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A walk in the woods with my daughter turned into a lesson about momentum, balance, and why moving forward is almost always easier than standing still.
Creating a Sanctuary at Home: How Music Helped Me Transform a Forgotten Room
A forgotten basement became the most meaningful room in my home — a quiet sanctuary built for music, learning, and slowing down. Inspired by my dad’s garage and Philippe Dufour’s morning ritual, this space reminded me that sanctuary isn’t a destination. It’s intention, light, warmth, and one small corner you claim for yourself.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Heaven in a Basement: How Music, Ritual, and Inheritance Built My Sanctuary
Most sanctuaries aren’t found.
They’re built — slowly, quietly, almost without announcing themselves.
Mine began the day I realized something simple and true:
That realization pulled me toward vinyl — the ritual, the warmth, the tactile involvement.
Once I started listening with intention, it felt obvious:
I needed a space worthy of the way music made me feel.
The Room That Was Waiting for Me
Our basement never had an identity.
First it was a rental.
Then a toy room the kids never wanted to use.
Then a storage zone — a place that collected things but not moments.
One day, standing at the top of the stairs, I realized two things at once:
the kids had outgrown the toys, and I had outgrown not having a room of my own.
A place where no one was asking for anything.
A place to unwind, study, think, learn, and listen.
So I claimed the basement. Quietly. Decisively.
As if the room had been waiting for someone to give it purpose.
The Sanctuary My Dad Taught Me to Build
It wasn’t until later that I understood where the instinct came from.
My dad never went to church.
His garage was his church — his refuge, his workshop, his quiet.
A radio always playing.
Tools arranged with purpose.
The steady rhythm of a man alone with his thoughts.
He never said, “You need a sanctuary.”
He simply modeled one.
Without realizing it, I inherited the idea that every person needs a room of their own — a place where the mind drops down a gear and life feels manageable again.
This basement is my version of his garage.
My inheritance.
My chapel.
The Vinyl Invitation
Vinyl didn’t just give me something to listen to.
It gave me a ritual.
You don’t half-listen to a record.
You sit.
You choose.
You commit.
A record slows you down enough to meet yourself.
(And I talk more about that journey here: Why I Began Collecting Vinyl.)
That’s when the room began shaping itself around the act of listening:
- A chair with the right posture
- Soft light warming the walls
- Shelves for albums I loved
- Objects selected, not stored
The basement stopped feeling like a leftover space and started feeling like a beginning.
Philippe Dufour’s Definition of Heaven
Around this time, I watched an interview with master watchmaker Philippe Dufour.
He was in his watchmaking studio — the sanctuary where he’s spent decades perfecting some of the world’s most patient, intricate craft.
Someone asked him what he enjoyed about watch making.
He smiled and said:
“When I arrive here in the morning, I light my pipe, take my coffee, put on classical music. It’s heaven.”
Heaven.
In a small Swiss workshop.
Created not by scenery or luxury, but by ritual and intention.
Dufour wasn’t describing productivity.
He was describing a state of being — a mental posture tuned by routine, sound, smell, light.
That’s exactly what I wanted for my room:
a place where I could work, study, learn, and listen — and feel myself slipping into a deeper kind of focus the moment I crossed the threshold.
A basement atelier of attention.
A Room That Breathes
The shelves became the architecture of the sanctuary.
Some Mets pieces from my childhood.
A few Lego builds I did with the kids.
Framed cards that hold stories.
Objects don’t just fill space — they shape the emotional temperature of a room.
And then winter arrived — the soft glow of the white tree, incense curling through the room, the space heater humming like a companion. The basement turned cocoonlike.
Warm.
Still.
Unhurried.
A place where music lands deeper.
A place where time loosens its grip.
A place that reminds me, gently, to breathe.
Heaven, Right Here
I used to think sanctuaries lived in faraway places — the woods, the mountains, cabins where no one could find you.
Now I know better.
Sanctuary is not about distance.
It’s about intention.
A pipe.
A coffee.
Classical music.
Or in my case:
vinyl, warm light, a reclaimed room, and the permission to disappear into my own thoughts for a little while.
My dad found heaven in his garage.
Philippe Dufour finds heaven in his studio.
And now — in this once-forgotten basement — I’m beginning to find mine.
How to Create a Sanctuary of Your Own
You don’t need a basement.
You don’t need a budget.
You just need intention.
Here are simple ways to begin:
1. Choose the purpose before the furniture.
Let the reason guide the design:
music, reading, journaling, meditation, learning.
2. Establish a ritual.
Your version of Dufour’s pipe-coffee-classical trio.
Tea.
Incense.
A specific record.
A candle.
One act that shifts the temperature of your mind.
3. Curate selectively.
Keep only what changes the way the room feels.
Meaning over decoration.
4. Warm the light.
Sanctuary begins at the level of glow.
5. Anchor the room with a chair.
A place your body recognizes as a cue to slow down.
6. Let the room evolve.
A sanctuary is never finished — it grows with you.
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