The Importance of Creating Your Own At-Home Creative/Relaxation Place

As adults, it’s all too easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of modern life. 

Days turn into weeks and years, and the little creative and relaxing pursuits we used to enjoy can fade into the background, even if we might not notice it at first.

Addressing this problem will require work, but jumping back into old positive habits, and creating new ones, is an achievable goal.

Setting up a dedicated relaxation and creative environment within your home is a great way to unwind, fulfill your potential, and it can even open up avenues for the rest of your life.

With that in mind, we want to take a look at the benefits of this concept, how you might apply it, and the range of examples from which you can draw.

Making Time for Yourself

A natural part of getting older involves moving beyond the things we used to love and enjoy. We often think of this as simply growing up, but this isn’t always the case.

Instead, leaving parts of life behind can be more accidental, as a response to new demands placed on us by life, work, and family.

It’s not that we wanted to stop being creative and having the time to chill out, it’s that we were increasingly occupied until we forget those parts of ourselves.

Thing is, forgetting something doesn’t mean it’s forgotten you. The same part of your brain that loves to be creative and needs to relax is still there, and even decades later, it can still be tickled by the same pursuits.

From a place to engage in creative seasonal crafts to a dedicated chillout zone, there’s considerable potential to unlock if you take inspiration from your past.

Even if you don’t have any ideas from your childhood, there are still a near-infinite number of possibilities in your own space from which you can draw.

That our surroundings will modify our emotions is not a new concept, it’s been a cornerstone of design for years. Creating your own space, even if it’s small, gives you room to expand your mind, breathe, learn new skills, and have fun.

Just as importantly, we need to internalise that there is nothing wrong with taking a break. Whether through our parents or life’s trajectory, we can feel lazy or wasted when taking time off, and this attitude can be harmful.

The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted, as the saying goes, and as long as your physical needs are met, it’s perfectly fine to take the time for yourself.

Examples in Action

To put the concepts into perspective, let’s consider a couple of different approaches for chillout and creative work. For example, S, a busy banker, comes home to help her family and finds time to unwind before she goes to bed.

Here she uses a little corner decorated with old pictures of family pets to keep her smiling, as she checks out bonuses, plays a few rounds, or just gets lost in conversation.

On the other hand, B is a stay-at-home Dad with time when his kids are at school. To keep himself busy, he’s set up one side of his spare room for his creative hobby, working on 3D prints and models.

As a big fan of Warhammer, he’s decorated his environment with banners from his favourite events, while, burning incense of old pine to remind him of his father’s workshop where his love of the hobby originated.

Working from a standing desk and ergonomic chair, he also shows off a signed picture of him with Henry Cavill, a fellow Warhammer enthusiast, to remind everyone how cool the hobby really is.

Creating Your Space

Some of us will be lucky enough to have the space to dedicate an entire room as our personal relaxation or creative zone, but many aren’t so fortunate.

If you live in a big city where space is at a premium, carving out a niche and finding ways to effectively utilise the space you have can be tricky, but luckily the same general concepts apply to rooms of all sizes.

Firstly if possible, a view needs to play a major part in your place of work/relaxation. This can mean looking out a window into a nice view, or it can mean simply dedicating a corner of a room with the right materials.

If you’re going for a comfy feel, hanging curtains of calm colours can be the way to go, whereas creative corners might be better suited to flashy layouts and bright images. You want your area to settle you into a frame of mind as soon as you lay your eyes on it, and since we’re visual creatures, this is a great place to start.

Moving on, our next stop is the underrated world of smell. Your olfactory system is linked closer to the emotions part of your brain, the limbic system, than other senses are.

If you’ve ever wondered why a long-forgotten smell briefly experienced can bring you to tears, this is why. It’s not just nostalgia that the nose knows either, it can also help through relaxation and fostering creativity.

Whether through candles, incense, or whatever your choice, don’t overlook this approach.

From sights and smells, we now need to consider comfort. Dragging out old furniture you have lying around can work, but the wrong piece of equipment can also hurt more than help. Whether you’re looking at creativity or relaxation, ergonomics is important.

It is important to balance comfort with the right tools for the job. This could be a simple nice reclining chair, or a crafting desk and office chair if you want to buckle down for some hard creative action. Remember that second-hand can be a great choice here, as new layouts can be expensive.

Depending on your loves and needs, there are infinite ways to build a relaxing and/or creative environment that works for you. Even if you need to experiment to find a way forward, remember to not feel guilty, and that this is a part of life that truly embraces what it is to be human. Your own place to acquire balance is important, and it’s something you need to hold close to your heart.