Feng Shui for Kitchens

By Erica Sofrina

Kitchens are considered one of most important rooms in the house. They represent the hearth and home and should be clean, well-lit, happy places for friends and family to gather and connect.

They are also a key place for you and your family’s health, which is closely connected to wealth. Having good health is paramount if we are to be able to successfully go out into the world and make a living.

This is one of the more active or yang areas of the home so bring in active, happy and inspiring artwork and brighter lighting.

Get Organized

Kitchens are magnets for everything to land, so you want to head it off at the pass and create places for everything to land. Vowing we are going to turn over a new leaf and keep counters clutter-free is often self-defeating.

Give the Small Stuff a Place to Land

Install a key rack/holder on the wall near the main entry door and train yourself to always hang them there when you come in. A small table next to the door with a basket on top is another option for organizing keys and spare change. Give them a place to land and discipline yourself to always put them in their designated place when you come in. After one week it will become a habit.

Mail and papers can be dealt with in many ways depending upon how you receive them. I get mine from the post office, which is great because I de-clutter all junk mail and shed all unnecessary envelopes into their recycle bins before leaving the premises. If you have to walk to get your mail, try passing by your recycle containers on the way back and do the same.  Always try to deal with junk mail the instant you get it and bring into your home just what is necessary.

Have an attractive basket on the kitchen counter where everything seems to be deposited. It should have a lid and be large enough to handle a week’s worth of mail and papers. Commit to emptying it and sorting everything out at least weekly. If the papers haven’t been read – recycle them. For unread magazines, give yourself a place to store them and limit it to five issues. As you bring in new ones, either recycle them or deliver them to places that would welcome them such as senior centers, beauty salons or non-profits that can use them.  Remember the three R’s – Recycle, Reduce, Reuse.

Organizers for Larger Objects

Pottery Barn and IKEA have an inexpensive piece of furniture that is great for organizing some of the larger things that land in the kitchen. It has hooks to hold book bags and coats with drawers, cabinets or cubbies below to hold multiple articles. Shoes for a shoeless home can be stored there, as well as books and homework that needs to be addressed later. If you enter the kitchen from the garage, train family members to unload these objects here.

Refrigerator Clutter

Refrigerator doors are great places to celebrate achievements and display pictures of friends and loved ones. Use this prime real estate for affirmations, vision boards and celebrations. The problem is that the few pictures displayed tend to have offspring and now you have a cluttered hodgepodge. If this has happened, take them all down, store in a shoebox and rotate five or six pictures each week giving everything and everyone a place of honor.

Clutter Clear Drawers and Cupboards

Kitchens are great places to do some quick purging of clutter and the junk drawer is a great place to start. If you haven’t used it in six months, deep six it. You will become inspired and will want to continue. Next tackle the pan cupboard and utensils drawers. You may be surprised at how many of those objects that were supposed to save you time just takes up space. Pack them up and donate to a charity that can use it for the benefit of others.

Clear Counter Tops

Discipline yourself to keep objects off the counters that you do not use on a daily basis such as toasters, blenders, mixers and Cuisinarts.  Store them in your newly cleared cupboards and replace with a few lovely vases and/or objects that inspire you. Juxtaposing functional cooking objects with whimsical or uplifting ones will greatly enhance the cooking experience and bring a higher vibrational energy into the food you are preparing.

Safety is Paramount

Safety is always of utmost importance in Feng Shui. We not only look at the things that are obviously dangerous, but the subtle things. Anything that looks like a weapon will keep us on ‘alert’ in the space.  Kitchen knives should be put out of sight in knife blocks or drawers designed for them. Remove all heavy pans, hooks or objects hanging off walls, ceilings and up high on cabinets. Store up high only lighter things such as baskets that will not injure if they fall.  Remove all flammable objects from close proximity to the stove. You will be amazed how much more you enjoy being in the space when the pans hanging on unfriendly hooks are removed.

The Importance of the Stove

The stove is considered extremely important and is connected to our health and wealth.  Stoves and burners should always be clean and in working order and ideally be in the empowered position, where the cook can see the action. If they have their back to the door while cooking, put a mirror or a reflective metal piece behind the stove so they can see what is going on behind. If you are remodeling your kitchen anyway, the happiest place for the stove is on a cooking island where the important chef will always feel like a vital part of the family while preparing meals.

Have an Attractive place to Share Meals without Televisions

Sharing a meal with family and loved ones should be an intimate and nurturing experience.  It is an important time to share our day, calm down and replenish our bodies. You need a good place to eat everyday, a place for people to connect and communicate. It is important to have comfortable chairs and an inspiring piece of artwork on the wall. Television shows are fine to watch as a family but are not conducive to good conversation or good digestion during a meal. Discipline yourself to always keep them off during meals.

If you live alone, make a ritual of eating. Turn off the television, light a candle, put on inspiring music and treat yourself as if you are the important person coming to dinner.

                    Bring in the Earth Element

Balancing the Five Elements in each room is an important part of Feng Shui for the home.  Kitchens should have a good amount of the earth element represented by earth tones, squares and rectangles and things made from earth such as tiles, adobe and stucco. The earth element encourages us to be in our bodies, which is important in kitchens where we are working with potentially dangerous things like fire and knives.

If you were planning on remodeling your kitchen, a good choice for the counter tops would be earthy granites or tiles in earth tones. There are beautiful tiles made of recycled glass that look spectacular on counter tops and will support our commitment to green building. Avoid darker tone in counter-top materials such as black, dark green or dark blues.  These represent the water element and encourage us to be out of our bodies, which is counterproductive to the activities we need to perform in kitchens.  If you already have a lot of black and metal you can add still add the earth element by bringing these colors onto the walls, adding terracotta or earth- tone pottery, table mats and table cloths.

Bring in Nature

We are all deeply connected to the natural world and biologically programmed to feel a sense of belonging and connection when we encounter it. Bringing in vibrant plants along with pictures and objects made from natural elements will energize your kitchen and make every one feel truly ‘at home’ here.

Creating a nurturing, happy, organized and inspiring kitchen will support the needs of the family while uplifting their souls, making your hearth truly the heart of your home!

Feng Shui Room By Room - The Living Room

By Erica Sofrina

Living Rooms

Living rooms are considered more Yin spaces where we want to relax and rejuvenate. They should be calming places with muted colors, more tactile fabrics with soft, comfy furniture.

Place the Main Pieces of Furniture in the Empowered Position

In every room that we spend time in we want to make sure that we face the main pieces of furniture, such as the sofa and bigger chairs, in the empowered position. This is where it is facing the main entrance but not positioned directly in alignment with it.  You will find that people will instinctively sit on the furniture placed in the empowered position first.  We naturally feel more comfortable and safe when we can see the action and don’t have activities going on behind us.

If you cannot move the sofa in this position because of room limitations, create a faux wall behind it. This can be done by placing a sofa table behind the sofa with tall lamps and plants on it, or by placing taller screens or trees behind. A mirror placed in such a way that you can see the entrance from the sofa will provide a greater sense of protection and comfort when you have to sit with your back to the door. You can always place the smaller chairs with their backs to the entry. The room will look silly with everything lined up in a row, but try to make sure the key pieces are in the best place for easy viewing.

Televisions should ideally be disguised in an entertainment center. This is the room often use for rest and relaxation and when televisions are the prominent piece of furniture it is tempting to have them on all the time. The more we can balance our television watching with reading, listening to music or other more creative activities, the more balanced we will feel in our lives. You can also cover them up with an attractive shawl when not in use. For rooms with huge wide screen televisions, I encourage my clients to get a CD or DVD that is like a screen saver. There are wonderful fish tank and fireplace scenes you can purchase that will change it from a black hole when it is off, to a lively interesting scene, attracting chi and balancing that part of the room.

Rooms with High Ceilings

High ceilings are very popular in more modern homes and apartments. They create a feeling of spaciousness, but are not very cozy. The chi or energy goes up to the ceiling rather than circulating nicely within the living space. As creatures of comfort, we seek comfy cozy places to relax and rejuvenate.

For rooms of this type we want to create what we call ‘a line between heaven and earth.’ This can be accomplished by creating an eye-line at about 8′-10′ high positioning pictures and furniture at the same height around the room. This will create the illusion of a lower ceiling and bring the chi back down into the space. Using earth tones and heavier rugs and furniture will also help anchor the living space in rooms with vaulted ceilings.

Bring in the Five Elements

Create an environment that brings in shapes, objects, colors and patterns from the natural world. The five elements are a powerful component of creating an environment that nurtures and inspires.

Fireplaces

If you have a fireplace, hanging a mirror over it is a great way to balance this large fire element with the water element represented by the mirror. For fireplaces that are unused, cover the ‘black hole’ opening with an attractive fan or screen. You can also create an interesting scene within the fireplace such as sand with candles on black wrought iron stands. (My readers with cats will say they will use them as a cat box, so only do what is appropriate to your situation). Plants within unused fireplaces are also an attractive option.

Ceilings with Heavy Beams

Rooms with heavy dark beams on the ceiling will feel oppressive to be in and you will often find yourself gravitating towards cozier spaces with lighter ceilings. If you rent and cannot do anything about them, one idea to lighten up the dark ceiling is to hang small white Christmas tree lights on the beams or put track lighting on them angling some of the lighting upwards. Always move the main pieces of furniture you spend the most time on out from under a beam. If you own your home you may want to consider painting or staining them a lighter color. It is a big undertaking but if you have the means to do so it will make a huge difference in the way you feel about being in the space.

Hang pictures at the right height. Most people hang them too high, causing the same feeling as being in a room with high ceilings. A good rule of thumb is to hang the top of the picture at about 5′3 – 5′6 high. If you are sitting on the sofa facing a picture, hang it lower so that you can enjoy it while seated.

Create Conversation Areas

After 5′ you no longer have a conversation area, making people feel a bit isolated if they find themselves sitting across the room from the sofa. Larger rooms will require two conversation areas or more. To allow for an easy and more intimate dialogue, arrange all seats in the same conversation area to be within about five feet of each other.

Group Objects in Relationship to Each Other

Objects have more interest if they are grouped in relationship to each other. You may have three or four objects that look great together. They make a stronger statement as a whole rather than individually. An example might be a low side table with a lamp and a picture that all work together. Put the lamp on the left side of the table and hang the picture low down on the right side just a few inches above the table top. (An occasional exception to the picture hanging ‘height’ rule) The eye will see all of these wonderful objects in relationship to each other creating interest and liveliness. Nature never bores us but our eyes do get bored in interior spaces. We need to create visual interest and invoke the element of surprise!

Clear Clutter and Remove Weapons or Weapon-like Objects

Clutter clearing is always paramount. Remember every object is alive and talking to you according to Feng Shui. Clearing clutter is considered a powerful way to make room for new opportunities in our lives and if nothing else, will make us feel better in the space. Arrange the furniture in such a way that you can easily move around the room. If your room feels cluttered with too much furniture, a good rule of thumb is to remove two pieces of furniture per room and see how much more spacious it feels!

Crate a Focal Point

This can be a mantle or a coffee table with an attractive candle, floral arrangement and decorative piece of art. One or two per room is all you want. If a colorful patterned rug is the main attraction, give it prominence. Compliment with a glass oval coffee table that shows it off with just a few objects placed on it. Enhance this with pillows that compliment the rug on a solid colored sofa with no pattern. You can have too much of a good thing creating a too-busy room with nowhere for the eye to rest. A good yin/yang balance in a room will juxtapose complexity and detail with simplicity and straight lines.

For those of us who collect treasures, arrange them in special places that showcase them but don’t allow them to take over the energy of the space. A moderate amount is interesting, but don’t over do it.

Safety First

Make sure all furniture is ‘people proof’ i.e. without sharp edges that can injure. Remove any object that looks like a weapon or is an actual weapon. No matter how interesting the artifact, our primitive instincts will register “danger “around them. Always store weapons behind locked cabinets.

Stay tuned for the next post on family rooms.

Feng Shui Room By Room - The Foyer

By Erica Sofrina

Welcome to the wonderful world of Feng Shui and my series on Feng Shui Room By Room. Over the next month, we will cover Feng Shui tips for all of the key areas of your home, room by room. Today, we will focus on the foyer, an area that’s especially important for welcoming opportunity into your life.

Whether you live in a house, a condo, an apartment or a one-room studio, hopefully you will find something helpful to take with you and apply to your own space.

The ancient art of Feng Shui is a wonderful study that brings together an eclectic mix of good interior design practices, the Chinese five element theory, Taoist principles of yin and yang based on the I Ching, and folk wisdom passed down from generation to generation in China.

At the foundation of Feng Shui is the belief that everything on the planet is imbued with life-source energy or chi and embodies consciousness, whether animate or inanimate objects. We, as humans are continuously interacting with everything we encounter. We are either being fed and inspired, expanding our chi, or our chi is being depleted by objects that bring us down.

Feng Shui acknowledges our profound connection to everything that surrounds us. Since we spend so much time in our homes, they are considered to have a powerful influence on our lives affecting our relationships, careers, prosperity and health, and are given utmost consideration. Creating a home that supports, uplifts and nurtures is considered tantamount to creating a balanced, healthy and happy life.

The Entryway – the Mouth of Chi

In Feng Shui we always begin at the front door, which is considered the mouth of chi where all of our opportunities come to us. My earlier article on How to Welcome Opportunities addresses the front door and entrance to the home, so I will move on to Feng Shui principles for the foyer of the home once we enter.

The Foyer

This is the transition area where we come in from the outer to the inner world. We want to make it ‘entrancing’ no matter what kind of foyer we have.

Homes and apartments have a myriad of different entrances areas. Some encounter a wall as soon as they enter, some have no foyer and we literally fall into the living space, some have elaborate entrances with room to create an ‘entrancing’ area.

What ever your situation, think about creating breaks and accelerators, stopping the chi before it rushes into the home, and creating a positive first impression. You can do this by creating a beautiful area that allows us to pause and reflect, lifting our chi and inspiring us as we enter.

The foyer is considered our most public area and not a place to display personal items such as family photos or religious artifacts. Save these for the more private areas such family rooms.

This is the place to hang your most lovely artwork, put a graceful table beneath it. Arrange an attractive floral arrangement (silk is fine) with ornamental objects that are pleasing. If there is no room for any furniture, you can hang a shallow shelf on the entry wall and put your arrangements there. No matter what kind of entry way you have to work with, make sure it inspires and uplifts.

Putting an attractive mirror at the entry way is a gracious way to welcome in the chi. Just make sure it is not placed directly across from the front door or it will send the chi (often interpreted as money) right back out!

Insure that the door can open fully, without encumbrances behind it. Front doors are considered very important in Feng Shui allowing in our opportunities and hence, money. We want to make sure there are no blockages here.

Clearly mark where people are to go if it is confusing.  As creatures of comfort, we never like to feel confused when entering any space. You can use directional art, which will cause the eye to go in the direction you want guests to go.

Stay tuned for later posts on the living room, family room, and more.

Space Clearing for the New Year

 By Erica Sofrina

A powerful way to set the stage for an auspicious new year is to clear out the old and start with fresh new energy in your home.

In this article I will show you how to do a major space clearing which will allow new energies into your life- in the form of opportunities, just in time for the New Year!

The 2,000-year-old art and science of Feng Shui teaches that every thing in our world is made up of life-source energy called chi. The goal is to arrange the chi or energy in our living and work spaces to utilize the optimum flow of positive chi in our lives.

Ancient civilizations have always acknowledged the power of the elements and our connection to this life-source energy. You may be familiar with the Native American practice of using dry sage “smudge” sticks to clear negative or denser energy from spaces.  The physical act of lighting the sage, combined with purposeful prayer and intention is what gives it the energy to clear the space.

Approaching energy in this way is not something we have language for in our western culture, which tends to be more left-brained, but we do feel and sense it all the same.

Have you ever heard the phrase “the energy was so thick you could have cut it with a knife”?  Perhaps you have gone into a home of a person who died recently and felt a thick oppressive cloud hanging over you that you did not come in with.

You are simply picking up energies. The more intuitive you are, the more you will feel them. Good energy hygiene is about knowing how to protect yourself from being an energy-sponge and having the discernment to know when something is coming from you or from someone else. teaches that our homes are a compilation of energies. They come from the objects we have chosen to put in them — our interactions with these objects and the emotions we experienced and expressed while living there. These energies collect in solid substances like furniture and fabrics and need to be cleared periodically. If not, they will anchor in old patterns that may not be reflecting what we truly desire in life.

A good time to do a major space clearing would be before or shortly after moving into a new home or dwelling.  It is also an effective way to set the stage for a positive new life direction such as  welcoming a new baby, celebrating a  marriage or a new career. Clearing the energies after accidents, arguments or illness would also be important. New years day is one of the most powerful times to purge your home of the old energies that have collected throughout the year, setting the stage for fresh new beginnings.

Many of you may already have your own methods of doing a space clearing. If you don’t, I will share with you a technique  that I teach to my own students These are instructions for doing a major space clearing, but you may want to do a mini space clearing every time you clean your home or at the beginning of each day to start with a fresh new energy. Open the windows and light a stick of incense or a smudge stick and move it around your home with the intention of clearing the space.  A note when traveling: opening the windows, using your hands to clap loudly up and down the walls, is a very effective method to clear your hotel room from energies of the prior occupants.

How to do a Major Space Clearing

Start with taking a shower and washing your hair. You want to start fresh and end fresh. When you finish the space clearing take another shower that evening, washing your hair again along with your clothes.  Energies collect on fabrics and you want to insure you are not keeping any of the residue of old energies.

Remove all metal jewelry, belts, etc. Metal inhibits your ability to feel the energy.

Thoroughly clean your home and open all windows. If you live in a very cold climate at least open your windows for the main part of the space clearing.  Fresh air is always a natural space clearer!

Remove all animals, children, and invalids from the premises. Cats and dogs can be put in a safe space in the yard.  Remove fish, birds, and smaller animals as well. Large amounts of energy can strongly affect and even harm them. (Just make sure you don’t put the cats next to the birds and fish or you might have the kind of space clearing you don’t want!)

Prepare a bowl filled with water for each room of your home. Float nine flowers in each bowl. The flowers can come from your garden or the store. Choose small ones that you can pop the heads off and easily float on top. You can also use nine petals from a flower. Nine signifying the magical number of Bagua.

Put one bowl of flowers, a stick of lit incense and a small lit votive candle in every room of your home including the garage.

Choose your space-clearing tool. It can be a loud bell, drum, rattle or gong. There are bells you can purchase which have four types of metals that are specifically used for space clearing. I prefer to use a bell because it will make a noticeable thud when encountering areas where the chi is stuck.

Stand at the front door with your space-clearing tool.

Do a grounding exercise where you visualize roots coming from the bottom of your feet going deep into the earth. Pull this loamy brown earth energy up through your torso feeling the rooted grounded energy in your body.

Call in your spiritual guides and say a prayer of protection and intention that all past energies be completely removed from the premises and do not enter into anything and anyone on the way out.

Starting at the front door, go around your home counter- clockwise, using your space-clearing tool of choice.  If you use a bell, ring it up and down the wall as you walk slowly around the room. Then move on to the next room. Tune into the energy and see if you can feel where the more stuck areas are located.  You may want to go around again in these areas. 

Visualize the stuck energy releasing from the ceiling and walls and furniture and moving out the windows.

When you are finished with the entire house, go back around each room from the same counter clockwise direction, and smooth the energy by using softer bells, a smudge or rain stick. You can use your hands to make “smoothing” gestures to move the energy out of the room and “calm down” the existing energy.

End back at the front door. Say a prayer releasing and thanking your guides, intending for the space to continue to be protected and blessed.

Bring the children and pets back in.

Let the energy sit an hour or more, keeping the window open as long as possible, preferably the rest of the day.

Then gather all the bowls of water and flowers and pour them together into a bucket.  It is very important to not touch the water or let any little people or critters drink it.  This is one of the vehicles for the dense energies to go into and is powerful stuff. Pour the water with the flowers somewhere off your property. You can put it down the gutter, it is all biodegradable and won’t harm the environment, but it should be entirely off your own property.

Finish by standing in each energy center of your home and saying an affirmation about that area of your life. Speak it out loud, in gratitude, with enthusiasm and in present tense, as if it is true now. 

Clearing out the old and bringing in the new energies with purpose, intention and passion will set up an energy grid in your home that will help move your life into an auspicious and powerful new direction for  2011. 

Have a happy and blessed New Year!