5 Things High Value Women Do in Their Homes

Your home is shaping your body every single day, whether you designed it on purpose or not. In this episode I share the 5 things high value women do in their homes to lower stress, sleep deeper, and truly restore, with the science under each one. This is Nervous System Design, not decorating. Build one tonight and feel it, in your sleep, your calm, and how you show up for the people you love. Come and work with me at happyhealthyhomes.au, and follow me on Instagram @etienny.trindade. Etienny Trindade, founder of Nervous System Design. Spaces. Systems. Human.

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Hello, hello, and welcome back to Happy Healthy Homes. I am so glad you are here. Wherever you are listening from, take a deep breathing with me and let your shoulders roll. Today I'm going to tell you what the woman whose homes truly restore them do different. What high value, high achieving womans are doing. And I am going to show you the science underneath every one of them. Because this is not about taste. It is not about money. This is about what your home is doing to your body every single day. Right now, whatever you design it or not, there are five conditions, not tip conditions, and if you build even one of them tonight, it will change your life. I do not mean that as soft, I mean it in a measured way, in your sleep, in your stress hormones, in how you speak to the people you love. Let me show you. If you are new here, I'm a Chienny. I have more than 20 years experience in design, and I created the nervous system design methodology. I do this work because I live it. I came into this world with a sensitive nervous system, and for years I was told I was too much, too sensitive, and I felt completely out of place. It turned out what I felt was not weakness, it was information. I am neurodivergent, and now I help you read your own spaces and change them so you can have superpowers. So they support you to have clarity and feel relaxed, restored. Alright, let's start. I'm sure you're listening to this episode because you wanna understand. First one, they live with radical intention. High value woman lives with radical intention. And this is biology. It's not about decoration. Decades of research have shown that the single most protective factor against stress is stronger than money, stronger than time. It's sense of control. A body that believes it is in command of its environment, stay calm. A body that feels at the mercy of its surround and cannot control what's going on. Stay brave, stay stressed. So when you design a room on purpose, whenever choice answers one question, this question is goal by the way. How do I feel here? I think the question needs to start. How do I feel? And then you need to ask a second question. How do I want to feel here? So if I was starting to change my house today, that's how I would walk around my home. How do I feel here? How do I wanna feel here? You are not decorating, you are handing your nervous system the one thing it needs most. The nervous system job is just to make you feel safe. Here's what I want you to do. Walk into one room and ask it out loud if you have to. Is this here on purpose or is is here just because it landed or because someone gave me. It was a present, so I need to keep it now. And feel it in your body. Feel it that object make you expand, feel good, relaxed, or if you're tightened. Your body is your best data. You're going to listen to me to say this so many times. Just listen to your body. Everything that is there by accident on a space is quietly telling your body that no one is in control. The objects are in control. Change one thing on purpose today. One thing. Get rid of one object, put something away, and give yourself back that sense of control. Number two, they keep only what they love and they are unapologetic about it. This is so important. In 2010, two researchers named Sacabo and Rippetty. Sorry about the spelling, did something clever. They walked woman through their own homes, listened to how they described them and measured their stress hormones. Look how incredible this is. Imagine someone is walking you around your own house and they measuring your stress hormones. The woman who described their home as cluttered or unfinished had cortisol that stayed high from morning to the night. So the whole day their cortisol levels were high. A more depressive mood to go with it. The woman who homes felt restiful had cortisol that felt away a healthy body let it fall. So here this your home is not neutral. It is measurably raising or lowering your stress hormones in your blood. Every object your eye lands on that you do not like is a small open file your body has to hold. So it's like all these tabs on your brain that keep open, you know? Let's take a breathe. Stay with me. I want you to take two minutes today. Two minutes. And go to the surface that drains you most and remove one thing you keep out of guilt instead of love. So if someone gave you a present, send them gratitude. If you don't like it, donate it. Might be incredible for someone else. Don't keep anything in your home that doesn't make you feel good. It's your home. Just one. Take one thing out today. Fewer things, better things, loved things. This is my mantra. Okay? This is how I run my house. Fewer things, better quality things, loved things. Your body's keeping score. Okay? Remember that your court is always high. Might be all the things you don't like and you've been keeping for 20 years. Number three. High value woman. They build a space for rest on purpose. Because rest is not supposed to be a mood, it's a set of conditions. You do need to train your body to rest, and you do need to allow your body to rest. What happened is some people leave expecting the holidays. And I see this in so many people and I feel so sad because like my next holiday is in five months so I can relax. Don't live like that. Our life is too important to live like that. If you're just always keeping track of the holiday, because I know the resort is designed to relax your nervous system. Most hotels, good, really good hotels, are designed to make you relax, but pay attention on your space. Make your home that resort. Make your home a space you can come home every day and relax. There is a body of research called the tension restoration theory from the psychologists Kaplan and Caplan that showed that certain environments they activate rebuild or depleted attention. The exact resource that runs out by the end of a long day. Soft natural elements, a view of something green, gentle light, a space that asks nothing of you. You just want to get into a space and say, I don't need to do anything here. That's the kind of space you wanted to have on your home. And we know that in the evening, bright overhead light suppress melatonin. So we are working against our natural hormones. The hormone that let you sleep, let you rest, let you recover. So a brightly lit night is a body being kept awake on purpose. And that's why midnight you wake up and you can't go back to sleep. Because you didn't allow your body to slowly get into the melatonin and into that rest hormone. So here's your instruction: choose one corner and build it for recover, not for look. One low warm land, one soft texture, one living thing, just one place, at least one place that has nothing off your body and your brain. And use it. Use it every single day. A restorative space you never sit, is just small decoration. Like, what's the point to have a relaxing corner that you never visit? You do need to create a habit. Put in your calendar every night, 10 minutes. I sit here and do nothing. I read a book, I drink a tea. This is my relaxing time. Our ancestors used to do that. They had the porch, they would sit outside, there was culture. And some of sometime along the way that got lost, and people just became these crazy people that's always running for work. You know? What are we chasing? That we can never allow our body just to relax and rest. Before you go further, one small thing. If this is landing for you, follow, subscribe to this podcast, and send this episode for one friend or your sister that I think really need to listen to this. That's how our podcast will reach more people, the people it was made for, and that's how I can produce more podcasts. Number four, they let their home tell the truth about who they are, and they do not apologize for it. I love when I get into a space and I can see the person. Because I'm an architect, I'm a designer, every time I work to someone's home, they are very tense and they're like, what do you think? Of course I'm going to say it, so it's good. But there are that sense of light in my heart when I get into someone's house and if I can see them, you know. I have one friend that she's super happy and she loves Bali, she loves traveling. And when I see her house, I see her. She has no apology for her, which she is. She has her crystals, she has a cabinet with crystals, she has beautiful lamps from Bali. It's her. It's fully her. So stop building an IKEA, fully IKEA home. Start miss mismatching things. Who invented this thing that's everything's to match? That's not the truth. You don't need to decorate a house all at once. I have some rules in my house that I'm still deciding. I keep looking marketplace. I love the mismatching things. Because it's who I am. I love finding the antiques mixed with the modern. Really like mid-century pieces. So just be you. Don't apologize for being you, having your style. I suggest some colors because they calm down the body. But if you like purple, have some purple objects there. Here's the science underneath this one. And it is mine. Your nervous system is reading your environment many times a second. Asking one question. Am I safe here? When your home is styled for other people's approval, a version of you that's not quite you, your body staying in a low, constant stress. And I'll tell you something. Just be flexible. Come on. People think they need to design their homes to be static for 20 years. That doesn't exist. Life change. You change. Just let the house change. Do you know? Like you have kids, you have losses, you change jobs. So just change it. There's no harm to change your home and be you. Just make it your home. 89% of the homes I visit, they are very not the person at all. Do you know? It's really rewarding as a designer when I get into someone's house and it's them. It's just them. The same exhausting performance you run out in the world on your work and whatever you need to be. But when your home reflects the real you, your colours, your history, the things that are yours. Your nervous system finally reads belonging and it lets you put the performance down, let you relax and be you. Authenticity is not indulgence, it's rests from the part of you that's always on. It's like, do you know that picture that you took on that trip that was a memorable place and you loved it? Just put on the wall. Do you know that piece of something that your grandma did for you and you love it? Just expose it. Anything during the day that you look and make you feel good, that's going to lower your cortisol. And make you feel a sense of space, autonomy, happy. There is nothing better than that. So two things, but one thing that's completely not in you, out of your house, and let you bring something that reflects yourself, who you really are, and how your current life is right now. Because maybe your house has been the same for 20 years and no changes. Maybe this is the time to slowly change the environment. Number five. High value womans. They let the body come all the way down. And they protect it like the asset it is. Because most women are not resting. They are lying down while the body stays switched on. There is a name for the cost of that. Alostatic load, the wear and tear of a nervous system that never fully powers off. Real rest is a philosophical state. The moment the body reads enough cues of safety to shift out of alert and into repair. That is where you heal. That is where your energy is rebuilt and your patience comes back. And it does not happen by accident. You do have to create the conditions for that. So work on your back journal, work on a relaxing corner, take the time. Maybe you dreamed about that you're this space for so many years and you never did it, and that is a room full of clutter that's not benefiting your life at all. So just go there and make that space what resonate with you. And it does not happen by accident. So tonight, one arm before bed, drop the lights, slow down the house, take the alarm off your body, and as I always say, scan your bedroom. Okay? Scan the surface. Do you really need five perfumes on the surface? Do you use that? I would put them on a drawer. I wouldn't let them expose because that's stained to your body that you need to do something. What's exposed on the surface? Does that bring you pleasure? Does that make you feel good? Do not because you earned it. Do it because you are not a machine. And the research says that a body held on alert for years. One time will break. So give yourself permission to switch off. Give yours a switch. And just say, I am allowed to rest. Okay? Sometimes not everything will be done. Sometimes it's hard to keep up with everything. But you need rest and keep one space restful where your body can turn down and you can be yourself. And here's the truth. I want to live with you. This will change your life. Not a slogan way. In a cortisol way. I sleep away how you speak to the people you love away. Five conditions built on purpose. And the woman who walks through that home at the end of the day is calmer, is happier, feel good on herself. Now let me be honest with you about something. I am not for everyone. I work with the woman who is done waiting for permission. The woman who wants to become their better version. The one who is ready to be intentional instead of exhausted. And if that's not you yet, that's completely fine. But if that's you, then stop collecting tips from my website and my podcast and apply to work with me. I do not serve everyone. I serve with intention. That's exactly how the woman building a home that finally holds her works too. So look around the room you are in right now and tell me the truth. Was it built on purpose or by accident? And which one had you been leaving inside? I want you to drop this on the comments. I'm really looking forward to understanding. And remember, this was never about perfection. Your home is not about perfection, it's about unconscious choice at the time. Your environment is shaping you every day. The good news you can shape your environment back. Thank you so much for your time. I love this episode. And if you like this type of episode, I'll bring more for you. Thank you. Bye.