Everyone deserves a special place. I am lucky, I have three: being on Maui; my garden; and my comfy chair in my living room. Having been on Maui recently, I was reminded of how important it is to be somewhere that feeds your soul, makes it easier to find calm, feel at home, relax.

When we go to Maui, the effect of the place is a major part of the purpose in visiting, and I sometimes forget that I have that same possibility at home as well.

What do I mean by a special place? Somewhere where you automatically relax and feel safe. Somewhere that helps you to find your centre, find some perspective, forget worries and troubles and busyness for a while. A place to recover yourself.

It is a place that has good associations for you, reminding you of happy times in your life, with a sense of familiarity and comfort. Does this sound grandiose, out of reach much of the time? It needn’t. We can create such a space quite simply.

It can be a corner of our garden where we can see favourite plants, be sheltered by a tree. It can be space in our living room where we can sit and look at things that remind us of good times -photos, books, objects we love – rather than staring at the tv. It can be a particular bench in a local park that has an air of quiet about it, no matter what’s going on.

By choosing to make it our special place, we begin to create the atmosphere of repose around it and this will grow eery time we use it for that purpose.

You may, like me, have a place you visit for holidays that is special to you. But we all deserve a special place in our everyday as well, where we can take a break and recuperate.