Have you ever experienced getting your home renovated, if not the entire house, perhaps a room? Well, home renovation is a time of disarray; dust, noise, clutter, and loss of personal space are its hallmarks. When I had my kitchen refurbished over the summer, I pretty much lost much of my valuable summer time meant for relaxation and soaking in the wonders of sea and sand or hiking in the woods perfumed by lilac. I lost the silence, the cleanliness, and the homeliness that are important for creative thought. The dust, the microwaved food, the piles that got higher in the adjacent rooms, made me feel I was in a war zone. The open architecture of the house did not allow for doors to be locked shut. The prospect of a haven became a chimera.
But, of course, all renovations, hopefully, come to an end. Ours did too. And then began the arduous task of cleaning up and putting things in their respective places. As I began to do this, my cheerfulness returned. It felt wonderful to bring order out of chaos, create a clean space, fill it with the required material and trash junk.
Renovation is a great metaphor for the making or remaking of the spirit. I observed my transition from despair to relief, from deprivation of beauty to finding beauty. And it does not have to be such a huge undertaking as a renovation to experience this. Emptying out the refrigerator, cleaning, and putting back the essential usable items and trashing the rest gives us the comforting and satisfying feeling that we get when we have cleaned out an old issue that has nagged us and have begun to have a fresh perception about this issue. Clutter and renewal, I guess, is the stuff of life.
Once again my yogic sister, we are in similar states of evironmental and mental transitions!
ReplyDeleteJust last weekend I painted my master bathroom. But for weeks before, as I contemplated paint colors, I was unable to focus until I cleaned out the cabinets under the sinks. I needed to have the inside organized before I could focas on the external. Realizing now - this was another lesson in yoga! Without cleaning the clutter from our minds and focasing on the inside (our muscles, ligaments, breath), our asanas, what we can see on the outside, are a shell, disconnected from our spirit.
Oh... and while I was in Home Depot getting a new towel rack and shower caddy, I was drawn over to the houseplants by some orchids popping their heads out above the rest of the plants. I now have a new friend to great me as a enter my freshly painted bath!