What Marie Kondo does NOT say to the woman hanging onto too-small clothes

If it doesn't fit now, and it hasn't fit in quite a while…

Image: [Wedding] Dress (Mantua) with Train, anonymous, c. 1750 - c. 1760, Rijksmuseum. Used with permission.

So you guys! While everyone else was watching Game of Thrones, I finally caught up on Tidying Up with Marie Kondo. Thank you, everyone, for telling me to get to it already.

This however: One of Marie's students, Sehnita, kinda broke my heart when she said she didn't want to get rid of any of her too-small clothes. (Side note: this gal did not have a small amount of clothing. She had a MOUNTAIN, same as everyone else on the show.)

Sehnita tells Marie, through a translator, that she hasn't given up hope on reaching her goal weight, so she wants to hang onto them. The things that do fit, she doesn't like, but she wants to keep them, too, because "they're PRACTICAL."

The look on her face! Sehnita, you're killing me. Heartbreaking.

Marie is way nicer than me, so she does not say Just get some new clothes already! But that would be my Rx for the closet: Call a consigner, make a little cash, spend it on a few things that FIT YOU NOW and that you UNEQUIVOCALLY LIKE. It doesn't have to cost a lot.

Later Sehnita does get rid of a bunch of things. I was doing my own little puttering-and-decluttering project while "watching," so I may have missed the moment, but I hope that in addition to letting things go, she got some new stuff.

I hope what happened is that Sehnita decided that there was no earthly reason not to have things in her closet that she felt good about and felt good in.

If you are making do with practical things you don't like until you reach your "goal weight," please don't. That could be a minute. Meanwhile your self-respect and enjoyment in adornment are taking a ding every time you open the closet, get dressed, see yourself in a big window, do the laundry, etc. etc.

Ask yourself if you have ever met a woman who lost weight because there was something hanging in her closet that she wanted to wear. Because I have not. 

But I have met a lot of women who started taking better care of themselves and allowing themselves to eat meals and maybe getting more vegetables and going to the gym and losing weight and feeling great in their bodies and generally showing themselves a good time when they decided it was worth it to have something nice to wear.