If you are not yet subscribed to my Substackthis is where I get a little more personal: I write from the heart about self-care, motherhood, wellness, and everything in between. My community loved this post, so I wanted to share an excerpt with you here.
One of my favorite feelings in the world is walking through my front door after a trip. No matter how great the vacation is, how beautiful the hotel is, or how perfect the weather is, when I enter my home, I feel like I’m exhaling deeply. There’s the familiar scent (we’re still burning this candleso that the salty air and citrus fruits become the smell of the house), I open the curtains in our living room to let the light in and I take off my shoes to feel the soft carpet under my feet. My shoulders drop and I pull on the cozy sweatshirts that tell my brain it’s time to relax.
I used to think this feeling was just a matter of familiarity, but over the years I’ve realized it’s so much more than that. The way my home feels is not an accident, it’s the result of hundreds of small, intentional design choices I made with one goal in mind: to create a space that not only looks beautiful, but actually calms my nervous system.
Most of us think about home design only in aesthetic terms. Does this sofa look good? Do these cushions match? Is it trendy? But I’ve come to view design as a way to speak to all the senses and signal to my nervous system what I want to feel.
Every room in your house makes you feel something. Visual noise, lighting, sounds, smells, textures all send signals to your brain and body. And when you start paying attention to these cues and deciding what vibe you want to give your home, you can start designing in a way that not only looks good on Pinterest, but truly supports your well-being.
The framework of the five senses
I like to divide it into five categories: what you see, what you hear, what you smell, what you touch and what you feel (the latter is about bringing nature into your home, more on that below). When I make a design decision for our home (and lately, for our Malibu renovation), I think about how the entire space will speak to the senses.
This substack article dives into the intentional design choices that make life calmer and more purposeful. When I follow them, I’m more present, less exhausted, and somehow the day gets a little longer.
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The position How I Designed My Home to Calm My Nervous System appeared first on Camille Styles.
