As I’ve said before, your home is the perfect reflection of where you are at in life. Don’t believe me? Take a look around! Take a moment and look around your home? Without judging yourself, what are some adjectives you would use to describe the state of your home? Go ahead and write down these adjectives, they will be useful in a minute. See if you can write a list of five to seven adjectives.
Now, it’s okay if some feelings come up for you. If your feelings are negative, just know that the feelings are there to help you understand what is going on; they do not reflect the truth of who you are. The truth of who you are is never negative and that’s a fact.
As you looked around your home, you might have noted your home is clutter, unorganized, half finished, dusty, or in transition. Or maybe you noticed that your home seems serene, lively, orderly, a perfect reflection of you, or maybe beautiful but not really you. There is no good or bad way for it to be. It just is what it is right now and a perfect tool, just like your emotions, to tell you how to move forward in your life in a way that serves your highest good.
Now, take another look at your list and see if some of the adjectives are a reflection of where you are currently at in your life. If one of your adjectives was “in transition” do you notice that you also feel that way yourself? Do you see the words “un-loved,” “dumping ground,” “chaotic,” “dull,” or “overly stimulated?” None of these words are bad news. In fact, they are great news because they can help you objectively see what is happening and whether or not you are actually okay with what is going on.
Maybe you do come up with the word “in transition,” but you know that that is exactly where you are at and feeling good about the work you are doing to move through the transition. Or maybe you have the word “in-transition” but know that you have done nothing to move your life forward since losing your job or relationship six months ago. Then, this is a great opportunity to use your home to help you transition even if you are not exactly sure how to change the emotional state or specifics of your life. Your home really can be that tool to help you start making some positive shifts.
Maybe one of the words on your list was “dull.” Only you can know whether or not this is helping or hurting you and the way that you know is by the reaction or feeling you get when looking at the word. Perhaps to you dull is a relief after having lived too chaotically for too long. Maybe you instinctively feel that you need this subdued time in your life to restore some inner balance. But maybe you have battling depression for a long time and you instinctively know that a dull environment is only adding to the weight you feel in your life. It’s okay if you don’t have the vision or motivation right now to overhaul your life. But you can make some adjustments to ease the dullness in your home, which will absolutely have some positive ramifications on the way you feel.
As a final example, perhaps one of your words is something like “stifled.” You might have a beautiful, curated home and yet still the word you chose was “stifled.” Why do you think that might be? Your feelings don’t lie; they are always on point but sometimes we have to dig a little under the surface to understand them. So, what might stifled mean when living in such a beautiful home? Here is where you can get curious and ask yourself some questions like: “Does my home feel like a reflection of me?” or “Do I feel safe or welcome here?”
If your answers are no to these questions, you can be sure that this is also how you feel about your own life. Perhaps these “no” answers mean that you are not really living your life in a way that is a good fit for who you really are. This realization doesn’t mean that you have to overhaul your life in one fell swoop. You may not have the clarity for that at this moment and it may not even be practically possible. But, there is always something you can do to begin making positive shifts towards more enjoyment in your life. Changing your life for the better is always a process that slowly brings about more clarity. And changing your environment is a great way to move you along this process and experience some tangible and some times more immediate moments of satisfaction.
As you see the parallels between the state of your home and the state of your life, go ahead and write down more specifically what you notice taking place in your life. In a future post, I will show you how to take this awareness and turn it into some fun, concrete steps you can take to start moving your life forward for the better. Hang in there; your home and your life are always a beautiful work in progress.
Katie