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!