What IS a Life Less Ordinary?

The line ” a life less ordinary” is something I bandy about with alarming frequency and though I know what I mean when I say it, it struck me today that YOU might have no clue whatsoever…

And so today I want to tell you what my vision of a life less ordinary looks like.

I want you to know that a life less ordinary doesn’t mean picture-perfect Instagram worthy home, heart or even hair, it simply means creating a way of life that reflects every last ounce of authenticity in you. Even the weird bits. And the wonky mouth.

A life less ordinary is created by a woman who wants her world to reflect her soul. It is fashioned by she who may not know exactly what she wants, but knows for sure, precisely what she doesn’t want. It isn’t a perfect life. It is sometimes messy and muddled. Constantly changing direction, not on a whim but to reflect the growth in her soul.

For she who lives a life less ordinary is never static. She is always learning, needing, wanting, growing. She wants more and she knows with every inch of her being that more will never be delivered to any door she is content to hide behind.

For there’s the the rub: The woman who lives a life less ordinary doesn’t hide behind her own truth. She doesn’t pretend she can tolerate dull conversation or a job that has been numbing her lovely mind for years on end. She ends the marriage, says no to the invitation, moves out of the house, creates a business, books the plane and decorates herself and her home any damn way she chooses.

Sometimes she is scared. Sometimes she is broken. But always she is alive. With possibility. And dreams. Alive in a house that holds her like a hug. Not picking every last piece of furniture from one catalog but giving her very own sanctuary time and space in which to develop a personality that truly reflects who she is and more than that, who she wants to be.

Sometimes she is frustrated. A little demented. But she never finds herself standing at the school gates making the kind of small talk that makes her want to scream, nor tolerates the kind of practices designed to create robots instead of children. She reads, She meditates. She journals. And above all else she nurtures a rich inner life she does not have to share with anyone, for it is hers and hers alone.

You see I know far too many women who are empty. Who live to make money or please their husbands. I know women who are martyrs to their children. To terrible relationships with their Fathers. To housework and the Botox in their foreheads. To trying to give the rest of the world the impression that all is well behind their own four walls when there is little beyond borderline alcoholism, a pile of ironing and yet another box set.

I know women who say spiteful things because they are hurting. Who gossip about those living authentically because they so desperately want that authenticity for themselves. Women who simply don’t care that her relationship with her partner is non-existent as long as he brings home enough pennies to put another shiny car on the drive and pay the second mortgage on their holiday home and women who barely know their children at all, but enforce the kind of home rules that stifle their little souls.

I know these women. And I wish I didn’t. I wish I could give them all the key to their own authenticity. To grant them permission to be real, honest and even a little ridiculous at times. I want them to know that no-one cares whether the pictures they parade on Facebook show the perfect 2.4 family, but some of us care whether the woman who took those pictures feels alive. Feels hopeful. Feels energized by her own life and the routines and rituals she has created to support it.

I want to say stop now. Take a deep breath and let’s examine all that is true and necessary and abandon all that is dis-honest and done only to keep up appearances. I want to say stand in your own light and reap the beautiful consequences. Feel the scary highs and lows. Cry and scream and throw in the tea-towel on something that isn’t serving you. Decide here and now to only tolerate that which brings meaning to your life.

Visit galleries instead of holding coffee mornings. Go the theater. Go to Italy! Read and read and read some more. Take the course. Do yoga. Climb walls. Have therapy. Buy the shoes. Take your son away for the weekend. Tell the doctor you feel like death warmed up. Tell the man/mother/teenager that from now on you are simply going to rise above their histrionics and let them stew. Walk out of the room and seek silence. Go for long walks when you should be hoovering. Insist on being truly kissed. Kissed until you can’t breathe. And if he won’t kiss you: leave. Eat well. Throw away all your money on really good food. Tell the friend you find her attitude to her children abhorrent. Speak the truth even when you have to squeeze the words out. Choose the wild wallpaper. Dye your hair. Forget playing safe.

Remember what it is to be you. Before you were a mother or a wife. Or a cashier or a teacher. Find a way to integrate that real you in to your everyday, in to your relationships, your obligations and resolve here and now to weather the storms of protest that just might come when you finally decide to be your best self.

This then is what I mean by living a life less ordinary. It is the reason why BrocanteHome exists and it is a gift I so very much want to help you bestow upon your self.

Originally published at www.brocantehome.net.

Alison May is the woman behind The School of Life and blogs about life, love and housekeeping at Brocante Home.