I Have Entered My 40's A Different Person
Yesterday, I turned 40 years old. It honestly felt like a page turned in my life. I felt light and excited and like a weight has lifted off my shoulders. I have a new vision, new interests, new likes and dislikes, new thoughts, and a new decade ahead of me.
One thing I especially decided to grab this decade is the idea that it is ok to fix up my house.
For some reason, I latched onto the idea in the past that it is somehow wrong to, say, take out a loan to fix up a house that is outdated, run down, but still useable. Funny thing is I didn't really think this of other people. I didn't look at people moving into a new home and fixing it up as being wrong of them. In fact, I sighed with a tinge of envy. But, as is common with many people, to feel better about what we can't do, we moralize it.
In the past we simply didn't have the funds to put into the house. It was a sacrifice we made so I could stay home when the children were small. So, I semi-consciously created a morality around my poverty that made me feel guilty when I really really REALLY wanted to fix up my house.
The children are older and we are getting into a better financial situation. Fixing up our house, and not just fixing it up on a teeny tiny budget of next to nothing, is in our grasp. At first, I felt terrible about the prospect. Would it be unwise to spend so much money or even get a loan to fix up the house? I decided no. It's important.
Our little cottage deserves to be fixed up. She hasn't seen much renovation since she was built in 1950. The bathroom got a facelift in the 90s, it seems. There are many things that are broken. Things like the electricity needs to be updated. We live in a different world with different electronics and different needs. Plus, we have to face the reality that we'll likely grow old in this house. It wouldn't be wise to grow old in a house that continues to need work. Better to do it now while we are still fit and able. I have 25 years before I am retirement age. That's plenty of time to pay off a mortgage-style loan on home renovation.
In order to do all this, I also have cast off my 1950s ideaology of being a forever stay at home wife. I am now a business owner.
Because I am a business owner, I cast off my false morality concerning keeping up my own appearance. Not that I was poorly groomed, but I shunned salons in the past and settled on whatever I could wear (especially footwear) inexpensively, keeping clothes longer than they looked good and attached a morality to it. Good-bye super long hair that is no longer serving me. You were cute in my younger days when you were thick and blond. Now, you are thinning and graying out and I want to look professional and not witchy.
I am not "displeasing God" or "becoming worldly" by fixing up my house or being well-groomed. I've thrown off those past assumptions. God placed me in the first world not to live like the second world. Holding myself back doesn't help me extend myself to others. It hid me and made me unapproachable.
I cast all that off and enter my 40's a new woman!
One thing I especially decided to grab this decade is the idea that it is ok to fix up my house.
For some reason, I latched onto the idea in the past that it is somehow wrong to, say, take out a loan to fix up a house that is outdated, run down, but still useable. Funny thing is I didn't really think this of other people. I didn't look at people moving into a new home and fixing it up as being wrong of them. In fact, I sighed with a tinge of envy. But, as is common with many people, to feel better about what we can't do, we moralize it.
In the past we simply didn't have the funds to put into the house. It was a sacrifice we made so I could stay home when the children were small. So, I semi-consciously created a morality around my poverty that made me feel guilty when I really really REALLY wanted to fix up my house.
The children are older and we are getting into a better financial situation. Fixing up our house, and not just fixing it up on a teeny tiny budget of next to nothing, is in our grasp. At first, I felt terrible about the prospect. Would it be unwise to spend so much money or even get a loan to fix up the house? I decided no. It's important.
Our little cottage deserves to be fixed up. She hasn't seen much renovation since she was built in 1950. The bathroom got a facelift in the 90s, it seems. There are many things that are broken. Things like the electricity needs to be updated. We live in a different world with different electronics and different needs. Plus, we have to face the reality that we'll likely grow old in this house. It wouldn't be wise to grow old in a house that continues to need work. Better to do it now while we are still fit and able. I have 25 years before I am retirement age. That's plenty of time to pay off a mortgage-style loan on home renovation.
In order to do all this, I also have cast off my 1950s ideaology of being a forever stay at home wife. I am now a business owner.
Because I am a business owner, I cast off my false morality concerning keeping up my own appearance. Not that I was poorly groomed, but I shunned salons in the past and settled on whatever I could wear (especially footwear) inexpensively, keeping clothes longer than they looked good and attached a morality to it. Good-bye super long hair that is no longer serving me. You were cute in my younger days when you were thick and blond. Now, you are thinning and graying out and I want to look professional and not witchy.
I am not "displeasing God" or "becoming worldly" by fixing up my house or being well-groomed. I've thrown off those past assumptions. God placed me in the first world not to live like the second world. Holding myself back doesn't help me extend myself to others. It hid me and made me unapproachable.
I cast all that off and enter my 40's a new woman!
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