Number 6 – Changing It Up

Yesterday, I had a burst of efficiency and decided to completely rearrange our second bedroom/home-office. I’m a fan of a good reshuffle once in a while. It helps keep things fresh and helps you to appreciate the spaces you have. It is also a reminder that we so often get stuck looking at something from one perspective and rarely take the time or the effort to change things up.

To take our office space for example. We had a long desk situated in front of the window, and an armchair in the corner. Now, whilst it was often nice to work looking out of the window with a view of the garden, that window is also south facing, and you spend much of your time squinting at the computer screen and readjusting the venetian blinds. Similarly, the chair in the corner looked cosy and snug enough, but it was always too dark to read properly in and so out of the way that it was never especially inviting.

A few weeks ago, I suddenly realised that the long desk would actually fit, almost to the cm along the side wall, freeing up the space under the window for the armchair. Yesterday, I finally put that plan into action. Now we’ve only been living with the reshuffled space for 24 hours, but it already feels a million times better. I’ve actually spent time in the armchair, reading and looking out of the window. The space seems to work well and better than ever.

The broader point here, is that very often we already have the correct pieces all around us, they’re just not positioned in their optimal location. (This is a slightly extreme metaphor but run with me!) Rather than looking further afield for the answers to our problems, maybe we just need to look afresh at what we already have. Can I do more with this? What if this was given priority over that?

It is also worth saying that sometimes, changing things up for the sake of it is positive. Right now, everything feels a bit stuck. We’re trapped in our homes and our routines, so swapping a few pieces of furniture around might help you to see your environment differently and engage with the space more positively. We feel like we’ve got a new room, which, at a time where our homes are our prisons as much as our castles, is immensely refreshing.

So, why not change things up a bit? Hey, you can always put it back if it doesn’t work!