We spend a lot of time in our homes. And that’s a problem, especially if we don’t like them. We can get to the stage where we loathe being in them and wish that we could be anywhere else. It becomes almost pathological.
Many times, we don’t know what we can do to improve the situation. We can’t see a way forward because we can’t identify the problem easily. We just have a gut feeling that something is wrong, but we can’t quite put our fingers on what exactly.
The good news is that there are a bunch of quick interior fixes that you can use to solve the problems in your home and feel normal again. The purpose of this post is to prove that you don’t have to go through the hassle or expense of moving home. The power is in your hands.
Remove Heirlooms And Gift You Don’t Like
When it comes to heirlooms and gifts, many of us feel obligated to keep them in our homes for the sake of the people around us. But think about the psychological effects that this is having on you. Not being able to express yourself puts you in a permanent state of resentment. You don’t like the idea that other people get to dictate what’s in your house. You want to make those kinds of personal decisions yourself.
The solution is to recognize that nobody deices what your house looks like on the inside except you. It’s your choice what heirlooms and gifts you include. Some will feel uplifting. But others will remind you of people that you no longer want in your life.
Cut Down On Kids’ Clutter
Kids have a nasty habit of fouling up your property and infantilizing the whole place. Once they begin to intrude, there seems to be no way to contain them. Toys wind up in communal areas, and the whole property feels like it is about them.
Cutting down on kids’ clutter, however, is surprisingly easy once you set aside room for it. Keep all kids’ stuff in a separate room and then tell your children that that’s where it should stay.
Get Rid Of Books You No Longer Love
As we go through life, we change as people. And that means that the types of reading material we enjoy also changes. The kinds of issues that meant a lot to us in our twenties don’t usually matter so much by the time we get to forty. Our priorities change.
Having old books lying around, however, can be a little depressing. If you don’t enjoy something, why is it still in your home? It feels kind of awkward.
Giving up books can sometimes feel like sacrilege. Books are sacred objects in many respects. You don’t have to get rid of them entirely. Somebody you know will undoubtedly be able to benefit from them. And even if they can’t, you can just deposit them at a charity shop and share the knowledge with other people.
Giving up books often also feels like giving up a part of our lives. But if we don’t let go of the past and live in the present, we’re setting ourselves up for suffering.
Remove Your Television
Getting rid of your television might sound a little extreme, but don’t knock it until you try it. TVs are a tremendous waste of time and space. They barely add anything to your life. And they take you away from productive activities that could be filling your evenings. Imagine if you spent time talking to family or indulging in art instead of watching the evening news. You’d have so much more to show for your time at the end of the year. It would be quite remarkable.
TV is a great source of stress for a lot of people too. Media organizations deliberately create news cycles that wind people up. And they speak in a tone of voice that gets you on edge and ready to prepare for danger. It’s an unpleasant experience, but it is also highly addictive. You hate it, but you find yourself wanting more for reasons you can’t explain.
Remove Your Mirrors
Mirrors are a standard feature of interiors, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they have to be a part of yours. They don’t.
The problem with mirrors is that they continually remind you of what you look like, causing you to feel self-conscious. When humans were first scaping around in the wilderness, the only time they would have seen their reflection would have been looking into a pool of water on a cloudy day. But today, mirrors are everywhere, and avoiding them is virtually impossible.
Getting rid of your mirrors can actually be a relief. Walking around your home transforms from an exercise in avoiding looking at yourself into one of freedom.
Getting rid of mirrors in the bathroom can be especially advantageous if you’re struggling to accept the way you look. Giving yourself a break from constant criticism improves your mood and lets you focus on other things.
Remove Crumbs
Crumbs in your pantry are a disaster and one of the main reasons for calling a pest control company. Not only are they unsightly, but they also attract vermin.
Getting rid of crumbs is a lot easier than most people imagine. Just take all of the food out of the pantry and then use the vacuum. If you notice your packets leaking, use clips and containers to store them better.
Stop Leaving Your Bed Unmade
Making your bed in the morning isn’t sufficient to guarantee a successful life, but it’s a start. When it is unkempt, it sets you off on the wrong foot for the entire day. If the bed isn’t made, nothing else in the house feels complete or “together.” Psychologically, it’s a disaster.
Making your bed, by contrast, has all sorts of positive effects. Sleep psychologists think that making your bed in the morning actually helps you to sleep easier at night because it makes you feel more relaxed. They also think that having a tinder bedroom reduces anxiety because there is less peripheral clutter. An ordered environment is a happy one for most people.
Get Rid Of Your Thick, Heavy Drapes
Thick and heavy drapes were something that the aristocracy loved in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. There was nothing more regal than a robust piece of velvet hanging in front of your windows.
But these types of window coverings tend to have a negative effect on the psychology of the average person. The heaviness brings you down and blocks out the incoming light through your windows. There are much better solutions out there. While there is a time and place for heavy drapes, most people are better off with roller blinds. They’re minimalist, only cover the window itself (instead of dropping down all the way to the floor), and they allow light to penetrate, even when closed.
Eliminate Broken Stuff
Having broken items cluttering your home isn’t just an eyesore, it’s also impractical. You’d love it if your microwave worked. But the fact that it doesn’t leaves you feeling frustrated. You wind up hating your home.
Broken stuff, though, doesn’t have to clutter your interiors. There’s a lot that you can do about it.
Start by writing a list of the things that annoy you most about your property and work through them methodically. Top of the list is probably the shower that won’t turn off when you press the button or the fireplace with the malfunctioning pilot light.
Try to fix one issue per week, running from the most annoying to the least. Hopefully, afterward, you’ll find that living in your abode is a much more pleasant experience.
Scan And Destroy Heaps Of Old Papers Lying Around
Having heaps of old papers lying around is never much fun. It always looks messy and it takes up loads of space. You do it because you never know when you might need a specific letter or document. But, in truth, you hardly ever do. It’s almost always completely irrelevant to your life.
There’s good news, though: you don’t have to put up with this situation forever. You can make headway.
A lot of smart people with papers lying around will invest in a scanner and shredder to deal with them. They simply use the scanner to upload documents to the cloud, and then put them through the shredder to dispose of them safely.
Remove Your Open Storage
Open storage where you keep stuff on shelves seems like a great idea when you see people doing it in interior design magazines. But it’s a nightmare in practice. Eventually, it just makes all your interior spaces look cluttered.
If you like the idea of open storage, try to minimize the number of items that you leave out in the open. Either make it decorative or just place your most-used items out in the open, keeping everything else in cupboards and drawers to keep it out of sight.
Kori
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