Unity

I know this isn’t the greatest of pictures, but I was trying to find something that illustrates my thoughts this morning on unity. I was glad for what I heard at meeting yesterday about unity and how important it is in God’s family. Thinking about unity in decorating helps me think about this concretely. Unity does not mean “everything the same”. That would be boring and non-functional. In ecosystems, we talk about everything having a niche, a place it fits into where it performs a function, and when everything does its part, there is unity in the system. Here are just a couple of my thoughts this morning:

1. Color Several colors blend together to make a nice atmosphere. You don’t want everything exactly the same color, but then you don’t want a color that just screams out and doesn’t fit in either.

2. Spacing Some things need to be close together, but if everything is crammed together really tightly, it just creates a feeling of chaos and clutter. Things and people need room to breathe, to be themselves but they also need to be close enough to feel like a part of the whole.

3. Balance Dark and light, day and night, easy and hard, big and small, left and right.

4. Texture I like to use different materials to achieve some variety of textures. I appreciate a rough piece of pottery when I can see it next to a smooth piece of glass. I can appreciate the whimsy of a child when I can also have access to the stability of a strong adult.

5. Tone To me, tone is like the message. This scene around one of my shelves is meant to say: rest. There are many, many different elements there, but it all leads to the whole of rest.