Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 530 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast! I hope this finds you feeling peaceful mentally, or at least knowing you can find mental peace and working towards that. One thing that plays a pivotal role in finding peace is my environment. As an interior Designer I am able to create feeling through space and one of my favorite feelings to create in a space is peace and calm. That’s one thing I feel like most of us can agree on, we all know a peaceful space when we see it. But knowing how to create that is a whole other thing. I know all of you listening have something you do really well, something that is innate, maybe you have found that, maybe you haven’t yet, but you do have something. For me that’s design and a passion for mindfulness. These two go hand in hand. Our environment shapes our mindset more than we realize, and a chaotic space can make finding peace so much harder.
I mean, have you ever sat in a space and thought man, I never want to leave, it feels so good in here? How about the opposite? A room where you can’t put your finger on it, but you can’t wait to leave it? If you have an eye for design, you can probably pinpoint some of the or maybe all of the problems. But if you don’t have a design eye, it can be so challenging because you know you don’t feel good in a space but you aren’t sure why. This episode is gonna fix that.
Being an Interior Designer with a passion not only for design but also for mindset, self care, and self improvement is what drives me to help people create an atmosphere not only in their head that is calming and feels good but also in their home. Even if you meditate daily and work on your equanimity all the time, having a space, whether it’s your office, your home, or even your car that calms you makes life so much more beautiful and enjoyable. In my opinion. It’s low hanging fruit for increasing our happiness. With my podcast, I always hope to help you bring yourself peace through mental calmness and clarity. But with my design, I really find it’s a lot of the same work, it’s just externally instead of internally. We need both really, By being aware of your thoughts and taking responsibility for every action you take you’re empowering yourself. That’s the goal of the podcast to help you find calmness and peace no matter what you’re going through. Your home shouldn’t add chaos to your life, but if you don’t have a design eye, Chaos in your home can be a bit challenging not only to identify but also to fix. So a space doesn’t feel good but you have no idea why, which makes it very difficult to fix.
I’ve worked with a client off and on for about 18 years, I met them when I did a design show in 2007 and since then I’ve had the privilege of designing not only their home base but also their vacation home, their barn and their offices. When I first met them in 2007 they had just finished and moved into a home that they designed and built themselves. During one of our first meetings I walked through their home and noticed design aspects that I didn’t love. The great room had too many clashing elements like a busy fireplace and poor lighting which made it feel chaotic. At the time they really loved it, and weren’t interested in changing the big stuff so it was my job to do the best with what we had and that’s what we did. Even after we added furniture and drapes it still felt off. It just didn’t feel comfortable or cozy. The things we added hadn’t really helped that. So it sat relatively unused for the next 15 years or so as we worked together on several of their other projects. Years later they were ready for an overhaul but wanted to start with the husband’s office. He told me “I want you to totally redo it, Im not worried about budget, let’s just do it right.” And boy did we ever. It turned out so gorgeous and calming and sophisticated that it became a catapult for a total overhaul to the rest of the house. The office was so welcoming that when he was out of town sometimes she would just hang out in there. Ultimately last year she called me and said, I kind of want the whole house to feel like his home office feels. I totally agreed but I said we are going to have to make some big changes to that great room, to which she agreed to all of it. When we were going over our plans with the husband, a lot of the budget was going into the great room, which he never liked and never went in there. He actually said it doesn’t matter what you do in there, I’m not ever gonna sit there, I just don’t like that room. Even though he’s great, he can be a bit intimidating, but all I heard was a challenge. His wife and I looked at each other and said game on. Fast forward to today, I was visiting them this week, it’s been a few months since we finished the overhaul and we were standing in THAT room and the wife noticed the pillows weren’t just right so as she was fixing them she looked at me smiled and said “I am constantly fixing these pillows because he sits in here ALL THE TIME. lol. Mission accomplished. We laughed in triumph but she said seriously though he loves it and we all use it all the time now. That was a good feeling.
The reason I tell you this story is like so many times with clients they have rooms they want to love but they don’t and they just don’t understand why.
That great room was chopped up and cut in half by a very colorful brick paver fireplace mantle with bookshelves on either side that were very full. The drapes were striped, and even though they were neutral they still felt chaotic now, and yes I have to take credit for them I installed them 15 years ago. But, Basically in a nutshell, we calmed the whole space down and took out a majority of the clutter. We fixed the lighting which was not good and Instead of having small tables scattered around, we have one huge 6’ square coffee table and the only thing on it is a large concrete bowl of live moss and then a small fern and a small succulent arrangement. Live plants bring life and energy to a room in beautiful ways.
Calm, welcoming spaces are my favorite. Every home should have at least one place where it feels calm, safe, and welcoming.
Our lives are chaotic at times, our homes shouldn’t be. So how does a chaotic home look you might wonder. Well I have a list of things that can be so easily fixed and I would be willing to bet you have at least one of these going on in your house right now. When I give you this list, understand that I know people have different tastes. That’s a beautiful thing. But everyone knows a calm space when they’re in it. A calm space can be created anywhere. You don’t necessarily have to change the architecture. It’s mostly about giving your brain a place where it doesn’t have to feel so charged. When we are out in the world…. We have to deal with traffic, crowds, flashing lights, computer screens, fluorescent lights, chaos. When we’re in our home we shouldn’t have to. In fact we don’t. It doesn’t take a lot to make a room calming.
First things first, One of the biggest areas that bring chaos to a space is lighting. Now while that matters mostly at night, it still matters. A lot. With warm incandescent bulbs harder to find these days, picking the right LED is they key. Picking the wrong bulb is an easy mistake to make. So here’s my suggestion to lessen the chaos in your space: One is to have all your lights in your home be the same color value so don’t mix cool bulbs with warm ones. This causes chaos. Two is to have all your bulbs be 2700 kelvin. You can find this metric on any light bulb box. Bonus if it’s dimmable. 2700 kelvin is a warm pleasing light. I’ll put that in the show notes. Number three, if at all possible don’t even turn your overhead lights on unless they have dimmers on them and you can set them to feel beautiful, otherwise place lamps with warm bulbs strategically in the rooms you spend the most time. You can get a lovely lamp from homegoods for $20. It’s worth it.
Secondly clear the clutter. Stacks of magazines and books, bills laying around, laundry piled up, those are just a few ways clutter shows up. Look around the room you spend the most time in as if you have never been in that room before or as if you were having a very important guest coming over. What clutter have you stopped seeing that is subtly bothering you but hasn’t hit the part of your brain that does anything about it? I have to do this regularly because we are avid readers so books pile up. Clear the clutter. Your brain will thank you.
And finally, have fresh flowers or greenery to breathe life into your room and when they die, discard them and buy them again. Literally it could be $5 per week or it could be free if you have greenery in your yard, I have often cut greenery from my yard and put it on my kitchen island. I feel like healthy, live plants or fresh flowers or fresh greenery make a space happy and welcoming and it tells everyone that life can thrive in this space. I always keep fresh flowers and greenery. I love eucalyptus. It’s inexpensive, lasts a while, smells fantastic. It reminds me of my grandma, she always kept fresh eucalyptus around, I appreciate that more today than I did when I was young.
Nothing says welcome like fresh flowers and greenery. Why do you think they do that in high end hotels? Because it feels amazing. You deserve that.
My challenge to you this week is to swap your bulbs for warm 2700 kelvin ones, clear the clutter from your space, and add fresh eucalyptus in a simple vase. It’s that simple. Share this with three people who’d love a calmer home, they’ll thank you later! I love you guys! I’ll talk to you in a few days.
