We Homes

Neuroanthropologist John S. Allen says that humans are “fundamentally home-minded.” Home isn’t just a physical place, it is also a cognitive one shaped by our biology and our culture. “You can’t buy a home,” Allen explains. Rather, a home is something “that you have to build yourself”, so that you have a space that shelters us from the outside world and, through its comfortable familiarity, calms our senses so that we may rest and face the next day’s challenges.

Besides a physical space, people also inhabit their inner homes. Everyone of us is a home to dreams, thoughts, memories, impressions, beliefs, ways of living and being, ways of carrying ourselves in this world. Those homes are not always peaceful and cozy however. When building an external home, isn’t it better to start with the one you have inside carefully choosing the look, feel of your inner space? Then perhaps even you are far away from your physical home, you won’t feel so homesick and lonely.