One of the first needs I felt when I moved to Washington DC was to buy a few things that I knew would help to feel slightly more at home. One thing were candles. It worked.
Recently, I followed a documentary on Feng Shui and it attracted my curiosity. Without wanting to go into the details of Feng Shui, I think Feng Shui provides a couple useful ideas how one can improve its own four walls to create a more healthy and welcoming environment (where the positive Qi is able to fill the space).
One rule is de-clutter. This sounds not only obvious and reasonable to me but is probably also one of the hardest thing to do, especially if you pay attention to minimal details.
I started with my bathroom. There was an ugly thick plastic shower curtain which was really disturbing and now that I have a cotton curtain and a soft liner to retain water it is hard to believe how and why I haven’t done this before.
This is an interesting question and I think the answer, in my case, is that when I’m somewhere and I know it is for a limited period, six month, one year, etc. it is not so straightforward to go further than to buy just a couple candles. After all, why should I invest in changeif it is only for a couple months and then I’ll have to leave or sell things? I think, it is the wrong approach. First, it is worth to create a welcoming environment even just for a couple days (often it doesn’t take much and perhaps you don’t need new things, order or reorder might be all you need). Second, you never know what will happen, so first you think “Oh, I’m here just for a couple months, it’s not worth to do anything”, then you might extend your stay for another couple months and you say “Oh, no, I leave it as it is, I’m leaving anyway soon”. Well, it’s sad you didn’t create a healthy and welcoming environment, and keep it, from day one.