Week 9 – Lights, Camera, Action!

Someone told me last week that your house is a reflection of how you see yourself.  This person was commenting how a friend of hers has painted the same room several times as if she is still in search of herself. I’ve been thinking about this statement quite a bit, evaluating it in my mind for truth and wondering how it applies to me and my house.  Is my house a picture of the inside of me?  I would say after some reflection, that it is true for me.  My environment is very important to me.  I was the one who had to turn off the fluorescent lights in the office and use a desk lamp.  When I worked in cubicle city I convinced my entire row of inside salespeople to do the same.  I realized that I included what my bedroom would look like in my DMP!  Here is what I said:   I am peaceful and content when I wake up in my bedroom decorated in soothing colors of white and green.

I have moved SO MANY times in my life that my furniture looks nothing like it did even two years ago.  I’ve had many items given to me from family members, and picked up the rest from thrift shops.  Rarely do I buy something new and hardly ever at full retail.

So finally we come to the point of this blog — the lamps in my bedroom next to my bed.  They have not matched in years.  The one I have been using next to the side I sleep on is too short for the bed.  Up until now, I had not given the matter much thought.  However, since my friend’s comment and my agreement with it, I realized how much better it would look with matching lamps that I had chosen instead of just using what someone had given me.  We had 11 over yesterday for Thanksgiving and as I cleaned the house earlier this week I realized how much I do enjoy my home and how I have created harmony inside as far as the furnishings.  Except, of course, now, for those mismatched lamps!

Part of the blueprint builder are the words “self-confidence”.  As a result of MKMMA, I have been feeling quite a bit more self-confident lately about a lot of things.  I decided to do something about those lamps.  So the hunt began a couple of days ago.  Thrift shops turned up nothing… most do not have shades anyway.  Good old Target’s lamps were still too pricey.  Then, as I walked towards the restroom at Steinmart today, two lamps caught my eye in the clearance clutter stashed in the hallway by the door.  BINGO!  Perfect color and perfect price!  $20.00 each.  No, they are not green per my DMP but they are the right ones.

Is my identity tied up in stuff?  Yes and no.  I do think that I am better than I was in the past at letting things go that I no longer need.   I think that ideally buying things to create a beautiful environment that is calming to you is better than buying things to fill a need that should be met by  other things, such as relationships, etc. I find that I am more content with myself and with life and more grateful in general.  The mental diet is still not perfect but it is better and I think that is contributing to my contentment.

As far as my recording, I am procrastinating again. I was able to do my new service chore, organizing my office, the same day I wrote it on the card.  I was surprised at the energy I had the night I did it since it was after 10:00pm.  Maybe the same surge of energy will come tonight… or the next.  But at least the lamps match…:)