David Trotter – Author, Speaker, Consultant

When I was a kid, I loved to re-arrange my room. I’d pull out a piece of paper, and I would start plotting out the most strategic location for each piece of furniture.

• What position should my bed be in? Near the door? In the corner? Under the window?
• Should my stereo be next to my bed or under the window?
• And, most importantly, where should I put my baseball collection?

I re-arranged my bedroom every couple of months for years! It was probably an adolescent sickness, but I absolutely loved it. I loved the creativity and the strategery. (That is a word, right?)

Then, I grew up.
I got married.
We decorated.
And, everything pretty much sat there.
Nothing moved.

Something changed when I moved back in with my family a couple of years ago. I re-decorated parts of our home, and I start taking photos and displaying them in matted frames and a creative hanging system. And, I started moving stuff around every few weeks.

Recently, I’ve found myself…

• Buying an old set of lockers and placing them in our living room as a functional decoration.
• Digging out a mid-century modern coffee table out of the trash in LA and using it.
• Using an old stereo credenza to place our flat screen TV on in our living room.
• Growing plants in a couple of glass terrariums.
• Buying new accent pillows for the couch.
• Displaying a number of my vintage cameras.
• Placing tall religious candles along our front walk way and unmarked tall candles around our home.
• Picking up interesting objects at a local home store and thrift stores and moving them around in different arrangements throughout our home.

Each time I place or move an object, it’s a moment of creativity. I’m enjoying the transformation of the moment, and I’m training myself to enjoy “change.” Rather than getting accustomed to the same ole thing, I’m enjoying the fluidity of our living space.

Not only do I want that for our home, but I want that for my life.

I want to hold things loosely and allow fluidity in my life. Things come and go. Experiences are here one moment and gone the next. People are here one day and not here soon after. Because of this reality of life, I don’t want to take anything for granted. When I allow things to fade into the background and just sit there, it’s like they become invisible. That’s why I like to move stuff around.

“Moving stuff around” means that I’m not seeing the world or people in the same way. I look at things from a different angle and think about things in a different way. What would it look like to move some stuff around in your life?

• What about re-arranging your schedule?
• How about re-arranging your priorities and calling someone that you haven’t talked to in a long time?
• Maybe you could re-arrange your home or move things around in your office at work.
• Perhaps you should re-arrange your desk and embrace a new organizational system.
• How about if you re-arranged when or where you exercised?
• Maybe you could re-arrange your mind and pick a new restaurant that you’ve never been to before.
• What if you re-arranged your closet and purchased a different style of clothing just to mix it up?

I don’t know what it would look like for you to move stuff around, but I bet you’ll feel a little off balance which will make you see things and experience life from a new perspective.

Move something around today…re-arrange life.

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