My mom likes to refer to me as a Yippie, which is short for yuppie hippie.
Fortunately, it’s a moniker that I rather like.
I don’t have a distaste for the term yuppie since my roots are far more humble – but that’s not to say I don’t enjoy a degree of consumerism, which given the poverty I come from, I might even enjoy it more than others.
However, I am also a hippie. Read my blog and you will see both sides; I am the inner and the outer. I am a paradox of 100 trillion cells being held together without touching. I am the unique creative force hidden within my mitochondrial DNA.
And that’s really what binds the inner and the outer sides to me together: my creativity. It’s one of the driving forces in my life. I’ve found that the more I express my unique, inner-creative self, the more I am that I am.
Sometimes I feel compelled to manifest my creative-side in ways that seem silly even to me; but I do my best to follow the intuition of the artist within me – despite the silent protests of my left brain.
I think there is an artist within all of us. One of the great ways to manifest that is to adorn your home and your body with your own personal touch.
It will help you feel more connected to yourself and you’ll feel more at home.
I was recently going through my closest and I came across a shirt that had a HUGE collar. I tried it on, and I was like ‘what the bejeezus! – that is a giant collar’.
But aside from the Miami-Vice-sized collar, it was a beautiful shirt.
So, instead of parting with it, I put it in the dry-clean pile with the a plan to cut the collar down and get the seam tailored.
Sure enough, I cut it with my kitchen scissors, took it to my tailor this week, and picked it up today.
I’m very happy with the final product. The collar is reminiscent of a pajama shirt and it’s now one of a kind and has a story behind it.
About a month ago, I saw a college-aged French guy wearing a denim shirt with a peace sign patch on the sleeve.
I asked him about the shirt and he told me it belonged to his father.
So, naturally when my favorite denim shirt developed a tear on the shoulder I took it to my dry-cleaner / tailor and asked her to sew it up and give it a personal touch of character.
There’s something about adorning your body and your home with personal touches. It’s comforting and reassuring to surround yourself with the little reminders of who you are.
If the body is the temple, the home is the sanctuary.
I get that you can’t take it with you when you go, and I’m not making the spiritual case for ‘things’, but to say that things are just things is to ignore the personal meaning that we naturally impart into our most treasured possessions.
If you used to talk to your teddy bear when you were five years old, you know what I mean.
If your heart has ever ached with regret for something you lost or threw away, you know what I mean.
If you can’t bear to throw away that stupid _______ that your ex gave you because it means more to you than the relationship at this point, you know what I mean.
My prized possessions are capable of reminding me of my story and who I am. By surrounding myself with things that have meaning to me, I am honoring myself.
It’s human nature to be nostalgic; it’s only natural to look at something and remember the experiences attached to it.
The most important thing in life is the meaning we decide to impart on our experiences; past, present, and future.
I don’t know about you – but I want to savor the meaning of my experiences. We can’t have the experience or a single time in our lives back, but the meaning lasts forever.
And that’s why I wrote this post – because I want to inspire others to adorn their lives with the meaning from their own personal experiences in life.
And one day, maybe you’ll even pass that meaning onto your kids.
But even if you never do – I encourage you to live a tailor-made life that’s adorned with meaning.
Trust me: I’ve suffered from bouts of wanderlust and I’ve lived in a handful of cities – but I’ve finally reached the stage in life where there is no place like home – and that’s a journey worth honoring.
In closing, here are some of my favorite things that I’ve adorned my home with.
