Interior design: Will a home makeover transform your life?

According to a new book, success in life is a reflection of the state of our home's interior

Thu, 22 Aug, 2024 - 20:30

Carol O’Callaghan

I have a love-hate relationship with interiors books, giving away more unread than read.

One called Happy Starts at Home: Change Your Space, Transform Your Life elicited a cynical grimace when it landed even though I am evangelical about the positive feeling that comes after a good decluttering. But is it too much to claim that changes in the home can transform your life?

Written by Seattle-based interior design psychology coach Rebecca West, she’s made a career out of coaching in how adjustments in the home can change or enhance different areas of your life, from dealing with stress and creating calm to making room for romance and financial abundance.

A home office reflecting and reinforcing a sense of self-assurance can makes us feel good.

“Nearly a decade ago I found myself divorced and living in a house that constantly reminded me of my failed marriage,” she says. “I got tired of living somewhere that reverberated with sadness, loss and defeat. After about six months of feeling stuck, I repainted the walls and completely refurnished the house and it didn’t take buckets of money. Changing what I saw around me transformed how I saw my future and that change thrilled me. While I hadn’t moved physically, I had moved on psychologically.”

I like bold assertions that claim a book can change your life, and then you read it and realise that possibly it could if you had the money to do everything it says, or hired help to take over routine tasks.

With so many of us barely having enough time to clear our heads or even muster the motivation to transform the bedroom into the sanctuary we might long for, I run a mile from ‘change your life’ claims. I like books that are grounded, sensible, rooted in reality, and I have to say once I got stuck into this one it had a good deal of all three.

It’s a home design book in essence but it’s not just about design as it takes a holistic view of how you, your inner self and your home are connected, with the outer reality of the home being a reflection of our inner reality.

“Every choice you make about your home influences your life,” the author says. “With every dollar you spend on your home, you cast a vote for the kind of life you wish to live, what you value, how you will be treated, and whom you will let in. If you’re like me, you are highly affected by your environment. In a messy room, we feel frustrated, stressed, even out of control.”

That certainly makes sense to me, even on a simple day-to-day level working from home I can’t bear the washing up piled in the sink distracting me.

Creating functional and pleasant spaces help you pause and enjoy a distraction-free meal.

Now on to the best bit: It’s an activity book, to an extent, and we’re expected to do the work to make aligning heart, mind and environment a success.

Every chapter has activities, usually pen and paper ones, but some involve drawing floor plans which mercifully do not require any drawing skill, and rather thrillingly, there is a bit of crayon action.

Questions are listed asking you to consider what lies behind how orderly or not your home is currently and if your plans really align with what you want and need, or are simply motivated by longing for that expensive new sofa you think is going to solve all your problems.

It goes on to ask what does your home mean to you? How does your relationship with money affect how you approach home improvements? Where in your home do you need to share and consider dreams and hopes of others as well as your own?

It proves to be a good book to read and implement with the necessary inspirational photography to help motivate but it’s the questions and the work they encourage you to do that matters.

If you’re planning an autumn holiday and looking to take a few books with you, this one comes out on October 8 and could be one of them to use like a workbook.

Sometimes the best place to consider making a change is to have distance from the problem, sitting by the sea, or a pool, or even if you staycation. The workbook element is not at all taxing so it won’t feel like work to consider things dispassionately and not be influenced by sentimentality.