Owning something as mine to tend, to repair, to dispose of, or to maintain and use requires honesty and wisdom. It gets me out of dream land and what-if land and wishful thinking and moves me to do something productive with and grateful for what really is.
Here's an example of one of the ways I had to apply this idea. We bought this old stone house over thirty years ago. The only other house I had lived in during all my growing up years was a farm house. I thought I knew home making in a
We had bought ourselves a cottage/cabin full of issues and in our naivete had became owners of an impossible farm house. What a struggle. I tried to "own" it. It wouldn't. Every thing was wrong about it. No master bedroom on the main level, no carpeted parlor area, kitchen almost non-existent in any farm house sense, and the windows felt like a crying shame to me. I did cry sometimes. Still, I loved the curb appeal and the trees and the unique stone walls.
I can't tell you exactly when it finally occurred to me that this house is not a farm house with straight painted walls and halls and carpets and properly strung electric fixtures and plug-ins. But when we began to own this place as a cottage or cabin, it began to make sense to us. The new wall coverings and floors could be wood as we liked after-all. And those heartbreaking windows suddenly swung "in" on their old hinges in perfect cottage style. We began to make progress on this house as a real home: new roof, new floors, and the tiny, almost "non-existent" kitchen was now perfect for my own cottage.