About a month ago I started a collection of writings that are no more than a sentence or two long.  I call these writings ‘mini musings’.  Several days ago I shared one of my mini musings with my Facebook and Twitter families.  For some reason that particular mini musing stuck in my head.

I tweeted and posted, “Sometimes all it takes to solve a problem is to change the perspective from which you are looking at it.  A new perspective can work wonders.”  That made me think back to the makeover on four rooms of my house that I undertook several years ago.  The twist on this makeover was that my house was in Texas, but I was in Europe.

I knew what I wanted for each room.  I selected paint and flooring and said a prayer that the den, master bedroom, master bathroom, and exercise room would be transformed into the spaces that I envisioned by the time that I returned from my five day business trip.

Amazingly I did not worry while I was away.  I had confidence that the contractors could and would make everything work.  That feeling changed when my return flight landed at the airport.  My confidence dwindled and I bounced between excitement and fear as I wondered what would greet me at my house.  The nervousness overtook me as I drove into my garage.  I fumbled with my keys and struggled to get the entrance door open.

I tipped inside and surveyed my surroundings.  The first renovation that I encountered was the den.  It was spectacular.  The new hardwood floors added warmth to the room and made it more inviting.

I moved onto the next piece of the project, the exercise room.  The ugly animal print border left by the previous owner was gone and the walls sported a radiant soft gold.

The next stop was the master bedroom.  The sea foam green of the walls and the beauty of the hardwood floors washed away the last bit of anxiety and induced a sense of peace in me.  Only one room was left.  I could not wait to see it.

I crossed the threshold into the master bathroom.  Words escaped me.  I could not believe that this was my bathroom.  The green on the walls jumped out at me, but not in the way that I expected or wanted.  There would be no long bubble baths in this bathroom.  The color was beyond unattractive.

I asked myself if I could live with the color.  I’m a glass half full type of person, but I was challenged to see any possibilities.  I took a step back and examined the room again.  There was no change.  Maybe I was influenced by jet lag.  A 15 hour trip can make a woman more sensitive to things than she normally would be.  It was late, so I decided to go to bed and wait to see how the color struck me the next day.

Eight house of sleep and fresh eyes did not help the situation.  Not only did I not see any improvement, the color seemed more extreme than the day before.  The light green that I hoped would be tranquil had mutated to granny smith apple green.  I told myself that there was still hope.  I had not placed the wall hangings and rugs back in the space.  I was certain that the room would look better with everything back in place.  After all, one of the reasons that I picked that particular color was because it looked like it would work with my existing wall hangings and rugs.

I put the four rugs and three wall hangings that were part of the old decor back in place.  They did not perform the magic that I hoped for.  The accessories clashed with the wall color and ramped the ugliness of the room up a notch.  “Don’t panic.”  That was all that I could say to myself as I tried to hold back the tears.

As I cleared the room of the obsolete items, a lotion bottle on the vanity caught my eye.  I noticed that the ocean blue bottle cap worked well with the green walls.  From that I concluded that adding touches of ocean blue into the room would tone down the wall color.  Off I went with the cap in hand to search for rugs and other decorations in that shade of blue.

I guess I should have paid more attention to the interior design magazines.  Blues were out that year.  Muted purples were in.  I didn’t find anything remotely close to what I was looking for.  I returned home deflated.  It was clear that I would have to work with what I had until I could paint the walls.

My pragmatic side surfaced, and I decided that the only accessory that I needed was a rug to step on when I got out of the shower.  Any rug would do until I was able to redo the walls, so I put my favorite of the old rugs back down.

Then I noticed something that I missed earlier.  By some twist of fate the green on the walls matched the green that swirled through the floral pattern of the rug.   A light went on in my mind.  I needed to approach the situation from a different perspective.  I decided to use the other colors of the rug to try to create a more soothing atmosphere.  I zeroed in on the ruby red and golden taupe that worked well with the green.

A few trips to my favorite home decor store and I found the accessories that I needed to complete my master bathroom.  It turned out that I had the bathroom that I wanted from the beginning.  I simply had to look at it from a different perspective to realize it.  I had to stop trying to make the new wall color work with the old decorations.  When I did that I opened myself up to new possibilities, and the option that I needed presented itself.

Life can be like that.  Sometimes we encounter a situation that at first glance appears unappealing, but when we stop judging it by our old way of thinking and seeing we open ourselves up to wonderful new prospects.

Is there something in your life that you could change from a challenge into a blessing by shifting your perspective?  What do you need to look at differently?  Perspective is powerful.  Let it work for you, not against you.

Blessings!

See.  Live.  Enjoy.