How to Use Your Senses to Liven Up Your Home This Spring

Let’s set the scene: You’ve had a taxing day at work and are eager to get home. You’ve generally felt unorganized and untethered in your day-to-day, thanks to a unique combination of relationship woes, financial stressors, and new work responsibilities. When you walk in the door, ready to relax, you’re disheartened by the scene: an untended pile of dirty laundry, stark white walls, and no real cozy corner to curl up and read. That lack of grounding and organization you’ve been feeling? It certainly didn’t get any better when you walked through the door. 

Our home can color our mental health regardless of our age, with a study finding children living in a home with significant disarray (think poor lighting, clutter, and uncleanliness) experience a higher level of inflammation and overall immune system dysregulation. Another study found that even the particular layout of a home can impact our mental health, with homes that are designed to encourage social interactions leading to positive mental health outcomes.

Whether you’re a creative with a penchant for home spaces or a design novice who has never quite understood how to curate an organized and aesthetically pleasing living quarter, we will guide you through the art of using your senses to liven up your home. 

Home Space, Heart Space

Our senses—sight, touch, sound, even scent—can all impact how we feel. “Fact is, when our homes work better, we feel better,” shares interior designer, licensed marriage and family therapist, and author of "Home Therapy" Anita Yokota. She emphasizes how using our five senses can be a gateway to exploring how our homes can relax and rejuvenate us.

She also notes that if you find that movement is a big mental health booster for you, carving out a space where you can blast your music and dance is another avenue to using your home space as a heart-centered space. 

Is Your Home Giving You a Hint?

We can also use our homes as indicators of when things are astray. If you’re struggling to perform daily responsibilities, like hopping in the shower or tending to that looming pile of laundry, then it may be a sign that your mental health is suffering. When our mental health is declining, healthy habits can give us the boost we need.

Yokota refers to this as the “home loop,” explaining that our home can support healthy habits. She suggests stocking up on items that help you stick to positive behaviors.

I can attest to this sentiment. When stressed, I often fall behind on essential household tasks. After seeing a friend of mine declare ad nauseam how a particular formulation of natural cleaning spray brought her joy due to its fresh scent, organic ingredients, and pretty label, I became curious if the same could hold true for me.

While I was doubtful any bottle of cleaning spray could combat one of my most tried and true maladaptive coping tools, I bought one begrudgingly. Turns out, this habit of cleanliness feels much less painless when I’m enjoying the natural aromas of citrus essential oils. Plus, I always feel much better when all is said and done.

Heal Your Mind Through Your Home

According to Yokota, bright colors make for bright moods. “Corals, lemon yellows, and blues with plenty of white in them are the first places to turn when wanting to bring color into a room that always lifts the mood,” she shares. Have a personality that leans towards a go-big-or-go-home ethos? Me too. My mind immediately went to stressful visions of trying to figure out how to paint my living room. Turns out, that isn’t necessary.

“Don’t feel like you have to paint. Just a pop of these colors here and there gets the job done,” assures Yokota. These words should be a relief for renters, those on a budget, and the DIY-adverse alike. 

Studies show that exposure to natural elements can lead to improved cognitive function, mental health, and brain activity. Not all of us have the privilege of having easy access to green spaces, but that doesn’t mean we can’t bring green space to our homes. 

Crafting Your Vision

You’ve likely visited a place that you love and often reminisce about. Perhaps it was a chic hotel on vacation or a visit to your grandmother’s house. You can use these places as inspiration for what you’d like your space to feel like.

Interior designer Courtney Madison encourages folks to create a folder filled with images that remind them of their favorite places to visit. She invites individuals to consider what about each of these spaces makes them feel good, whether that is the furniture, the color, or even the energy of the room. “Once you have a better understanding about what makes you feel happy [in those spaces], try to adapt those to your space,” she explains.

She continues by expressing simple solves like adding pillows to your sofa or moving your sofa closer to the window. “Remember, this is your space. Don’t worry about trends; just think about what brings you joy,” she asserts.

Build It On A Budget

Finances can be a major barrier in revamping our homes. Ease the pressure and keep in mind that it is an ongoing process. “I’m a big believer that good homes aren’t created overnight… The best ones develop over time,” explains Madison. Part of what can build a heart-centered home is crafting small details that genuinely bring you joy, many of which can take time.

Perhaps it is your favorite serving bowl from your parent’s house that you have on loan from your mom or a photo from your wedding day in a vintage frame from a thrift store. Consider where you can add sentimental details that jog your memory back to fond moments with those you love. Yokota backs up this notion. “Even strategically placing photography that reminds us of a special place or time can give us a much-needed daily dopamine hit,” she states

Daily Delights

As you begin to build your home to have more intention, consider how you can engage in your space mindfully. Yokota shares that she has a home therapy intention tray that she incorporates within her morning routine. “Humans are visual creatures and the intention tray helps take a hope that we hold for ourselves inside and places it out into the physical world,” she explains.

For example, her tray holds a candle, journal, pretty pen, and mantra book, all of which represent her current intention of doing away with limiting beliefs. Consider what you’re hoping to shift within your mindset and take an inventory of what objects represent that to you. 

Personally? I am becoming more intentional with creating a separation between work and home life, despite having a home psychotherapy office. On a small tray placed on my desk, I have set out a stick of palo santo, a journal, and a deck of affirmation cards. As the woodsy smoke fills the air and I pull an affirmation card to set an intention for the evening, my mind gently strays from my clinical work.

As soon as I open my office door and prepare to enter back into my personal world, I can trust my intention, closing the door on my various thoughts and feelings from the work day. As I walk through my hallway, my home’s lack of natural light is drowned out by the delight I feel as I pass by images that remind me of the places I’ve been, the places I’ll go, and the many people I’ll meet along the way.

The methods of home design are magic, and it turns out the most potent medicine can be the space where we lay our heads.