Why the Pains of Homeownership Must be Solved
This post continues the documented journey from: Owning a Home Shouldn’t Hurt
In my last post I set a sort of stake in the ground, stating that I’m tired of how painful Home maintenance/improvement has been and that I’m going to build a company that builds products to eliminate that pain.
Before doing that, it’s important to me that I’m clear on why this is a problem any of us should care about. It’s how I intend to operate this company and it will be a part of our values; state your “Why”. What is the underlying motivation, why are you burning a hole in your mental wallet and consuming your thoughts to solve the problem at hand?
TLDR: My hypothesis is that stressful Home maintenance and improvement experiences introduce high impact levels of anxiety. High impact because it’s our homes, the most expensive thing we will probably ever buy and the sanctuary for our true and genuine selves. Those negative experiences in turn have a profound impact on whether we navigate the world in a positive or negative manner. How we navigate the world is how we leave behind our influence on the society around us, shouldn’t we be striving to leave behind a positive influence? It must start inside, with how we manage things in our Homes.
Why is fixing the pains of Homeownership important to me, you, and our future?
Homeownership is a powerful platform that creates mentally fit and strong people…the bedrock of a positive society.
Since becoming a homeowner, I’ve come to realize how powerful this experience can be. This isn’t just about having a roof over your head. Owning a Home means having a space that is truly yours, where you can express yourself however and whenever you want. Your emotions, feelings, thoughts, talents, the very essence of who you are as a person can be genuinely expressed in this space.
We don’t need research to remind us that our personal development is highly influenced by the Homes we grow up and live in. Everything from our cognitive, social, emotional, and behavioral domains are formed and transformed in large part because of where and how we live. And when we step outside, the lenses with which we view the world have been colored in with those experiences. We carry the memories, experiences, and even the idiosyncrasies of our Homes with us as we navigate the world.
(In an overly simplistic example, I didn’t use my dishwasher for years after moving out because my mom always said they did a bad job. It did make a great drying rack though!)
Without a strong foundation, platforms tend to crumble
I believe that in order for the experience of Homeownership to be a positive one, it must provide Safety, feel Comfortable, and be filled with Love.
Only then will we find that our mental well-being thrives and our resilience to deal with life’s challenges in a positive and virtuous manner remain strong. So when the sanctity of our Homes is interrupted, our very core as a person is shaken.
From the seemingly tiny to the biggest of projects, anytime we have work done on our Home, the experience is plagued with a lack of Trust, no Transparency, and extremely poor Communication. This leaves us with a feeling of Fear and Uncertainty. We become filled with anxiety and our belief in the Safety, Comfort, and Love of our Homes feels nonexistent. Of course the scale of impact is relative to the project size, but the cognitive and emotional tolls are still there.
Those stresses are then carried with us in the way we behave, speak, and think. Layer on the responsibility of partners, kids, bills, jobs, and it immediately becomes much harder to focus on what matter most; being good people.
The way we treat the outside world starts with what’s happening inside our own.
The Silver Rule is another one of those values that will be part of this company: “Do not treat others the way you would not like them to treat you.”…aka don’t be an a-hole to others if you don’t want others to be one to you.
Looking at life from this angle creates a stronger conscience to whisper in our ears. We can all identify what we don’t like pretty quick, so there’s no excuse for treating others poorly.
Of course that is easier said than done, especially when our homes, the sanctuaries of our mental safety feel like they’re in shambles.
The scary part is that the adverse effects of this aren’t limited to the walls we live in; it has an impact on our entire society.
How on earth could a poor home improvement experience negatively impact society?
Using the basic concept of a growth loop (just a process that gets bigger/smaller every time it’s run), I’d like to illustrate my hypothesis on what happens when Homeowners are properly equipped to make their Homes Safe, Comfortable, and Loving:
While this is an obvious oversimplification, I believe it holds a good amount of truth to it. The better equipped Homeowners are to handle the Fear and Uncertainty surrounding the state of their Homes, the greater the likelihood that society experiences a positive change.
That is why it is crucial to address and fix these pains of Homeownership. It’s not just about individual homeowners; it’s about the society we want to shape. When homeownership becomes a positive and empowering experience, it creates a ripple effect that benefits everyone. A society with mentally healthy and resilient individuals is a society that thrives, fostering stronger communities, better relationships, and a more positive future for everyone.
The battle I intend to fight is in that first input of the first loop; I am going to empower Homeowners with the tools and resources needed to handle such situations, and I will recruit a team of people to do it under the name Clear Casa.
