Feng Shui & Your Bedroom

A friend of mine has recently divorced her husband of twelve years and seems to be going through a stage that at first I found mildly alarming but now I am kind of intrigued by. All of a sudden she is into everything alternative and I am simply hypnotised listening to her tales. This lady who has led a rather average lifestyle for over a decade has now become vegan, signed up for a charity skydive, had reiki healing, is learning about how crystals influence our lives and most recently had  a Feng Shui master round to Feng Shui her house.

Now most of this stuff I can take or leave, but Feng Shui is something that has always interested me so I listened intently as she told me about moving furniture around, adding layered lighting and throwing out some of her wall hangings.  I didn’t want to let her know but I was totally intrigued and really wanted to find out more, in fact I really wanted to have a go myself. But as I had been slightly critical of my friends new approach to life, I might at one stage have called her an aging hippie with a mid-life crisis, I felt I couldn’t really tell her I was going to try Feng Shui. So what to do?

Lightbulb moment… I’ll Feng Shui my bedroom and then she will never know. Genius! It is also the most run down and unappealing room in the house with lacklustre lighting, a third hand bed that is falling to pieces and rather drab pictures on the wall. I knew I was going to have to start from scratch to achieve good Feng Shui as my room lacked any sort of energy, let alone positive energy and had a proper clear out before beginning, clutter is definitely bad for the energy flow.

So, the first step was to clear the furniture and look online for a decent looking bed and two bedside tables, it is important to have two as this balances the energy around the bed.  If you’re looking at your own furniture and thinking it could use a facelift then see the bedroom furniture range here that is on offer at David Phillips. A great range and lots of simple lines that are great for the Feng Shui energy.

Next were the images on my walls. For good Feng Shui you are meant to display only images that you want to see happening in your life; I chose a calm sky scene with a hot air balloon rising above the clouds. Lastly, I had to sort out the lighting and colour flow in the room as well as the air quality. The potted plants on my sideboard were out and the air dehumidifier in and then I added a dimmer switch to the main light and well placed coloured lamps. Voila, my new room is complete and it looks great. Does it give me better energy, who knows but I’m certainly a happier girl sleeping in my newly decorated boudoir!

Feng Shui For Beginners

Feng Shui is all about the energy of your home, and ways in which you can make it feel like a nicer place.  Every home can be beautiful and Feng Shui is a natural and cost effective way of making the most out of your space; so where are good places to start?

The outside of your home is very important for good Feng Shui inside.  If there is low or aggressive energy on the exterior then it will be difficult for positive energy to penetrate the interior.  Think about where your house is situated and what surrounds it.  Do you have a front garden or yard? Does your home go straight onto a street? How can you make this a more calming, serene place for good energy to pass through?  Adding a water feature or some lush plant life is always a good idea, although simple things like repainting windowsills and attending to cracking brickwork or wooden fences could be an easy enough way to improve your outside energy. http://www.ehow.com has some great tips on designing a Feng Shui garden.

Good Feng Shui inside your home centres around the main rooms of energy and activity in your home and these are the kitchen, the bedroom and the bathroom.  Furniture placement can have a big impact in these areas; positive energy needs to be able to travel from these rooms throughout your home and circulate, so having any furniture blocking doorways or light can be harmful to this. The type of furniture in your home can also have an impact; too many patterns can become oppressive and too much clashing furniture will not give the rooms’ good harmony.  The furniture in your home should fit together and match its surroundings, so everything is in balance.  You do not have to buy new furniture to achieve this, think of common features you could add to each room to make the energy flow better.

To create good Feng Shui means creating peace and harmony inside your home and light and sound are two factors which cannot be overlooked in attempting this.  Letting as much natural light into your home as possible is a necessity, as sunlight makes people happy and feel healthy, and having lights tailored to the needs of your home will be helpful too – visit www.downlights.co.uk to get started on picking these, and concentrate on brightness and depth of light.  Adding soothing sounds like water features too can help add to the Feng Shui of your home, especially if they are in a position where the sound, and therefore the energy, can be carried through to a few different rooms.

Improving the Feng Shui in your home is easy and straightforward and will provide something of a spiritual energy de-clutter; you’ll be amazed at how different you feel when you’ve done it!

Improve your Feng Shui through Art

It is a well-known fact that art can add something extra to your home and make it a more vibrant, creative and beautiful space. Art is a personal thing and can range from paintings and canvases to statues and ornaments; there is no such thing as bad art if you like it.

As well as being wonderful for the aesthetics of your home, the use of art can also help improve your Feng Shui, and is a cheap and fantastic way of getting the right balance of energy to make your home an even happier place. Certain shapes, colours and images will bring positive energy into your home and allow it to circulate, whereas others may drain the energy out so it is important to choose wisely.

A great way to start deciding what art to pick to improve your Feng Shui is to get a bit of inspiration, and www.pinterest.com is a great place to start, with many boards all about Feng Shui in the home.  It is important to think about what you really like, what speaks to you and what you think will sit well with the colours, furnishings and size of your home.  Gentle, floral prints bring a lovely calming energy as do certain brush strokes and muted colours, so if you have a bold colour scheme or a strong theme in your home already then pick something gentle like this.  Too many conflicting patterns and colours will clash and make the energy in your home oppressive, and this is what you want to avoid.  Similarly statues, sculptures or ornaments which are too big for a space will darken a room and draw negative energy towards it.  Bold colours and patterns can bring wonderful positivity and vibrancy however, and if you can introduce these in a positive way then it is worth doing – they can lift the energy of a room which is relatively plain.

The idea with Feng Shui is that energy should circulate around your home, so having art that continues into different rooms is a great way of doing this.  If you have found a series of ornaments or statues that you love try splitting them up and putting them in different rooms in the house – being careful about the positioning.  You can also buy beautiful canvases which come in 3 or 5 part sets and could split these up in different rooms if you wanted.  Dotcreative Ltd T/ACatchincolour UK is a fantastic canvas company which has a great array of these.  Pictures and canvases of loved ones or special memories always lift your heart and make you smile, and these will also improve the Feng Shui in your home.

Art is a wonderful, expressive medium that can transform the energy in your home, all you need is a bit of Feng Shui knowledge and some creative flair; this will be a fun and soothing way of improving your home.