Living a Life with Purpose: A place to call home

January 18, 2015

Written by Heather Hymas

What does your house say about you? How does your house make you feel? Does the size of your home matter? Does it affect your moods, your state of mind, or your productivity?

Do you judge other people based on what you see when you go into their home, or where they live? Of course you do! We all do, whether we want to admit it or not, how a person lives, or how we perceive their surroundings, says a lot about how we interpret their character. I don’t want to get into the perils of judging others and the slippery slope that it leads us to; but rather, I would like to take a moment and look at how my homes have shaped my personality over the years, what I have learned, and how I have judged myself by my surroundings.

Let’s just say, I did not grow up in an affluent home. I really didn’t grow up in a home per se` at all because we moved so often. There really is not one house that stands out in my mind as my “childhood home.” I have literally lived in houses of every shape and size in many different towns from basement apartments, to a travel trailer, to a lovely brick home, to a regular trailer, to my mother’s three story dream house, to the tiny old white house where we had seven people living in two bedrooms, to my favorite house that had the big garden in the back. That one had a cherry tree that I climbed once and was stuck up in all day because I was too scared to climb down. These are just some of my childhood homes, and then there are so many more that I have resided in over the years as an adult. So, what does this say about me?

Some of you reading this may be thinking to yourself, oh that is so sad–she never had a real place she called home–roots shall we say? And, on one hand, I would agree with you, but on the other hand I would have to vehemently disagree. Yes, I often longed for the house with the white picket fence and the “Leave it to Beaver” scenario playing out there everyday after school.

I would look at other kids and think how great it was that they lived with both their mom and their dad. It seemed that they had all these wonderful memories and experiences stored up and forever living inside the walls of their perfectly decorated houses; I was jealous. It was hard moving all the time and always being the new kid and starting over, and over, and over… I was often standing on the outside of a group’s inner circle wishing I could join and be a part of something that had taken years to build, but as life kept moving, so did my family, and I learned some valuable lessons about people, myself, and life in general along the way.

1. You can always paint over it or clean it up. No matter how shabby or dirty something gets, you can always scrub it clean or make it look new again with a fresh coat of paint. There is value in restoring the old and/or cleaning off the dirt and seeing that there is still something beautiful just hiding underneath. New and bigger is not always better.

2. You can make any situation work if you have to. Whether it was four of us living in a ginormous three story house, or six of us living in a tiny travel trailer, there was always a way to make it work and for everyone to have their needs met. It might not have always been fun or comfortable, but it was always doable. If you are willing to try, there is a way to make the best out of any situation.

3. Things are just things; they will come and they will go. Don’t get so attached to objects that they ever become more important than people. Houses and everything in them can be replaced, but people and relationships can not.

4. The “in-crowd” isn’t always what it seems to be. Being popular and a part of the crowd that seems to have it all can be just as challenging and lonely as sitting at a middle school lunch table by yourself. Trying to be accepted and mimic a group of people that do not really care about you is the loneliest place on the planet. Having a few really good friends with whom you have common interests and who really know you as a person is far superior to having the most friends with whom you have nothing in common at all, and/or can not really be yourself around. Approval from others will never fill your heart with love and joy like approval from yourself will.

5. Starting over is not always good, but it can always be better. Leaving what you know and everything familiar behind is hard, and can be devastating sometimes. I often had to leave good friends, teachers, neighbors, and houses that I loved for what seemed to be a step-down, or a much lesser, lower if you will, situation. But you know what I found by having to do this? I found that there are good people everywhere you go if you give them a chance and get to know them. I found that even though it hurts and is sad to leave some things behind, if I look forward instead of backwards there is always something good waiting down the road. And that different is just different, it is not always better or worse, sometimes it is just different, and different can be amazing.

6. Don’t base your self-worth on your address. I literally was the same person with all the same qualities on the inside when we lived in the trailer court as I was when we lived in our three story dream house. I felt the sting of being judged by others many many times when they saw where I lived, and what we had or didn’t have. Being smart, kind, funny, and loving, or the opposite of these qualities, did not depend upon what door I closed behind me every night. Those things had to come from and be nurtured inside of me. Think of this when you meet someone new, and they allow you the privilege of coming inside their house for the very first time. Where they happen to reside at that point and time in their life doesn’t define them as a person, and it doesn’t predict where life will take them next.

I could go on with examples, but I think you get the idea, and I’m pretty sure I hit the most important ones. You can choose to read these literally as they are written, because they are all good lessons in and of themselves, or you can choose to look at the metaphor lingering just below each one as it applies to life in general.

Whether you lived in the same house for the first 18 years of your life, or you have moved more times than you would like to count–like I have, and whether you decide to put down roots somewhere and live your last 25 years in the same house, or you choose to travel the globe and keep starting over in new surroundings. Remember, it’s not about the four walls that keep you safe at night, it’s about what you take and let co-habitat within you.

They say home is where the heart is, but I say make your heart your home. That way no matter where life takes you, or where you end up laying your head for the night, it will always be enough and you can always feel like you have roots planted firmly in the ground, because you have them connected to what is important to you and your purpose.

Heather Hymas has been a teacher in one form or another for the past 14 years. She has taught fourth grade, intermediate school, and college English, both at Dixie State University and Southern Utah University. She currently works as a teacher in a residential treatment center for troubled youth. She has a B.S. in elementary education, a master’s degree in education, and is currently working on her doctorate. She lives in St. George with her teenage daughter.