Composition of a Life

I've been thinking so very much lately about my living room.

What?  Did you think it would be poignant? 

(anyone other than me feel so impressed with themselves when they spell poignant right the first time? anyone?)

We've been in our house for 3 years now.  Somehow, we still seem to be in the college-furniture stage of our lives, despite being fully grown with 3+ jobs between us.  We're debt-averse, and we're not much for form over function, and our little people, well, they're why we can't have nice things, on So. Many. Levels.

Anyhow, sometimes I get dissatisfied with my living room.  Its silly, but it just doesn't have the look that I see in other people's houses.  It doesn't look "inviting" to me, and it definitely doesn't scream finished.  I just get out of sorts about it every once in a while.  

So one night, I decided to flip my thinking and determine what exactly I felt it was missing.  Instead of stewing over a feeling, I decided to think about it rationally, and then move.  So I looked at pictures of living rooms I like, I compared them to what I had, and I made some concrete examples.  Things I want to have in a my living room, as an adult person who works and makes money.  Things such as:

• A rug
• Soft, cuddle-able blankets
• Ceramic logs in our gas fireplace, instead of an old piece of wood and a bunch of air
• A coffee table that we can sit around and play games on

These are the things that I believe would lead me to feel more satisfied with my living room.  Now, knowing them doesn't mean that I am ready to fill up my Wayfair.com cart and pull the trigger, or take my checkbook and head to IKEA.  But now at least I know what changes I'm moving towards.  We'll probably get those ceramic logs first, since it will make a big impact at Christmastime, and that makes me happiest.  And then I'll add a blanket or two, because its easy.  Eventually I'll have the right rug in mind, and we'll get that hook up.  And someday, our living room will reflect the kind of life that I want to live in it.

I've also been thinking about my life.  About how I have been feeling so very much a victim of circumstance lately.  It is at least in part due to the fact that as a nursing mama, I'm subject to the whims of a tiny tyrant I created.  But as well, things have been moving so fast, and I've been treading water, trying to feed everyone and not turn into "Mad Mama" as my daughter calls it.  I don't like living that way.  I've just recently gotten to the post-baby state where I can be thinking about the kind of person I'd like to be someday; it strikes me that I won't end up that person by accident.  And it would be such a pity for my life to metaphorically resemble my living room in its current state.  

So I'm taking stock.  I'm carving out a bit of time for reflection and goal setting.  I need to figure out who I want to be, what I want this life I'm given to look like, how I want this second decade of my marriage to work out, even what I want my kids to remember about their childhoods.  Without this legwork, I will end up a result of my circumstances and reactions.  Nah.  That's not what I was made for.  There is more available to me, I know, if I will simply be intentional and proactive.

I don't for one minute imagine that by setting these goals I'll achieve them.  Even with the living room parallel, knowing how I want it to look doesn't make it that way.  As I grow, as I age, as time moves on, I will likely change the ideas I'm forming now.  I'll want different things, want to be a different kind of person.  The intentionality, though, I think its still key.  

I'm gonna work up a list, and I may even share it here, because I love this space for reflecting and setting things into words.  What about you (if there's even any "you"s out there, since this has been dormant for the better part of 2 years)?  Where have you been intentional?  Do you believe in deciding how and who you want to be, or do you prefer to think less about it?  Its so funny how we can forget that the way our brain works isn't necessarily the way someone else thrives.  I'd love to know what you do!

<3 M.