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Your home environment mirrors your emotional and mental state. The Home as a Mirror of The Self The thoughts, uncertainties, worries, trauma wounds, and emotions that you have not addressed, processed, and released, are mirrored in your home environment. When we experience significant mental preoccupation and emotional distress, as learned in previous blog posts, our body begins to feel the effects from the significant accumulation of stress, which can manifest in different ways. Those constant ruminating thoughts that continue to overwhelm your mind and any unprocessed emotions have the ability to make you feel detached from your home environment. Ruminating thoughts can make it difficult to shift our attention to planning, managing, organizing, cleaning, and modifying our home environment. Additionally, emotions that are stuck in our body can make it difficult for us to interact with our home environment. In particular, emotional distress can impact our mood, energy, safety, and comfort levels needed to engage authentically in our home environment. Your current home environment may also be a reflection of your trauma wounds. For example, if you grew up in a chaotic, unstable, unpredictable, or unsafe home, your current home environment may reflect the chaos and instability that you grew up with. You may have normalized growing up in these conditions and may be unaware that you are recreating similar patterns in your current home environment. Take a moment to reflect on the following questions: Does your home or a space in your home feel overwhelming? Are you having trouble figuring out how to make your home or a particular space in your home make sense? Are you struggling with keeping your home organized? Are you finding it difficult to feel at home in your own home? Do feel unsafe or uncomfortable in your home? Does your home or a space in your home create a lot of stress for you? If you answered yes, to any of these questions there may be a deeper layer to explore that will help you gain insight into how your internal state is disrupting how feel in, interact with and engage in your home environment.  If you answered yes to any of these questions, there may be a deeper layer to explore that will help you gain insight into how your internal state is disrupting how feel in, interact with, and engage in your home environment.  Creating a supportive home environment goes beyond decor and furniture, it is also a process of inner growth and healing. Read about what my client had to say about their experience with our home wellness refresh service. Client Testimonial “Working one on one with Maria was such a beautiful and eye-opening experience. My bedroom was a relic, an homage to my post college life. After the pandemic, like many others, I found myself feeling stuck and wondering about my life and what I wanted to achieve. My bedroom felt stuck and in need of some change, just as I felt I needed. Speaking with Maria was calming and reliable as she was very attentive to what I was looking for. Our design meetings felt like mini therapy sessions where I could speak my mind on the changes I was looking for. Now I have a new fresh space that aligns with the fresh start that I was seeking in my life.”   -Marialejandra Gutierrez disclaimer: This blog post does not replace therapy. This is an educational resource.

What is your home environment communicating to your nervous system? Brief Overview: The Nervous System at Work As human beings, we depend on our nervous system for cues of safety. Your nervous system is the main regulatory, monitoring, and communicating system in your body. Through its receptors, which are connected to the central nervous system and function as devices to receive and release signals to facilitate communication between the brain and different parts of the body, our nervous system remains connected with our environment, both internal and external. Although there are various types of receptors throughout our body, our sensory receptors are primarily responsible for responding to different stimuli in our environment. A stimulus is any agent, event, or situation, both internal or external, that elicits a response from an organism (American Psychological Association, 2023). When stimuli activate sensory receptors, our sensory receptors create electrical signals that carry information about the stimulus to be processed by the nervous system and then transmitted to the brain, two processes known as reception and transduction. These signals to the brain can produce sensations, thoughts, and activate memory and motor functions. At this stage, the process that begins to operate is our interpretation of the sensory signals which can function at a conscious level (perception) or at an unconscious level (neuroception). “Our brain’s ability to sense and interpret signals from the environment is essential in controlling how our bodies and emotions react and shape our overall feelings of safety and well-being.” – Dr. Stephen Porges Our interpretation of sensory signals can trigger physiological responses that prepare the body for action. If interpreted as safe, our parasympathetic nervous system operates to make us feel calm and connected. If interpreted as unsafe, our sympathetic nervous system activates the fight-or-flight or freeze response in order to defend from potential danger or dissociate from one’s overwhelming thoughts or feelings. Neuroception, Trauma, and the Home Environment As stated above, neuroception is an automatic process within our nervous system that allows us to interpret or evaluate sensory signals without awareness. For individuals who have experienced trauma, neuroception can become altered or dysregulated. Trauma disrupts safety by shifting the traumatized individual’s autonomic nervous system into a state of defense. This piece of information is important to be aware of and understand particularly when looking to create a supportive home environment. Individuals who have experienced trauma can develop heightened sensitivity which can lead to hypervigilance and heightened responses to perceived danger. For individuals with heightened sensitivity, it can become difficulty to relax and feel safe. For this reason, it is important to understand which design elements to incorporate that foster a sense of tranquility, predictability, and safety in order help restore and heal one’s nervous system. If one continues to incorporate environmental elements that activate defense responses, our home environment may never feel safe for our nervous system. However, if there is congruence between our nervous system and our  home environment it will help cultivate a neuroception of safety. -Marialejandra Gutierrez disclaimer: This blog post does not replace therapy. This is an educational resource.

Making changes to align your home environment and your inner growth and healing. When Your Home Environment No Longer Aligns If you are on a journey of growth, breaking cycles, and healing, it is important that you are surround by an environment that supports this journey. Since many of us retreat home after a long day or spend most of our day at home, our home environment should be suited to help meet our wellness needs. Living in a home environment that fosters and continues patterns of dysfunction, chaos, unpredictability, stress, and instability will impede your growth and healing. If your current home environment triggers unpleasant memories or feelings, induces stress, negatively impacts your mood, behavior, motivation, and rest, it is no longer supporting your mental health. Just as you make changes to care for yourself when you become physically ill as well as address and work through emotional wounds to improve your emotional well-being, you need to make sure your home environment serves as a support system to aid in your healing and recovery. If you have started to recognize that your home environment no longer aligns with the goals for your inner growth and healing, then that is a sign that change is needed and it is time to rebuild a new home environment for yourself. "Our home is part of our self-definition" Rebuilding a New Home Environment To rebuild your current home environment to feel safe and supportive, you need to begin by identifying the elements in your home that are keeping you down and holding you back from your growth and healing. Take a moment to reflect on the following questions: What area(s) in your home are creating stress? What systems at home are contributing to emotional distress? What elements in your home are no longer functional? What elements or area(s) in your home no longer make you feel safe? How does your home currently make you feel? How do you wish your home made you feel? How are you contributing to maintaining an unsupportive home environment? Once you have finished answering these questions, you can begin making changes in your home that will support your well-being. It is important to think about your home as an extension of yourself. Your body, mind, and home are all interconnected! A home is not just a physical space, but also a reflection of our identity, personality, culture, values, and aspirations. A home should also provide a sense of safety, comfort, and security. Since we seek refuge at home from stressors, it should be a place that allows you to relax, unwind, recover, and heal. If there is a disconnection between our home environment and our self, it creates dissatisfaction and stress in our life. Therefore, it is important that you continue to maintain and nourish your home to experience a greater sense of peace, safety, comfort, and belonging in order to continue to heal and thrive. -Marialejandra Gutierrez