Out of Chaos an organizing newsletter

The Importance of Folding

I had a great weekend with family visiting, but it dawned on me as we were coming home from a long day at the Botanical Gardens and a late lunch on Arthur Avenue that I hadn’t come up with a topic for this week’s newsletter. Usually, I have at least drafted something by Sunday afternoon, so, I tossed it out to my crew. My 15-year-old son said, “You should write on folding.” Interesting.

“Well,” I said, “The really important thing about folding is that you are consistent, and that you have established what the best way to fold is for your particular space. Like the way I can fit more jeans in my drawer if I fold them into thirds rather than fourths. But every situation—and every drawer—is unique.”

“No, no,” said my husband, “The thing people need to know about folding, is that it’s a meditation. It’s a task you can do in absolute quiet, and it is actually very peaceful.”

“I don’t know,” said my daughter, “I hate it, it’s the hardest part.”

I told her I thought a lot of people would agree with her.

My husband continued, “It’s kind of like moving, you pack, you move, you think that is the hard part, but really the hard part is unpacking… but until you unpack, or fold, you haven’t really finished the task.”

So, embrace folding. I’m not going to micromanage how you fold, like some organizers. I’m just going to tell you that your drawers and shelves will look better if you are consistent. Putting the folded edges together is more visually pleasing, but sometimes in a drawer, like with men’s boxer shorts or linen napkins, you can actually fit more if you alternate where the folded edge goes. Maybe all of this seems petty. But if you embrace my husband’s idea that folding can be a meditation, and in that meditation you can try and fold each T-shirt to the exact same size, maybe you can ride that Zen feeling all the way through to carefully putting your neat, laundered piles into the drawers and shelves where they belong, thus completing the task. And if, by chance, you find that those neatly folded clothes don’t fit into your drawers, then it might be time to return to the foundational step of organization, letting stuff go. Because no matter how well you’ve folded, you can only fit so many sweaters on one shelf.

You may think folding isn’t something you need to worry about, that you’re not trying to be Marie Kondo. I hear you, neither am I, but folding is a basic building block of organizing, and if you give it a little thought, and pay attention while you are doing it, you will reap the rewards.