“My home…It is my retreat and resting place from wars; I try to keep this corner as a haven against the tempest outside, as I do another corner in my soul.” – Michel de Montaigne.
Having a serene and peaceful atmosphere at home rejuvenates you and makes you feel relaxed and happy. Spending a relaxing night at home can be one of life’s greatest pleasures.
Here are four simple steps to a peaceful home:
Bringing nature inside:
Bringing nature inside your home goes beyond indoor plants and decorative greenery. A natural decor can help us alleviate stress and increase productivity and creativity in our daily lives.
A green wall or including natural objects like seashells, rocks, branches and gems can be a great addition to your home. Creating designs with rocks or gems and raking sand helps improve concentration and de-stress.
Using natural materials like bamboo, wood, stone, leather, hemp, cork, clay, and granite for various areas of your home like kitchen slabs, flooring, furnishings, and tabletops will help bring you closer to nature. Another way of incorporating nature into your interior decor is using the colours of nature like sky blue, green, brown, and sandy shades. It can help you get in touch with the elements of nature around you.
Soundproof Curtains:
Do you live near a noisy street? Do you find it difficult to sleep or work or read due to the cacophony of sounds?
Adding soundproof curtains can be the perfect solution to your problems. It contributes to maintaining a peaceful ambience in your home and adds to its beauty. You can even coordinate the curtains with the colours on your walls or other decorations. Generally, noise reflecting ones tend to be dense and heavy, while the noise-absorbing ones are fluffy and porous.
These curtains minimise noise pollution in rooms while simultaneously protecting residents from being exposed to direct sunlight. You can enjoy privacy in a controlled environment by using soundproof curtains.
Strategic Lighting:
Lighting is an essential part while decorating your home. Bright, glaring lights will neither help you relax after a long day nor does it tend to appear elegant in most cases. Similarly, too dim lights will not help you while cooking or working.
Therefore having the correct lighting for each room is crucial to having a peaceful home. You will need to ponder the purpose of each room, its location and what kind of lights will be the best fit. Bringing in as much natural light as possible can be a good idea. For those who live in houses with few to no windows, you can try having reflective surfaces on the walls. Strategically placed large mirrors or lacquered pieces will reflect the sunlight and increase the room’s amount of light.
Perhaps you can change your lighting according to the different seasonal light levels.
Music and Aromatherapy:
Aromatherapy is getting a lot of attention these days. However, it is not overrated. Research shows that there are various stress-relief benefits to it. It can reduce the perception of stress, increase mental peace, and decrease cortisol levels which is the stress hormone. Lighting scented candles is perhaps the simplest way to scent up a room, or you can also use essential oils by evaporating them through the air.
Music like aromatherapy can be a great stress-reliever and add to a peaceful ambience in your home. You can listen to music while getting ready, cooking, cleaning or before bed.
Swaying to some hip-hop while cleaning can make it a fun chore instead of boring, and putting on some jazz or tracks from your playlist while cooking can help you relax, enabling you to savour your meal in a better frame of mind.
Conclusion
The most important thing about creating a peaceful ambience in your home is finding out what works. Some of the suggestions here might not suit you due to lack of space or being expensive or other such reasons.
When creating your sanctuary, you should consider your inner joy or peace and the aesthetics. The best way to give yourself a peaceful home is according to how it suits you the best.