When I was working in my first job, there were three things that caught my attention: the coffee wasn’t great, the chairs we sat on rather uncomfortable and the lights were very bright, as if we were in an operation room. Oftentimes I was called a ‘mole’, as I always turned off the lights in my office, whilst working next to a desk light with soft lightening and, whilst I was at it, had brought my own coffee machine. If I were to bring the best of myself to the job, I figured I’d bring the best to myself first.
Most employers focus on the type of schooling you’ve had and on job experience. However, it’s about so much more. The environment needs to be conducive to bringing out the best results and it has such an impact, especially on the highly sensitive amongst us. So, years later, when it was time to decorate my office, good coffee, very comfortable chairs and great lightning were high on the priority list. And so was art. At first, the walls (painted in a soft and fresh green) were empty.. Then one day, when going to an art fair in Amsterdam, I fell in love with a massive photo by Donata Wenders, of which she made three. By that time, I was rather overstimulated by all the pieces of art I had seen in the previous hours.. Until I landed on this photo.. It calmed my whole nervous system in mere seconds. It’s a black and white photo of a woman in the snow. And by the way it’s taken, it appears to be snowing still. Everything around me stopped existing. It was just this lady and myself. I thought, if it can have such a calming effect on me, it most likely will on (most of) my clients as well.
Similarly, whilst going to an opening of an art gallery, I walked into this beautiful painting of a lady in a mountain lake, painted in various shades of green, one of ‘em matching my wall perfectly. Some clients only noticed it after weeks of it hanging on the wall, which confirmed why it was the right choice. It brings a level of peace and quiet, in the periphery, calming down the senses being triggered by the topics being discussed. My energy is very important in all of this, but so is the environment I create. Nothing goes unnoticed, albeit in our subconscious.
