your organizing success. For example, do you keep things because you might need them later; then find you rarely look at them again? This book will help you break that cycle.

Other eBook choices are "5 Days to a Clutter-Free House" by Sandra Felton and "The Get Organized Answer Book" by Jamie Novak.

For more information about this, or any other subject, contact your local library.

Also, check out the library's new literary and art journal, 805, at www.805lit.org. Submissions of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and art accepted year-round and worldwide.

Speaking Volumes, written by Manatee County Public Library System staff members, is published each Sunday. You may also access the library via mymanatee.org/library. Mary Lysaght is the assistant supervisor at the Rocky Bluff Library in Ellenton.

This story was originally published March 25, 2016 at 5:47 PM with the headline "Speaking Volumes | Keep calm and get organized ."