Why Design Matters

A few times a year, I have these introspective moments, pondering the validity of my career choice. I ultimately chose interior design because I love making interior spaces more organized, pretty, and livable but also for the flexibility the career would give my life.

I could have the flexibility of working for a big firm, strutting my heels as I walk downtown going from meeting to meeting as well as have a baby or two and open up my home office to help clients with their homes, one at a time. I was thinking that the variety of options would allow me to have "something to do" in any season of my life.

So it is in this in between season that is so difficult. The transition.

And as in any season of change, I begin to question everything, including the validity of interior design as it relates to be significant. There are times I wonder, is what I'm doing really going to matter? Shouldn't I be feeding hungry kids in Africa or working for a church to love hurting people rather than showing people the latest and greatest home accessory to spend money on?!

And it's in voicing these fears and worries (that maybe my life isn't going to matter), that I'm often met with the resounding truth that ANY career a person is in matters! If I was a garbage man, working to serve others and love others and be the best at it I can be, then my life would be a success. It's so Western-thinking, so black-and-white, to think that these careers are "right/Godly/good" and those over there are "secular/selfish/wordly."

I still struggle with that thinking. That what I do identifies me. And if what I do isn't big enough, then I must be failing at rising to the grand call of life, to be what God wants me to be, to meet my potential. So once I get the idea that there are no right or wrong, spiritual or un-spiritual careers, I'm then faced with my career- design.

How can it help others? How can I use it to do good in the world, to see beyond myself? Well, by helping people with their homes, a very intimate and personal place, I am invited in. I'm invited into a space where their daily life happens. And when someone wants to see about making that space more beautiful, functional, organized, inspirational, they are asking for help to live in a better mental/emotional/spiritual space.

And then of course there's the whole discussion of why and how the home are so very important to human psychology. The home is a very extension of a person. It's where one goes to feel safe, after a long stressful day at work or school. There's a reason we call it "home-base." So making that more inviting and comfortable- priceless!

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A very good friend of mine said that your life is the art. How you get dressed in the morning, how you make your coffee when you wake up, how you drive your car, how you kiss your husband- these are all expressions of your uniqueness, of YOU. And you are the canvas. Your life is your art. And your home is an extension of that art, of you. It's meant to be safe, beautiful, comforting, inspiring, inviting.

There is purpose in adding beauty to the home. And from there is where I draw comfort, reminding myself that design does matter. It is important. It is how I express myself, my life art. And it's how you do too.



xoxo,