Haven’t we all held onto an idea or repeated behavior that proved incorrect, counter-productive, or costly? Kept stuff long after its usefulness has passed?

“Fish or cut bait” is a real (reel?!) thing if you’re fishing, and a folksy metaphor for almost any stalemate we face.  It’s a call to action, a decision to focus and evaluate where you’ll either stay the course of something less than productive (keep fishing) or change course to something more useful (like cutting bait).

Staging and design work is rife with these struggles. Some are serious matters, others not so much. But they all consume without a return: your time and energy, your brain space and life force.

Keep the uncomfortable sofa no one sits in? Stay with the well-intentioned paint choice that you ended up hating? Delay an important task until you can find the time to do it yourself? Dedicate dollars to work around something you don’t like?

Most of us take our space and things quite seriously, so revisiting what hasn’t worked out can be painful. In real estate, reports of low inventory and bidding wars are an especially bitter pill for home sellers whose listing continues to sit.

For many, staying the course becomes almost a moral issue: penance for their “bad” or costly decisions, or guilt because they really should have (whatever). OUCH!

We all harbor unproductive ideas or behaviors that limit us by sucking time and bandwidth. Dragging them out into the sunlight cuts them down to size.

My own dilemma: Holding onto single socks and earrings.

Socks or earrings that go missing are disappointing, but a part of life for most.  Oh no. Not me.  Written in attempted modesty font I have a remarkable track record of finding things.

Proudest find?  The hit-and-run driver who slammed into me on the Taconic. (Yes, really!) So it’s natural to reject that MY socks could go missing. I keep the orphans in a pile, expecting their mate to turn up at any moment: found folded into a piece of less-used laundry or in some other unexpected place.

Missing earrings are deeper as I love my earrings, and have a truly phenomenal record of finding most of the lost ones, in the damnedest of places.

Yet these two at left have stubbornly stayed single. And they mock me. Or, better said, I allow them to mock me.  One, kept on my desk, the other on a shelf above the kitchen sink.

Singles for some time (okay, years), no idea where I lost one, but I know where the other one is. Kinda-sorta. And despite all logic, I let it torture me more. It went rogue one winter on Rye Playland beach as I was walking with my dog Mona.  And yes, even if by some miracle it turned up I know it’d be terribly degraded from being in the water all this time. But yet, I still look.

I share this story for a few reasons.

If you’re feeling stuck, you’re not alone. We may think we are so unique when it comes to things that weigh on us.  But an entire career in the spaces-people-stuff business, and trust me, we’re not. We ALL want to finally like that uncomfortable sofa, pick that right paint color, or be able to lay that new floor: But the time, patience,  skill sets, and expectations don’t always line up.

As a designer and home stager, I’ve seen the pain and costs of indecision and the effects of hanging on to regret. But I’ve also witnessed clients’ relief, joy, and freedom that comes from working it through, and then getting on with their life.  Donating the sofa, repainting, or bringing in help to do something quickly, right, and well.

Life is too short to be surrounded by things you don’t like, in a space that doesn’t make you happy, or to be putting time into something that’s just not working out.

The Refreshed Home is a design and listing prep agency with a different approach.  We help you untangle and prioritize, giving you the tools to move forward as you want to. You drive the bus. You control the level of involvement and the costs.

A consult with The Refreshed Home, or its digital sister OrangeBoom will help you make your own best decisions about your space and your things so you can get on with the rest of your life. Want to know more? Just start the conversation!