Your Home Is Your Safe Space
My house growing up was tucked in on a dead end road. It was by no means a mansion. It was not filled with expensive furniture and all the latest and greatest things. It was something far more important than that. It was our safe place to land. My mom paid very close detail to creating that for us. This is something that I have worked hard to make a reality for our family.
Woven into my brain early on in life was the mindset that if your life is feeling chaotic and you come home to a chaotic home, nothing will change. If your life is messy and you continue to live in a messy environment, you’re likely to stay stuck in that for a longer period of time. Your home is something that you can have control over. Your home is something that you can make your safe spot and you can do it on whatever budget you have.
It has taken me a few years and many moves to finally make our house a home. When we moved into our first apartment together, the memory of me sitting on the floor surrounded by a room filled with boxes is one that will never go away. I can still fill the anxiety building in my stomach as I tried to map out where everything could go, with having next to no extra storage available in a little two bedroom apartment. My mom can clearly describe the look on my face and tears in my eyes as she opened the door when she came to help.
That was a time in my life where I was in survival mode. I was in the middle of a health crisis, lost and confused and she knew I needed a safe place and I needed it ASAP. We worked together on the large puzzle of finding a place for everything. I had piles and boxes of things I would eventually come back to sort and organize. Some boxes were disbursed to other houses that had extra storage. But we made it livable.
After two years in the apartment plus adding our son, we moved to a bigger space. After two years there and adding our daughter, we moved in with Zach’s mom as we began our transition to a new state. Our things continued to get shoved in boxes and moved around. And with our littles, we had a lot more to manage. After moving that many times, we realized we were moving things that we never even used or came back to. We had so many unneeded things, plus boxes that had been tucked away for years at other houses. Before moving to a new state, we purged a lot, including the majority of our furniture. We were ready for a fresh start. Yet, when it came time to move, we still crammed a uhaul and three cars with things that were just taking up space.
Here is what we have been doing over the last (almost) two years that has made a massive impact:
Getting rid of unneeded things. We have already moved once due to a less than desirable situation. But the silver lining of our first place was that we had way too much stuff for the size of our house. It forced us to purge even more. We would spend weekends picking a few totes at a time to sort through. We had to be ruthless as we determined what we truly needed. This would happen on random weekends where we would actually get some time at home. It happened while we had two toddlers running around and going through everything they found on the ground. It was chaotic and a little overwhelming but we slowly made progress. (my point is that you don’t need the “perfect setting” to start the process, you simply just need to start)
We only purchased what we needed. Our house was pretty empty for a majority of that first year. We didn’t just buy anything to fill our house with what we could find or what people were offering to give us. We carefully chose what would be necessary for the space. That year felt chaotic because we were managing so much and were in a wild season of parenthood (while I was growing our third little), that I mentally couldn’t decide what our house needed. I was on a mission to declutter and not much was coming in.
Everything has a place. Now that we are in a new space, we were grateful to find a house that gives us a little breathing room. We’ve been able to find a space for everything and organize it in a way that is more manageable. This also came with a lot more decluttering. We are almost to a point where I feel like we have gotten rid of everything that is just taking up space.
With our space being more manageable and organized, we have spent so much more time making this house a home. This is the first house we have decorated and made it our own. Every room is strategically designed in a way that meets our needs. With less clutter, we are getting to a place where it is easier to keep things picked up. Our home feels nice to come home to. We love spending time here with each other. We can unwind and recharge. This is now our safe place. We take a lot of pride in working on projects around here making even more improvements. It’s actually fun now.
There are many things that come with having a Conscious Home. But I will say, the most important place to start is to declutter. If you take a page from the Nonnie Playbook (my mom) it is to make your home a “catalog house”. This doesn’t mean your house needs to be filled with expensive things, it means your house has what we call, factory settings. When your house is cleaned, organized, and put together, it looks like a house in a catalog. Things have their place, you don’t see a pile of messes thrown in a corner. You don’t have rooms with things piling up with zero purpose. You take pride in your most important space, your home.
Stick around this blog and we will start taking baby steps together over time. Like everything with The Conscious Living Approach, it is all about baby steps. You need to ease into things one at a time, slowly, in order to truly pave a more positive path and create productive habits.
If your home is something that feels overwhelming and a lot of this feels familiar, find your breath. Start slow. Start by taking 15 minutes to go through that junk drawer we all have. Next you can upgrade to the closet we all shove things into. Take a small area at a time to catch momentum. Your basement, garage or storage space can be tackled one box at a time. Go at a pace that works for you. Recognize how you begin feeling as you thin out the chaos that comes with unneeded things. Allow yourself to be ruthless, if needed. I have done a lot of work to detach myself from “things”. All of the clutter in our space was a silent pile of bricks piling up on my chest.
You may start to become more conscious about the things that come into your home, which is a good sign. Don’t panic, just bring awareness to that. We will spend plenty of time walking through all of the things together. Overtime, your home will become that safe place to land and your journey to living your healthiest and happiest life will feel much more doable.
Happy decluttering =)
