When it comes to loving your home, sometimes you just need a new perspective.
Has the phrase “home sweet home” ever resonated with you? For many of us, our home does not feel “sweet”.
It can be a constant struggle to feel good about our home, especially if we feel our home isn’t big enough or nice enough when compared to everyone else’s. It’s that “keeping up with the Joneses” mentality that many of us impose on ourselves, sometimes without even realizing it.
I visit hundreds of clients each year and you would be amazed how many of them struggle with the way they feel about their home, how it looks and its contents. Many have a hard time speaking about these feelings.
One of my passions is helping homeowners break free of old ways of thinking, look ahead and create a home that reflects their personality — no matter what the size of home they have. And a home that shows your personality is one that is easier for you to love.
A cosy conversation area can be an inviting spot to chat or read.
One of my favourite sayings, and one I think we can all relate to, is: ”It’s not how big the house is. It’s how happy the home is.”
The size of your house doesn’t matter, it’s who’s inside that counts.
One mom’s story
I’d like to share with you a story about one of my clients, a young mother in a very small home.
She had three small children and everything in her home was secondhand and well-loved. While we were chatting about how I could help, she got very emotional, saying she was embarrassed about her home and everything in it.
All her friends had bigger houses and newer furniture and she felt she was being judged. It affected her deeply, shattering her confidence.
She felt so depressed about her home and didn’t like to have friends or family over because she felt her home wasn’t good enough.
The first thing I shared with her is it doesn’t matter how big or small your home is or all the beautiful furniture that you may have, if your home and family don’t have love, joy and health it doesn’t mean a thing.
That helped her to feel like a weight was being lifted from her shoulders and she could then start to look at her home and belongings with a new perspective.
We enjoyed a cup of tea and then toured her home room by room, looking at things in a new way.
Although not the mom’s home, this living room is an example of how refreshed a space can feel when you look at it with a new perspective and then rearrange.
We even moved furniture around, right then and there, and brought out special photos and accessories she had in her basement that she had forgotten about. She could already feel a difference in her home and in herself.
Here is an excellent example of a bedroom that we transformed in an hour.
Before & after: Giving focus to a child’s room and highlighting the wall decals makes it easier to love.
We injected her family’s personality into her home, surrounding them with things that they love — and already owned!
When we were done, she had the biggest smile on her face (making my day) and she gained a new perspective and more confidence along the way.
As I was leaving, she said she was going to invite a few moms for tea, something she had never done. It took surprisingly little time and effort for her to learn how to love her home, no matter its size.
It can take surprisingly little to turn your home into a place you love.
And that’s a valuable lesson for all of us.
Related
