Living Space
We spend our lives in places and spaces. Playgrounds, classrooms, worship centers, restaurants, and such serve as the background of memories and relationships. Of all the spaces we inhabit, our homes carry special and permanent significance. The romantic view is that home is an ideal locale in which we are loved, accepted, and valued. The cynical view is that home is a location in which people stop pretending for the public and show their true colors. The truth is somewhere in between.
We learn how to live at home. There are no more powerful teachers than our parents, siblings, and extended family. I am my family. You are your family. Some bristle against such a suggestion, but the family dynamics present in our families exert tremendous and pervasive influence on our thoughts, emotions, and behavior. For many, the home is a place to learn how to live, create, love, discuss, attempt, explore, and relax. For others, a house has been the setting to learn how to cover up, hide, escape, argue, yell, hit, pretend, and tense up.
To make a home a Living Space, we must inject life into the place. Life is that delicate and determined idea to experience reality openly and often. To live is to appreciate oneself, to value others, to feel deeply about relationships, to welcome the ever-present surge of the interesting. Children who are learning to live are wide-eyed, energetic, able to explore, curious, engaged, and playful. Laughter appears often on the faces of the built-up and the bold.
So, how do we disperse life into our homes? How do we make home a tender, safe place that is filled with meaningful, authentic relationships? How do we sow life into our home and create a Living Space? Here are 5 simple ideas.
1. Create a Memory Field - Many times, we display formal, dressed-up pictures around the house that only remind us of how much we hated to get dressed-up and pose with that hairdo, that dress, and that goofy grin. Pictures of fun times, holidays, vacations, and so on add a Memory Field around us. Like a mine field, these Memory Fields are planted in various places in the home (inside closets, in the garage, etc.) and supply a continuing source for smiles and warm feelings. We can use walls, countertops, tables, and the like to display memories.
2. Cause Guerilla Grins - In my home, we leave notes and voicemails that are guaranteed to lead to grins. We wage a guerilla campaign to leave each other written and spoken messages that communicate appreciation, thanks, thoughts, and comments. Thanking each other often, written and spoken, is a powerful method of building intimacy, peace, and support. It can be a game or a fun competition. Who can create the most smiles?
3. The Extra Mile - Others know that they are loved when we are willing to go the extra mile for them. One expression of this is to do another person's chores for them (as a surprise). The willingness to work a little harder at times in order to show love for another person is a sure way to inject life into a relationship. Parents can inspire great personality characteristics in children by teaming up with the children to do the other parent's chores as a secret gift. The children light up with smiles when the other parent thanks them for the gift.
4. Board Games - Families and friends benefit from playing board games. Assuming all members are moderately competitive and open to fun, board games provide opportunities for unique interactions, loads of laughs, and lifetime memories. Games help us drop our defenses and experience others in a fresh way. Taking the time to play games with children is a sure way to communicate that the children are valued and appreciated.
5. Hand-made Gifts - For each holiday, challenge each member of the family to give at least 1 hand-made gift. When we take the time and effort to create a present for another person, we offer a significant memory as well as a material gift. Birthdays, Christmas, Easter, and other holidays are easy opportunities to show our feelings for each other. We can teach giving and value for relationships to our children by helping them create gifts for others. And, please, don't just put a signature in a card. Write something personal and meaningful!
Life is to be lived. The end of life comes to quickly. There are simple ways to build a Living Space for ourselves and our families.
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