Many of us are ill prepared to work remotely from our homes, yet this is now a reality for most people. The home has become a makeshift office, gym, classroom, production studio, entertainment space, but this multipurpose hub must still provide shelter and a place to replenish. However, when the boundaries are undefined—as can happen in a multipurpose environment—both our mental health and productivity suffer.
This is when we need a simplicity expert…
Eve Broenland is the author of Unclogging: the antidote to overwhelm, and a maestro of minimalism who creates environments for high-performing people. In this article, Broenland shares her strategies for designing adaptive environments and shows us how to reclaim the lost sanctuary of home.
How to Design Adaptive Environments
Do you feel your home is still your sacred family space? As we all have had to adapt instantly to a new manner of using our home, have you wondered what the effects are of using your house as a multi-purpose environment?
The COVID pandemic has shifted the ways we use our home; we now increasingly use our personal spaces for working, home schooling, fitness activities and various business activities. But where we used to separate these activities through physical boundaries, this has become more challenging in our current way of living as we do all of it under one roof. Blurring these lines contributes to our stress levels, as we can’t always break away so easily from our previous activity. We used to commute home and use that transition time to reset ourselves, even if this happened subconsciously. But as the demands, expectations and pressure on our productivity rises, we hurry from one task to the next without a necessary pause. Sometimes we find our mind preoccupied on the next activity, without completing the task at hand. We’re losing our presence and that raises our stress levels tremendously.
Losing our physical boundaries exacerbates this. As we spent more time at home and we don’t have a dedicated space for each activity, we feel the stress even more because we can’t separate our roles and activities. It’s like we wear all our hats at the same time. In a culture where we glorify being busy, bringing that overlap into one location, which should be your sanctuary, your safe space, is a dangerous position.
To simplify this new situation, it’s key to be aware of what’s happening. When we adapt, we don’t always bring sufficient rationale and diligence to the change at hand. The biggest contributor to our overwhelm is that we continue to add, as that is easy, but separating or eliminating is hard. So, without this natural and physical transition, we need to become diligent in creating this divide ourselves.
We are all very aware of how to stay physically fit, but we lack knowledge and self-awareness about how to stay mentally productive and efficient. Now you know how not pausing adds to your feeling of haste, pressure and stress, you need to use the same personal discipline for your mental fitness. To unclog we need to create a personal routine that works for us.
To do so, you need to do two things; creating the personal habit to transition and using an item that symbolises the transition.
For the personal routine, consider taking a deep breath and stretching your body, drink a glass of water, or move out of the room and come back. Do this consistently and this habit will instil in your mind that your focus has shifted. To incorporate a physical item in this routine, you will most definitely anchor in the transition. Let’s say you use the same table for home schooling and dining, think of using an item that symbolises the activity you’re in—as you finish studies for the day, you replace the books and the desk table light with a tablecloth so the area is ready for dining and togetherness. Even if you don’t eat at that table, but end up having dinner on the sofa, it’s key to use a non-verbal cue like that to anchor in the transition. Implementing these simple practices will ensure you don’t end up mindfully rushing from one task to the next, and you get to switch off from the previous role and be fully present.
Your home environment has changed recently, and will continue to do so, and now you know how to take control of it for your own wellbeing. The future will require more adaptability from us, but we also need to protect and honour that what is most important to us. So be intentional, create the breaks your mind so desperately needs and be kind with yourself as you try to navigate through this new situation. We should and can continue to enjoy the sanctity of home.
For more ideas on creating healthy work/life environments, visit evebroenland.com and follow her @evebroenland
