DIY Disaster Part 2: Sometimes Things Have To Get Worse Before Getting Better…

Have you ever noticed that when things ‘go wrong’ the situation can sometimes ‘escalate’ and it seems that when you think a situation is at it’s worst, you are simply WRONG? Oh yes, worse is definitely still to come…..

Well that’s the case with our DIY Kitchen Disaster at the moment!

Fortunately though, I’ve learned over the years, that when there is some ‘chaos’ it means that I’m being shoved in the right direction even if it’s a bit of a nightmare as it happens!. 

Sometimes life has to be at it’s ‘worst’ before we move ourselves out of our comfort zones and really do something that makes the massive shift that we need to make in our lives or to achieve one of the ‘visions’ on our Vision Boards…..

I don’t know why but sometimes, I forget to put the most obvious things on my vision board so when I updated my board for 2017, I added a picture of a lovely ‘glitzy’ kitchen. Why wasn’t a ‘glitzy kitchen’ already on there when ours has always been a ‘pain in the bum’… (to put it politely!) and I know Vision Boarding works…. I’m sure I ‘block’ myself from putting things on there.. Note to Self… Must investigate this further!

We fitted the original kitchen 25 years ago, on a shoestring budget and it was installed by my hubby who’d never fitted a kitchen previously…. Need I say more!!! (Sorry hubby – you tried hard and I appreciated it but the holes in the back of the cupboard, the numerous water leaks under the sink and the corner cupboard that couldn’t be used, weren’t great…..).

Have you noticed that sometimes we just get ‘stuck’ with things in our life that aren’t good and yet we just get used to them and continue to live with all sorts of ridiculous things for far too long. It can be the same with relationships and/or friendships can’t it? We sometimes cling onto old friendships because they’ve been part of our lives for so long when really we should just ‘let go’… I’ve experienced this recently in my life when I realised that a long standing friendship had become ‘toxic’… It took a pretty extreme event though for me to see it for what it was and to finally let go….

So one way or another, the Universe has been sending me messages to simply ‘let go’… First with my old and dilapidated 25 year old kitchen and then with a friendship that had been part of my life for over 40 years… In both cases, I’ve had to experience extreme ‘discomfort’ to shove me out of my not so comfortable ‘comfort zone’….

We are driven in our lives by the need to ‘avoid pain’ and to ‘seek pleasure’ and sometimes we put up with a degree of pain because we fear what the future holds. This is where I believe Vision Boarding comes into it’s own.

I added a picture of my dream ‘glitzy’ kitchen to my board and I can now see that this started off a sequence of events which began with a sudden out of the blue decision to do a DIY budget makeover on my existing kitchen.

I’d checked out Pinterest and seen some ‘fabulous’ kitchen makeovers (apparently) using Annie Sloan Chalk Paint.. Yay – great idea….. NOT!!!!!! This is one of the Pinterest pictures that inspired me….

I donned my shower cap… (not a good look but it stops me getting paint splattered in my hair..), bought some Annie Sloan paint and started painting…..

So.. why didn’t my kitchen look like the one on Pinterest?

I have the answer!!

It’s because it was never ‘meant to be’…. It wasn’t like the picture on my Vision Board. I was trying to be ‘responsible’ and to ‘make do’… with a kitchen that had REALLY seen better days. Well the Universe had other intentions…

My DIY makeover was SO bad that even hubby decided we could no longer ‘make do and mend’ and that it had to go completely. It became a ‘no brainer’…

My Vision Board is working it’s magic and although there has been some ‘pain’ in letting go, for the first time in my life (and that’s a pretty long time), I’m going to get the kitchen I dreamed of…

Why ever did I wait so long to put it on my Vision Board!

In this period of complete and utter mess, which has left me with no water downstairs, a trickle of freezing cold water upstairs and no cooker, I’ve also learned to appreciate the ‘little things in life’ once more, which means that when I move out of the ‘pain zone’ and into the ‘pleasure zone’, I’m really going to savour the moment…

Here’s my ‘kitchen pain zone’…

And I’m moving toward my ‘kitchen pleasure zone’…. The plasterer has been in … although he still wasn’t able to cover the ‘grotty area’ so that’s been left to my husband to ‘bodge it’…. I meant to say – rectify it.. haha!

And…. every cloud has a silver lining.. Being a ‘hardy camper’, it’s still possible to cook a  ‘full monty’ breakfast on a camping stove and paper plates are worth every penny… who needs a dishwasher!

Other ‘healthy options’ for cooking are a bit limited and I will certainly appreciate getting back to ‘hot water ‘on tap’, the ability to once again cook my healthy low carb meals on my new cooker and the ‘hot shower’ without having to trek around to my sisters… thank goodness my sister lives next door and that Marks & Spencer is only 5 minutes away for some ‘healthy food options’…

This last few weeks has definitely made me appreciate the ‘little things’ that I often take for granted and which I know I am lucky to have, as not everyone in the world currently has access to water on tap…

It has also made me appreciate the need to let go of people in my life, who have held me back from living my dreams…

So the next time you enter a ‘pain zone’, maybe it’s time to ask yourself what message you are being given. What is the ‘discomfort’ showing you? Maybe it’s time to move out of your uncomfortable ‘comfort zone’ and move toward your ‘pleasure zone’ instead!