I have always been interested in feng shui (pronounced fung shway), and have been doing a lot of research, taking out just about every book on the topic from our local library as well as making charts of our home — how it is and how I want it to be.
Feng shui, which in Chinese means "wind water," is a system of orienting your home in the most beneficial manner, to best utilize qi, or vital energy. There are various schools (form and compass) and types of feng shui which can be used to best utilize the flow of energy inside and outside of your home or office or wherever you would like to apply these principles. Whether you believe that feng shui can improve your luck or not, it is undeniable that streamlining one's life and trying to eliminate clutter cannot help but benefit how you interact and experience your home environment.
All the systems, whether one uses a compass or not, place a grid overlay, or a bagua map, over one's home. The grid is divided into sections which represent the eight aspirations: fame, relationships/marriage, children/creativity, helpful people/travel, career, inner knowledge, family/ancestors/health, and wealth/blessings.
![]() |
The bagua compass layout |
The first book I checked out, 101 Feng Shui Tips for Your Home (Feng Shui Series)
"... If you were one of those people who cannot let anything go because 'it might be useful one day', you're sending out a message that you do not trust the world to supply everything you need. Instead of becoming more secure, the opposite starts to happen and you become more insecure."I made a map based on his suggestions, utilizing compass directions, which I found easy to use, as living near the coast of Florida makes finding N-S-E-W directions pretty easy to do.
![]() |
A bagua compass overlay on a sample home layout |
Another book, Move Your Stuff, Change Your Life: How to Use Feng Shui to Get Love, Money, Respect, and Happiness
"... Everything is contained in consciousness, which has no boundaries. So the placement of your bed has meaning in relation to the rest of your experience. ... When your bed is moved with intention, the belief and emotion dimensions also move. ... Every thing, even the sticky front door that doesn't open all the way, has meaning. Every thing, every action, is intentional, sometimes conscious, sometimes unconscious. Feng Shui brings the unconscious in our environment back into consciousness."I like that.
I did pay attention to the chapter she included with her ideas for improving the center of the home, as the center is always the center, no matter how you spin the grid.
![]() |
The bagua as a grid, with Knowledge/Wisdom, Career, and Travel/Helpful People always aligned with the wall that has the home's front door |
The third book I checked out was Spirit of the Home: How to Make Your Home a Sanctuary
Carl Jung's four personality types - sensation, intuition, thinking, feeling - as ways to decide how to design your home spaces
Exercises to work on your "soul home" - imagining your childhood home - something I have done before as a memory exerciseLike most books on feng shui, Alexander considers clutter the enemy, and includes plenty of tips for unloading unwanted or no longer used books, clothing, gadgets, etc. She also talks about space clearing rituals, using Native American smudging techniques. About midway through the book she finally gets to feng shui concepts, and also incorporates color and aroma therapies.
I still have a pile of other books on this topic to get through. I'm not really looking for the definitive feng shui bible, but rather trying to gather as many tips and approaches as I can on the topic to incorporate in my own home, my own way. It's an interesting path to be on.
0 comments:
Post a Comment