Remember the 90’s? All of our now embarrassing hair-dos and catchphrases? It was the best and worst of times. I remember when the art of feng shui became this elite but trendy thing to apply to your recently self-assembled IKEA home furniture. Recently, feng shui has become popular on social media sites like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, with a wealth of information available about how to design your home to support your mindset. Now that I’m a professional organizer, I can see that the principles of feng shui are more than just a trend. It’s a simple shift in your mindset that exudes its way through your home.
I'll walk you through the basic principles of feng shui in this article, and you can follow along by completing the free guided workbook about feng shui and clutter. Click here get the download page sent to your email!
What is Feng Shui? Fundamental Feng Shui Principles
Feng shui is a way of arranging one’s home to allow for energy to flow in a positive way that supports your goals, your relationships, and your health. The practice of feng shui is connected to the natural environment, and key concepts are related to elements such as wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. Even if you don’t know about all of these elements in detail, however, you can still intuitively arrange different spaces in your home to better support you with the help of some simple feng shui. Each room and the placement and use of objects within that room can have a distinct impact on your mindset.
#1 Design Your Bedroom to Support You and Your Relationships
Your bedroom is said to represent you and your relationships. Many of us want to feel as comfortable as possible in our bedrooms to practice good sleep hygiene. Take a minute to consider the following:
Where is your bed positioned in your bedroom?
When you lie down in bed, are you facing the door? Do you have your back to the windows?
If you are facing the door when trying to fall asleep, you may feel a sense of anxiety about someone opening the door and being able to see you right away, leaving you to feel vulnerable instead of comfortable. The same can be said about your windows. You may feel better if you are to the side of the windows and the door, with the back of the door opening towards your head when lying down so that you can feel more tucked away in your bedroom.
A professional organizer may be able to help you try out a new position for your bed after decluttering your room, making use of the newly found space.
#2 Kitchen Design for Wealth
In feng shui, your kitchen represents your wealth and your resources. The kitchen is a space of creation and opportunity. What opportunities are you looking to bring into your life? How can you organize your kitchen to be open to these opportunities? If your kitchen is cluttered, it may feel closed-off, anxiety-inducing, or even lead to being self-critical. These mindsets don’t enable you to see life’s opportunities as clearly.
One of the most popular tips to feng shui your kitchen is to switch up your cooking routine. Since most of us are in the kitchen multiple times each day, we may start to get bogged down by our typical routine and get into a rut– whether in the foods we eat or in our life as a whole.
A simple way to switch up your routine is to use a different burner on the stove than you normally do. You may have a preference for your favorite burner, but making this simple shift allows you to see your kitchen in a new light. Where else do you have space to practice flexible thinking?
#3 How to Design Your Office to Support Your Goals
Your home office represents your career and your life’s path. The “command position” is a key element of feng shui that is especially important when it comes to your office.
Is your desk facing the wall, with your back to the rest of the room? How does this make you feel? This position would not be using the command position to help you reach your goals.
Instead, consider how it might feel to have your back to the wall, with you facing the rest of the room while you work, open to the door. Notice how this is in direct contrast with the positioning of your bed, which seeks to invite comfort into your room. In your home office, you likely want to feel confident and in charge. You will likely feel more secure with your back being towards the wall and more energetic by facing the door.
Feng Shui for Your Mind
Each object or piece of furniture in our homes has a distinct function. Understanding the basic principles of feng shui helps understand how to make the most of each object. By helping people reclaim their cluttered houses for over a decade, I have seen how space organizing changes lives.
If your bedroom, kitchen, and office are cluttered, check in. How are your relationships, resources, and goals affected? A cluttered space reflects a cluttered life and a scattered mindset. Does this ring true for you?
Keeping that in mind, where in your heart and home do you want to start clearing out the clutter?
Free Guided Feng Shui Worksheet
To help you design your home for feng shui so that you can declutter your life and position yourself for more joy and abundance, it may be helpful to walk yourself through a few questions and reflect on where you are in your journey currently.
We’ve created a free workbook for you to get started on this process! It will guide you through prompts not just about how to feng shui your home, but also about your goals and how to practice self-compassion along the way.
Tag us on Instagram @morespace_organizing with a photo of your worksheet!
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