Immediate Spaces: Why Cleaning “Your Room” Should Be Your Priority

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There are two distinct sides to life. One is your inner life, the real you. The other is every place that your life touches the outer world.

If you’ve chosen to make God your center, He’s there in your inner self, providing peace, refuge, order, laughter.

Your inner life is what shines through to those you live with. It will be reflected in the condition of your home as well, especially in your most private and personal spaces where there is no one to please but yourself and the God who made you.

In the words of Anne Ortlund, “If this is true (that God is your life’s center) then your immediate surroundings ought also to reflect him. Your immediate surroundings–your drawers and closets, your bedside table, your desk–are the filmiest clothing of your most personal, private life.” The Gentle Ways of the Beautiful Woman

In terms of the orderliness of your home, what is your priority? Is it the main living area? I know mine often has been. It’s easy to want to put a “beautiful face” on for guests when in actuality the depths of the home are disorganized or unsightly.

Anne suggests a different priority. For her, the foundational, inner and secret life of a beautiful woman will be most reflected in how she keeps her personal, private spaces.

These are the spaces we can own as wives and moms. We can train our children to respect these areas as ours and keep them to our liking, beautiful and orderly as is our God.

Try this with me today. Let’s maintain our home not from the “outside” in, but from the “inside” out.

Let’s be disciplined in the way we keep our personal spaces. Neaten your room. Pick up anything that’s accumulated on bedroom surfaces. Organize and beautify your closet. Place a fresh flower in a vase on your bathroom vanity and another on your nightstand, and see if you don’t feel more centered and balanced, ready for the chaos of the day.

Creating orderliness in your immediate surroundings will provide a foundation and launch point from which you can “attack” the condition of the remainder of your house throughout the day.

What are your thoughts or reactions to these ideas?

 

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