In the Beginning

It all started when my mother passed away and the task of clearing out her Florida condo was left to me and my sister. Sitting amongst the spray bottles, rubber gloves and garbage bags I remember thinking "Why on earth do we all have so much shit?"

The answer, of course, is complicated. We start out with the best intentions and then get swept up in the living of our lives and suddenly we look around and think, where did all of this come from? It's really nobody's fault. But it got me thinking that every day there is probably someone cleaning out their deceased parent's crap, and every day there's someone buying something they don't really need, and every day there's someone suffocating in the clutter of their life and wishing that their house looked better. And since the one commodity we never seem to have enough of is time, I couldn't help but feel that I was onto something.

We live in a land of super-size-me and capitalism-gone-wild and even as I see examples of this virtually everywhere, I have also noticed a small but growing movement of radicals rejecting this super-consumerism and choosing a simpler, restrained, hand-hewn and ultimately more satisfying lifestyle. This was the beginning of my wondering if we could live differently, with more balance and moderation, and still feel joyous and full and surrounded by beauty.

I soon found myself at home, catatonically watching back-to-back episodes of Sex and the City and wondering – now what? I had quit my career in advertising and after much soul searching, I decided to put myself in the hands of a skilled career counselor and enroll in an online business school program. And you know what? All of my Myers-Briggs, career vectors, skills inventories and strategy canvases brought me right back to where I started – I have always been an artist.

It was the beginning of House Whole.