What To Do When You Feel Uninspired by Your Space

We live in a world in which we are saturated every day with photos of beautiful homes, beautiful things, and people who are living lives that sometimes feel so much more grand than our own.  Sometimes this can make us feel uninspired by our own spaces, or things, or lives.  We compare ourselves to others and we compare our houses to what we see on Pinterest, and we feel discontent with what is around us.  We want more.

So what should you do when you are looking around your home, feeling dissatisfied, like something is missing, like you want it to be fresher or brighter, or more organized and less cluttered?  What should you do when the budget is tight and a room makeover is not realistic at that time, but you feel you like you want to do something, anything to make you feel inspired by your space again?

Can you forego the fancy coffee this week and buy yourself some flowers instead?  Or, even better yet, can you take a walk in your backyard and cut some flowers that speak to you, that inspire you?  Bring some life inside your space!  Take a dusty vase out of your cupboard and toss the flowers in and let the flowers be beautiful.

Can you move your furniture around, and breathe new life into your space with every moving part?  Can you layer things and putter and turn some music on that you love and enjoy shopping your house while rediscovering things that you forgot you had?  Maybe you like cleaning — what about dusting and wiping places that you normally forget about, like lucite chair backs and ottoman feet?

What about finding some cozy elements from other rooms and bringing them into new spaces, thinking about how these items might be used by the people you get to welcome into your house?  Things like a cozy throw blanket for crisp, cool Spring mornings or a basket with pillows for loved ones to perch on.

Sometimes the answer to our feelings of being uninspired is not to add, but to take away.  Are there places that you can declutter?  Are there things that no longer bring you joy, but that you know could bring someone else joy?  Things like an old pitcher, table linens, or picture frames.  Donate the things that no longer speak to you, and when you do this, feel your house take a breath with the release.  Sometimes we need to clear our space in order to find our direction again!

There will always be times in our lives when we feel like our spaces aren’t what we want them to be.  There are seasons where it feels like a dream to live in our homes and then there are seasons where we lose our way and we don’t really know how we want them to look — we just know we don’t want it to look like this.  But every season comes to pass, and by perpetually nesting and puttering, we can make our inspirational droughts last for a lot less time.

How do you bring back the inspiration when you are feeling uninspired by your space?  Let’s help one another!