I created my book shelve with hanging jars & mugs together with Joran. It holds a lot of creative and inspirational books and objects.
The posters on my red wall behind the couch are the poster collection I designed, containing 1001 ideas to a creative, playful and happy life. It functions as a constant inspiration wall.
All the paintings hanging on my wooden wall are painted by myself. You can buy them in my Etsy shop, as well as prints of most of the paintings I created.
The turquoise cabinet is one of my latest large creations. I built it together with Joran as well. It holds all my craft supplies, paints and creative materials. I will show a more detailed post on it soon.
My golden chair is the one real investment I made when it comes to furniture. Most of my furniture I got as free leftovers, bargains, or I made them myself from scraps of wood and old drawers. I bought the crochet blanket in Ubud, Bali. I’ve always wanted such a blanket and I am so happy with it.
I used the hanging paper cranes at my art exhibition last year, and they are of course a reference to the time I folded 1000 origami cranes and handed them out to random strangers.
I’ve never shown my living space on my blog before, at least not a complete view. Today is a special day though, because it’s the day I decided to give you a little tour of my home. For years I didn’t care about what my room looked like. But over time I’ve realized that it’s important to create a space for yourself that you love. Your space should radiate positive energy and bring out your best playful and creative self.
I moved into my apartment, which I share with three roommates, during my first year of university. Continuously I found reasons for not actively creating a space I loved: I would only be in this room temporarily and search for a new one, go on an internship for a semester, finish my bachelor soon and potentially move to another city for my master, potentially find a job after my master in a different place and move to a space of my own. I didn’t want to waste money and time on something that was only temporarily anyway. Now, many years later, I still live in the same apartment. I did move to the biggest room in the house in the meantime though.
After years of living like I was going to leave soon anyway, I decided to do things differently. I don’t longer care about how long I will continue to live in this space. I’ve decided to make the best of it during the time that I’m here. Of course I want to move out eventually and afford a space of my own. But at the start of making money doing what I love, I am content with where I am.
As you might have guessed, there is a moral to this story.
When you’re always fixed on what’s going to happen in the future, you forget how to live fully now. It’s human to only want to invest your precious time, money and energy when the conditions are right. That way they don’t go to waste. But the downside is that it can cause you to stop investing all together, until you will reach a set point in the future.
“Once we move to a bigger space, my relationship will be better.” “Once I am off my anti-depressants, I will be able to enjoy my life again.” “Once I make enough money, I can start creating a beautiful home that I adore.”
What’s even worse, once you do reach that point (you’ve moved, you’re off your pills, and you make loads of money), you often end up making new excuses why things are just not working and why you shouldn’t invest completely right now. When I say invest, I don’t mean getting your credit card out to make thousand-dollar purchases. I mean use what you have and turn it into the very best you realistically can.
Just because the conditions aren’t perfect, doesn’t mean you cannot do anything to improve upon them. Let’s face it. Your life is never going to be perfect: not your home, not your health, not your social relationships, not your wardrobe. Nothing ever is perfect.
Therefore, pick your battles. New floor? Not gonna happen, even though I think my carpet is the ugliest thing since crocs. New creative cabinet? Yes. Doable. I can build that.
Perfection is a burdensome mindset. Perfectionism makes you feel bad about essentially good-enough-things. You cannot wait for things to be perfect to start improving on your life, because then you will wait forever. Accept that the conditions are never ideal, and start making small improvements upon whatever you have to work with.
Creating a space around me that I love is part of accepting where I am in life right now, despite of what might happen tomorrow or the day after.
Work actively to create a living space you love. It will make you feel grounded in the now, in control of shaping your life for the better, and it will spark joy.
Stay tuned, because I have a series of posts coming up which are related to how to create an inspiring, happy living space. In the upcoming week, I will be talking about how to thoroughly de-clutter your room, show you how I built my turquoise cabinet, and talk about the importance of making space for creativity (literally this time).
All pictures were taken by my (little) sister.
9 Comments
Brenda
August 6, 2015 at 16:27
Wise words. Thank you for continuing to inspire. If you are ever traveling in western Canada do contact me.
magicaldaydream
August 6, 2015 at 19:04
Most welcome :) I used to live in Calgary as a small child (like 3 – 5 years old)
Tiffany
August 6, 2015 at 18:28
Love the pictures! I like my apartment for the most part, but I would like to add a few updates too, like more bookshelves. A lot of the problem for me is that my husband and I do a lot of entertaining between friends and family, so we need our space for things like couches and tables. Our apartment isn’t too tiny, but it’s not huge either, so we have to prioritize what goes in it.
Tiffany @ http://writteninblue21.blogspot.com/
magicaldaydream
August 6, 2015 at 19:07
I know what you mean. I don’t have an entire apartment, but my boyfriend has a house and it’s fun to see some creative possibilities there. He has a window sill bench that transforms into a table for example: http://www.magicaldaydream.com/2014/02/my-new-favourite-coffee-place.html
Maria
August 7, 2015 at 21:26
Oh, wow! I ve always wanted a golden chair! And that drawer is just plain gorgeous! Great job!
Maria
August 8, 2015 at 23:34
You definitely have to create a living space, no matter how long you’re going to be there. After years of moving around from place to place, I can say I am very experienced at this. I love the gold chair, and the turquoise cabinet is cool!
magicaldaydream
August 10, 2015 at 07:38
I relate to this. As a kid, I never lived in a place for more than a couple of years. But sometimes I feel like it has made me a bit more closed off as well to truly invest, because it feels like that might be a waste of my time if I’m gonna move soon again. In other ways I am able to make a place my home quickly. I don’t know. It’s complex :)
Suzanne
February 11, 2017 at 17:47
You have a beautiful space and lots of great advice for living in the now. Thank you! Your line, “once I’m off antidepressants, I’ll be able to enjoy my life”, bothered me. I’ve been taking antidepressants most of my adult life because I have been diagnosed with clinical depression. I take antidepressants so that I can get off the floor of despair and enjoy my life.
magicaldaydream
February 14, 2017 at 10:54
Hey Suzanne. First of all I never intended to hurt anyone’s feelings with my post, so I’m sorry that it had that effect on you. I think antidepressants are a helpful tool and I can only applaud you for taking them if they improve your life. I hope you understand that my point was not speaking negatively about antidepressants or clinical illness. But sometimes, some people, are so focused on future events that will improve their life some day, they stop investing today. I’m not saying that’s you. From what you tell me, you’re doing the opposite: taking actions today (by taking medicine for one thing) to make things better. People (myself included) can decide to not act NOW for whatever reason. Sometimes that’s fine, but sometimes it can also put your life on a halt, like I did when I expected to move out of my room anyway. Does that make sense?