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Finding Our Way Home

Posted on: December 9th, 2016 by Ruth-Ann Shantz

Home! What does the word home mean to you?  What images and thoughts pop into your head?  Home might conjure up warm feelings of love, belonging and safety or perhaps…home brings back memories of pain, loss and the wish that it all could somehow be better or different.

December is a month filled with expectation and emotion and home often contributes to those feelinrileycreeksnowgs. In my leadership work with youth and twenty somethings they express a deep desire to find ways to fit in.  In fact, one of their core emotional needs is to belong.  For many, ‘home’ is about stability, refuge, belonging and security.  Social media has sensationalized “home is where the heart is” moments and as a result has created a culture of self-comparison. These images can be distorted because home can also be messy, unpredictable, lonely, stressful and often uncontrollable.

As adults we have this remarkable responsibility to create a place for our hearts, a place that we can call home. While this is true, home can be anywhere where we are understood, supported and loved unconditionally. Hence, the old adage, “I feel at home here”.

Here are a few suggestions of ways that we can continue to create home in the coming weeks:

Stop trying to be perfect – There is a tendency to want everything to be “just right” – the perfect family, the perfect photos, the perfect food, the perfect gifts and even, the perfect weather.  The build up to the holiday time creates an expectation that is rarely ever met and in fact isn’t realistic. Worry less about trying to create perfection and instead create time together.

Put Away Your Phone –Turn off your phone and live in the moment. Create memories in your home. Don’t share these moments with the intention and sole purpose of posting to the world – cherish them instead.

Pay Attention – This goes back to the point above. If you are making the effort to show up then do so with the intention of being happy to be wherever you are.  Make the people you are with feel like they matter. One of the ways you can do this is by paying attention so you don’t become distracted.  Do more listening. Engage people in conversation. Turn off the television.  Play some board games.  Go for a walk with someone you love…just because. Tell the people that you surround yourself with that they mean something to you.

What I know for sure is life has moments of highs and lows. Home can be a place of love and belonging where we can be ourselves but it can also sometimes be a place of disappointment that home is not always perfect. If we are sensitive to that fact and we focus on what matters and who we care about, we will always find our way home.

 

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