The truth is I’m not a talented enough photographer or writer or artist to really encapsulate the soulfulness that I can feel. Articulating soulfulness is a challenge. I’m up to the task of practice…
I am sensitive though. I can feel the energy in rooms, objects and people. I have ideas about how a room wants to flow and I’m willing to have a conversation with it. To consider its occupants and the dance they will do together.
All this is to optimize our capacity for living a full life.
When we build or arrange rooms and buildings without much consideration, there is a tendency to force configurations on spaces. People arrange furniture how they think it will look best or according to a wall the TV has to hang on. This is fine. Likely no one will die due to this tendency. They can, however, have bits of their energy picked away at, their lifestyle poorly influenced or their connection to their loved ones suffer because of it.
Consider a family who bought a house built by a developer in the late 1970s. They lived in the house as a busy American household. Over time the room configuration grew constricting. It was segmented and rigid. It didn’t flow as the family inside it lived. Some rooms saw a lot of life and others were used once or twice a year. The colors and fabrics faded. It had fallen out of line with the taste of its inhabitants. And every time someone in the family died, their belongings defaulted to the house. Updating it was never a priority and the frustration with the flow and the apathy toward the style took its toll. Lots of wishing things could be different. No idea where to begin.
Members of the family still live there, but there is a slow leaking of positive energy. Big changes have occurred in the family. Marriages, deaths, aging. The house itself remains largely unchanged. This keeps the people living there stuck as well. Perhaps it’s a chicken and egg situation, but the egg can’t change… The chicken has to take the initiative. Their house is keeping them stuck 20, 30, 40 plus years in the past.
Consider the effect it can have on us to inhabit spaces that are contrary to our current lifestyles, values and taste. It can be a bit like swimming in an over-chlorinated pool. You may not notice it consciously but after a while you’ll get a headache and your skin will burn or itch. You may not attribute it to the pool, but what could have been a restful and refreshing day in the water leaves you feeling tired, achy and drained. Now imagine not just an afternoon spent in the pool, but the effects in swimming, marinating in your home’s energy year after year.
How are you nurturing your soul? How is your home supporting your life? How is it holding you back?
If your heart lights up at a beautiful sunset, your child running through the door with art project in hand or when you slip on our favorite outfit, think of the scale to which your home can affect your heart. I want your house to feed you, to feed your soul. I want it to be a place to express, grow, connect, build, rest and play.
* Photos by Martin Jaros and Chastity Cortijo not of work done by Sonja Skvarla.