The phrase “home is where the heart is” looks great cross-stitched on a pillow, but research suggests there’s more to it than that. Studies show that people may be less flexible, express more social isolation and aggression, feel like a victim and less supported by their local community when they don’t feel at home.
With a tight budget – or no budget at all – investing in making a short-term space feel comfortable and homey can seem senseless, but the human instinct is to nest.
Nesting can be any means of turning a living space into a place of comfort, belonging, and physical and emotional stability.
With a clear understanding that a shelter is not a home, our hearts were touched by how guests at the City of San José’s Bascom Emergency Shelter, run by HomeFirst Services created highly individual “nests” for themselves.
Maya Angelou wrote,
“The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place we can go as ware and not be questioned.”
How thoughtfully guests at the Bascom Shelter are arranging their space – all separated by the six foot distance considered safe social distancing. Whether blue or pink, plaid or solid satin or crocheted,
These arrangements represent that individual’s safe place that is unique and comfortable. Let us hope that this temporary space eases to some degree that ache for home.
SOURCE: Lindsay Schlegel, Verily Magazine on Nesting
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