A Home Should Be Beautiful
A home should be beautiful.
“But I don’t have money to make my home look beautiful.”
“Isn’t that superficial? Materialistic?”
“There are more important things in life.”
Having an Instagram account known for my home has led me to do some serious self-evaluating. Am I promoting a materialistic lifestyle? Is the desire I have for my home to be beautiful a good desire?
These are my reflections on the matter.
Firstly, I believe our standards for what beauty is needs to be evaluated. When I say a home should be beautiful, I do not mean it should be lavish. I certainly do not mean you should spend a lot of money. I do not mean you need MORE. It is more likely that you actually need LESS to attain the beauty I am speaking of. You often don’t need fresh new things, but a lesson on how to use your hands to remake something old.
In my experience, whenever I spend an unnecessary amount of money on some piece of furniture, I usually feel regret sooner or later because of the lack of any meaningful fulfillment it brings. How fast the high seems to fade and the furniture becomes equivalent to any other ordinary thing, often causing me to want something else that’s new, better, more exciting.
It’s a novel thing, isn’t it? We aren’t made to be fulfilled by material things. And yet, how funny the human condition is that we think the problem is that we just don’t have enough so we get more and more and more. I’ll save that rant for later...let’s get back to understanding beauty...
I do believe it is good and maybe even necessary for our well being to have a beautiful home. It is a part of human nature to be attracted to beauty and we thrive when surrounded by it.
But hear me out, Beauty is not superficiality. I would argue “beauty that is superficial” is not actual beauty at all (thank you culture for mixing this one up).
Beauty is meant to attract a person to what is good.
This is meant to inspire contemplation.
Contemplation is meant to lead us to truth.
Beauty, goodness, and truth are only found in one source and that is God. In fact, beauty, goodness, and truth cannot exist without Him.
Beauty, therefore, is meant to be a path that leads us to God.
Our desire for beauty is actually a longing for God.
MARRIED AND A HOUSE
To sum it up: Our desire for beauty is actually a longing for God. That should help when considering what I mean when I say a home should be beautiful.
It should be a place that leads you to God, where it is easy to worship Him.
It should be a place where you find rest.
A place where you pray daily.
Where there is a spirit of peace.
Where others enter feeling warm and welcome.
A place where you find it easy to refocus yourself daily in your pursuit of goodness.
A place of order.
A place of love.
Is your home a place that fosters these things? If so, I would say, you have a beautiful home. If not, how can you make it a place where you can focus on these things? If you are unsure, stick around, this blog is just getting started.
“So I don’t need to completely gut and renovate my home?”
No. You probably don’t, you can, and it’s fun but you don’t need to (unless it is unlivable, which ours was). The physical environment that surrounds a person only matters to the degree that it helps or hinders a person attain the things listed above.
The “stuff” in your home could DISTRACT you from being a place of daily service to God and others or it could serve as a daily REMINDER of these things and ATTRACT you to them.
True beauty brings us deeper into the interior life of everything. It is never meant to stay on “the outside”. When it does, it loses its meaning and purpose, and becomes disposable, excess, clutter.
Ever wonder why churches are supposed to be beautiful places? It is not so they become the object of our worship, but instead that they lead us into deeper worship. They should be places filled with physical reminders of God that elevate our worship and raise our gaze to heaven. Most importantly however, churches are beautiful because they are dwelling places of God.
The connection with our environment is simple. We have both a body and a soul. The experience of our bodies in this physical world has an impact on our souls and vice versa. God made us this way. He made us to learn and grow through interactions with the physical world. Just so, the physical environment of your home can be like a church, it can move you into a deeper interior life and it too can be a place where God dwells.
This is the goal of my home: To create an environment that helps me to live out my vocation to the fullest; to love and serve God and others. I want my home to bring peace and order, I want it to lead me to contemplation, inspire me to pray, to read, to slow down. All of these things are not about the superficial. They are about my interior life playing itself out in the exterior environment which I live and spend my days.
Where to begin?
Maybe you need to start with “gutting your interior life” or maybe you need to start with the physical environment of your home, but that decision is up to your discernment.
Just like people, a beautiful home is unique and unrepeatable. There isn’t one “correct” style a home should feature. But here are some criteria that can help you create a beautiful home where your interior life can flourish.
First, know that a truly beautiful home does NOT mean the following…
An over abundance of possessions.
It does not mean spending a lot of money.
It does not mean clutter and chaos (unless of course it is the chaos of happy children)
Beauty is not found in technology. It won’t come from having a larger screened TV.
It is not in the size of the home or even the materials that hold it together.
Rather, a beautiful home contains…
Coziness, warmth (places to sit, commune and rest, blankets & pillows, ambient lighting, fireplace, candles, etc.)
Something that inspires you or brings you joy (books, instruments, art work, mementos, hobbies, etc.)
Order and cleanliness (the mind can focus much better when a room is free of clutter and clean)
Simplicity (through minimalism, a cohesive scheme, or styled with items that are practical and aesthetic. Simplicity allows the mind to rest)
But most importantly, the spirit of the home is reflected by the beauty of the people who live inside it. A family who tries their best to live and love well will greatly impact the beauty that fills their home.
Maybe you are overwhelmed and don’t know where to start. Well, I can help you with that! At least that’s what I hope to do with these blog posts. If you don’t want to wait until the next post on the matter, you want personalized help, or you doubt your home could be made beautiful, feel free to leave a comment or contact me and we can chat!