Your home is a sacred place, and for a lot of us, it’s where we spend the majority of our time. It’s where we have game night with the kiddos. It’s where you kick off your shoes at the end of a long day. It’s where you feel comfortable, safe, at peace. It’s where your heart is. 💕
But outside stressors can make it easy to forget just how important it is, and just as your mind and body need nurturing, so does your home. These feng shui basics will help improve the energy in your home, because they are made to turn where you live into something that works for you and your lifestyle.
What Is Feng Shui?
Feng shui is the ancient Chinese art of harnessing energy and establishing harmony between yourself and your environment. By arranging various pieces in your living space or spaces, it can help to create balance with nature through spatial design.
Feng shui origin
The ancient Chinese tradition of feng shui basics and feng shui rules was developed over 3,000 years ago in China. “Feng” translates to wind, and “shui” to water. In Chinese culture, wind and water are both associated with good health, so it makes sense that feng shui came to mean good fortune. (1)
Feng shui focuses on the interactions of humans and their environment, with the spatial arrangement and orientation of your furniture, nick-nacks, and pretty much everything in your home positioned or designed in harmony with principles of natural energy flow.
For centuries, this ancient Chinese tradition has used design principles to improve life, and architects often take this into account when designing. If you’ve ever wondered if your space is “chi” enough, these feng shui basics are a great place to start.
The Feng Shui Basics
There are plenty of ways to feng shui your place to achieve balance, comfort, and harmony, and to optimize your environment so that it works for you. But there are feng shui rules to follow if you want to achieve this.
- Eliminate clutter—Over-crowded living spaces have been shown to act as a stressor. If your home is disorganized, you might end up feeling that way too. For more tips on how to properly declutter your space, be sure to check out this blog.
- Separate work & sleep areas—Your bedroom should be your oasis, but that might be difficult to achieve if you’re staring at your work computer from across the room.
- Keep your bed away from the window—Your mind and body need support, a bed against a solid wall helps do this.
- Understand your colors—Colors can impact our moods and our stress. Picking colors that relax you are key.
Feng Shui Tips For Your Home
Now that you know some basic feng shui rules, let’s get into how you can put those into practice, like creating a feng shui bedroom.
1. Check your commanding positions
This is the position of important pieces of furniture in your home. This includes your bed, which represents you, your desk, which represents your career, and the stove, which represents wealth. (2) Now, while you may not be able to move the stove, placing your bed and your workspace separately, and making sure you don’t have your back to the door when utilizing either of these is a great way to invite positive chi into your home.
2. Declutter the entryway
The entryway is the first thing you see when you walk in the door, so it makes sense that this is an important element of feng shui basics. Create an inviting entryway so that when you come home from a long day, you feel welcome and happy in your space.
3. Add plants
In feng shui, plants embody life energy, so living green plants in the home connect us with nature, while bringing in more life. Think green, healthy foods, and of course, money. 😉
4. Pay attention to doors
Doors represent communication in feng shui, and embody portals in which new opportunities can be received. Remove any clutter behind your doors so that they can open up all the way and you can invite positive energy in.
5. Big, clean windows
Make sure your windows are clean to let in the most sunlight possible. Sunshine helps wake us up, feel energized, and help create a more vibrant energy.
You don’t have to rearrange your entire home to practice the art of feng shui. These simple adjustments are easy ways to bring more positive chi into your life, but always make sure to make it you. You know what makes you feel comfortable, what makes you happy, so make sure the things in your home reflect that.
The way we live and the things that surround us can affect how we feel and perform, so adding in feng shui principles has the ability to drive success, bring forth happiness and pleasure, and make our home what it was made to be: a tranquil oasis.