Sort your switch out and set yourself up for success
A tiny thing, a big deal.
It is a pretty basic thing – you use it multiple times a day, usually (unless loadshedding is involved) without even thinking about it.
It’s on or it’s off, sometimes it can be dimmed, sometimes it can be automated, some even listen when you clap or speak but that’s it. It is just a light switch.
Sounds like a silly thing to spend time and money on, but this little thing can have a huge impact.
Personal anecdote time:
When I moved into my first house it was the fixer uppest of fixer uppers. No two floor surfaces matched, it hadn’t been painted indoors or outdoors since the sixties, the bathroom was the dreaded avocado porcelain, and the garden well…wasn’t.
Switched off
Feeling lost, suffering from severe buyer’s remorse and with no idea how to make this hovel a home, I looked at my partner with big, worried eyes.
He got in the car and drove off
At first I thought he was running away but about 40 minutes later he came back with a bag from the local hardware store and a screwdriver.
The great switch-switch
Meticulously, amidst the stacks of unopened boxes, treading across cracked tiles and stained carpets, he went from room to room and simply replaced all the mismatched, finger-stained light switches with pristine white minimalist ones.
The switch that was heard around the world!
…And that changed everything. Suddenly the house started to look like a place where people with a plan lived. We went out the very next morning got paint and by that evening three rooms were painted. We followed up our switch-switch with new light fittings and new wall plug covers, and slowly but surely our house moved from fixer upper to fixed up and we felt at home. This wasn’t an expensive fix, but it was the visible, tangible change that we needed. We could see the impact a little bit of work would have and that kicked us into action…You might even say it “switched us on.”
A new home or even an old one you’ve been neglecting can seem an insurmountable task. Not knowing what, how and where to start can be paralysing.
