The Dark Side of Feng Shui

Guest User July 14, 2021

The title of this post is a little misleading, because there isn’t really a dark side of feng shui! However, I was recently reminded about the importance of looking at your darker side. I pulled the sorcerer card from one of my favorite decks, the Mystical Shaman Oracle Deck. It’s from Four Winds School, where I studied shamanic healing. This card is about looking at your darker side, and how you may be harming yourself, or maybe setting yourself up to feel as if there’s not enough in the world.

In reality, the world is an abundant place. The universe is abundant and it wants to support you. One of the ways that I have a poverty mentality is that I start to worry about not having enough time. I often try to multitask and do two things at once. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. The world is an abundant space, and I don’t need to try to fill it up.

How does this reflect in our feng shui? Most obviously, we clutter up our homes. If there’s an empty space in a client’s home, they often ask what they should put there. Sometimes, space is all you need. Are there areas of your home, life, or schedule where you’re always trying to fill up space? How can you feel more abundant by being more spacious?

I invite you to do this with your home, and to also do it in tandem with your internal environment. One way I’m going to work with this is to let go of nine things a day for a certain period of time to create more spaciousness in my home. I’m also going to work on saying no and letting go of schedule obligations. I can also be more generous to myself by not trying to multitask, and by doing things I love just for the sake of doing them.

Does this resonate with you? If so, I invite you to also take a look at your dark side, and see how you can be more spacious!

by Anjie Cho

If you’d like to learn more about feng shui, check out Mindful Design Feng Shui School at: www.mindfuldesignschool.com

Q&A Sunday: Flowers and Feng Shui

Guest User September 6, 2020

Someone told me it is good feng shui to have flowers in the dining room. Is this true?

Thank you for your question! Yes, in general, fresh flowers are great, because they can bring in joy and uplift the qi in your home. Flowers also feel special. When I was going to ikebana class every week, I would bring flowers home and people would always ask where they were from. Having fresh flowers in your home can be a lovely and simple way to do some special for yourself.

It’s also true that flowers are especially good for the dining room. Dining rooms are important places in the home because they represent how we nourish ourselves, and also how we connect to others and how deep our friendships are. However, they’re often neglected because we often don’t spend a lot of time eating in the dining room, and sometimes we even use the dining room table as a home office. If you want to deepen your friendships, make sure you are being mindful of how you interact with your dining room and especially your dining room table. Find a separate space that can function as your home office if you can, and take time regularly to eat meals at your table. Having a vase of beautiful flowers here can also help to bring more attention and energy to your dining room table and the parts of your life that it represents.

If you do bring flowers into your home, there are a few things to keep in mind. First, if you can, try to find locally grown flowers. Local flowers are generally better for the environment because they aren’t shipped from far away, and don’t require as many chemicals to stay fresh for a long trip. It’s also a great way to support your local farmers.

It’s also important to care for your flowers once you’ve brought them into your home. Replace the water daily and remove any dead leaves or flowers. Water is their life blood, just like it is ours, and it’s important to keep it clean and free of any debris that might fall into the vase. When you replace the water, you can also cut off the bottom inch or so of each stem, so that the flowers can receive more water.

I encourage you to do something special for yourself and bring some fresh flowers into your home. Choose flowers that you’re drawn to, and if you like, you can even look up the symbolism of those flowers to learn more about what they can teach you.

by Anjie Cho

Thanks for reading our "Q&A Sunday". If you have personal questions, we encourage you to check out Practical Feng Shui or hire one of Anjie's Grads.

If you’d like to learn more about feng shui, check out Mindful Design Feng Shui School at: www.mindfuldesignschool.com

Gratitude for Your Home

Anjie Cho September 2, 2020

The feng shui that I practice is a shamanic tradition, which means we believe that everything around us is alive. Not only are you and I alive, but your home is alive, your desk is alive, your bed is alive, and so on. Even our spaces, and the air we breathe, are alive, and we’re all made up of the same stardust.

I think sometimes we forget this, and we take our homes for granted. It’s important to take a moment and think about how much gratitude you have for your home, especially since many of us have been spending more time at home than usual this year. A lot of us have also lost our homes or changed homes, and it’s been a year of really considering what home means to us. For example, does the city where you’ve been living really feel like home? Have you been living somewhere that does not suit you or support you?

No matter how you’re feeling about your current home, it’s still important to have gratitude and to thank your home. I encourage you to take some time to think about all of the things you’re grateful for, and simply say thank you out loud to your home.

Make this a sacred moment of gratitude, rather than rushing to get it done between tasks or immediately going back to scrolling through Instagram. Take a deep inhale, a long exhale, hold your hands over your heart if that feels good to you, and say to your home: Thank you so much.

You can add whatever you want to add - you can even give your home a name if you’d like - but a simple thank you is enough. Your home doesn’t speak in words, it speaks in energy. When you’re humble in your gratitude, your home will know.

I hope you take some time today to thank your home. If you would like more feng shui tips along with community and accountability, I would love for you to join me for eight weeks of free feng shui challenges!

by Anjie Cho