Moving is a chance to start over again. Why not give your new venture an extra boost by incorporating a little Feng Shui into your new home? While most of us inhabit our places unconsciously, Feng Shui — which is about living in harmony and with considered intention in your space — suggests that you spend some time thinking about how you want your home to work for you. Use these tips in your new space (or in your newly reinvented old space) to clear out the old energy and bring in the new!
- Start with a clean and decluttered space: Whether it's a new space or a reinvigorated space, make sure it's clean and free of clutter so that the energy can move freely around.
- Consider your intentions for your new home: What would you like to accomplish while you are living here? Perhaps you'd like to start a family, build your career, or lead a more balanced life. Whatever your wishes are, say them out loud as if they are happening in the present as you move from room to room. You can even have a different wish for each room.
- Ring a small bell in each room: Let it ring until the sound dies down. No bell? Clap your hands briskly.
- Burn sage: Sage has a long history of getting rid of old energies. Let the smoke waft through each room.
- Catch the old energy: Some people place small piles or bowls of sea salt in each corner to help corral the old energy. Let the salt sit for 24 hours and then dispose of it.
- Burn cedar: Cedar is said to usher in new and buoyant energy. Lavender is another option. (If you can't find sage or cedar locally — Whole Foods is one source — you can purchase them by on Amazon)
- Let the energy circulate: Fling open the windows, turn on the fans, and let the sunlight flood your home as much as possible. Added bonus: it'll clear out the smoke you just created!
- Place some Hematite in each corner: Its properties are said to help ground your space and protect you.
What are your rituals in a new home?
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I dig it!
My ritual for the new home is to find the Kuan Yin's corner. When I was growing up, we moved a lot and the first thing my mother placed in the house was a five foot high Kuan Yin, in a corner near the entry way of the house. For me, that always signified that this house was now our home, and when the Kuan Yin was packed to move, it was no longer our home, but again just a house.
I have inherited the Kuan Yin and, as when I was a child, the first thing I do when we move is put the Kuan Yin in her corner. That tells me this is now our home. She now lives in the corner of our sunroom and is the first thing people see as they enter or leave the house.
What is Hematite?
"nobody puts Kwan Yin in a corner..nobody."
(sorry I couldn't resist)
My mohter in Law just gave us a Kwan Yin! Hooray!!! Thanks for the tip kariwik!
if you're part of a faith, you can also likely ask your leader to come give a home blessing. Some faiths have set prayers/rituals for this. Sometimes people invite their friends to join (maybe accompanying a house warming party - laughter is a good way to begin in a new home), and in some faiths they will also annoint the entryways.
"What is Hematite?"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hematite
Simple prayer works for -->ME<--.
Thanks for the great suggestions!
More messy than cleansing: The first thing I do in a new apartment is buy ingredients for chocolate chip cookies: a kitchen's not really a kitchen unless it has eggs, sugar, flour, butter, etc. in it!
One other thing: get rid of things from bad past relationships (interpersonal and/or romantic). Sell them, swap them, give them away, put them in storage...just get them out of your space. Trust me.
I clean everything with my own brands of cleansers, so the new place smells like *me.*
Stileletto ~ good idea even if we're not moving! I need to do that...
Not being superstitious, I like to sweep and clean.
Unless these ridiculous rituals summon the rent fairy, I think they're a waste of time.
You'll find me with chrisbean, GenMoore, and Palmetto, doing something constructive instead of wasting sage and salt.
I admit I light some sage and walk around the house it's still empty, getting to know the walls. And Stiletto has a point, getting rid of the crap from the past allows the future to come into the house.
Clear out "bad home energy?" ..... "Ring a bell" ... "place your hematite in a corner?"
What a load of rubbish. Seriously? SERIOUSLY? I thought this was a site about design, not pseudoscientific nonsense. Come on, apartment therapy, step it up a little and quit with the "ancient chinese secret" bunk. What's next, fairy dust? Pagan rituals? Healing crystals?
A nice coat of paint is going to do much more for you than burning sage to "get rid of old energies."
Mind boggling.
My family is Mexican Catholic, and I remember my parents used to bless each room with holy water every so often - usually around the holidays, but occasionally after periods of infighting (between my sisters and me), or when a visitor came and stirred up negative energy.
This was something that my parents picked up from their parents, and I find myself doing the same in my own apartment. My husband is agnostic and finds it amusing when I do this but respects the deep-seated beliefs and familial connection that it stems from.
Tobacco and sage for me. But it's from my culture (American Indian) and constructive *for me*.
Sceptics might be surprised to find that balancing the energy in your home, whether or not you believe in ying and yang, actually can make a difference. If you don't believe in it, fine, but no reason to be so disrespectful to the millions of people in the world for whom feng shui is part of their belief system and culture.
i like the tips - im getting ready to move into a house (i rent) and even though cleaning and putting up new wall colors, and of course getting rid of old things and bringing in a few new pieces is all part of my normal processs - i think i will get some sage and open all the windows and turn on the fans the first nite, have a glass of wine with my roomie/sister and enjoy that the place is now our home and it'll smell good (after all the cleaning and painting - sage really couldnt hurt)... and we can celebrate that this house is us for the time being (1 year lease) - i dont necessarily believe in oriental belief systems but i think calmly taking your time to walk thru each room with the sage will be a anti-stress agent and a good memory for me and my sis... nothing wrong with having fun with it...
People do things in different ways. And ritual is a fundamental part of human behavior; if you've read anything about psychology, you'd know the importance of structure and ritual in regards to feelings of safety and belonging.
If you don't partake in these particular rituals, that doesn't mean you don't partake in any. Holidays are almost entirely ritual. A first meal of Chinese food in a new apartment is ritual.
Please don't trash on people for having their own rituals that they adhere to. Spreading sage or salt is no more ridiculous than baking cookies or ordering out.
Just helped my Iraqi roommate move into her temporary (hopefully) basement apartment. She was very sad to leave my bright condo for the dark basement but it was necessary for school. As I inspected her bathroom, some of her overpacked items fell from the coffee table and she freaked out and said, "Do you think there is a genie here?"
I stood there speechless as she went to each room saying Arabic prayers and spitting three times to drive the evil genie away. It was for her peace of mind and whom am I to say anything about it?
I believe in an old fashioned house blessing -having a minister come in and pray over the house before it is fully inhabited. Of course, this can also be done with a few friends of shared faith. And, as someone mentioned earlier, anointing doors and windows with blessed oil/holy water every so often after times of trauma also helps protect a home from more evil entering. All of these things are symbols, though. It is your faith that supports and empowers them, not the ritual itself.
make sure the smoke from the sage goes into all of the angles and corners...this is where bad energy tends to collect. You can also use a lit candle making sure all of the "dark places" have light which also alledgedly gets rid of neagtive energy.
These are reiki techniques as far as I know called "smudging" and are based on native american traditions.
All I can say is that I've seen them work for me. Its more of a meditation for yourself; by even doing it, you acknowledge that you want a place to be a healthy, happy, home.
You can also do these any time. Sometimes the home just gets filled with stress and it needs to be cleared out.
Ahleih, I couldn't have said it better.
No matter what you believe, you need to respect the beliefs and practices of others.
Believe me, these feng shui tips only barely scratch the surface. My husband grew up in an Asian (Vietnamese) culture steeped in this, and every time we move somewhere new, we go through an entire list of things we need to ascertain or position, such as which way the main door/house faces, which way the head of the bed faces, if the back door is in a direct line with the front door (all your good luck will run through and out of the house), etc etc.
I don't particularly believe all of it, having been raised Catholic, but I respect his beliefs just as I expect him to respect mine.
Also, I think of it as hedging my bets -- sure, you believe one way, but how do you know that YOUR beliefs aren't the incorrect ones?
My (hopefully) soon-to-be place is filled with good energy - my great-grandparents lived there for over 30 years, and I even had my first few Christmas Eves there when I was little-little.
Since they moved out, my uncle and his off-kilter wife moved in and, while my uncle's family and I have to love him, it really makes me a bit miffed what happened to the house.
I'm looking forward to getting in there, cleaning, repainting, and probably lighting some sage and tobacco to ground the place and make it stop smelling like paint.
Hey Damond, speak for yourself -- I'm officially requesting more posts such as this. This site is not so much about design as it is setting up home, which in the end is ultimately about establishing and creating your own energy within your home. If it were strictly about design, half the existing posts would be invalid also. Great post AT, thanks.
Great post.
Yes, damond, please refrain from bashing other beliefs. Maybe you should try some of this if you're that cranky. You can express your opinion that it's not something that YOU do, but leave the bashing to other blogs you frequent.
A friend gave me some sage when I moved into my new apt, but I never got around to using it. I'm in the process of rearranging the place (again), so this might be a good time to finally try it.
Bring on the good energies!
I'm all for others doing whatever they like in the privacy of their homes. But please, don't try to tell me that family traditions and feel-good religious activities have any science behind them. If you want to honor your family or your heritage, fabulous! And if you just think it sounds cool, fabulous! But spare me the pearl-clutching because others think it's silly.
Of course I can bash this, because it's nonsense. Millions of people believe in Bigfoot too, but guess what, it's also mostly nonsense. This is a how-to article on doing rituals to "CLEAR OUR BAD HOME ENERGY." I think that pretty much falls under the patently-ridiculous file.
"Bad energy?" Ok, define that. What's bad energy? Oh wait, there's no such thing. If this article wasn't credulously banging the drum for the belief in empty mysticism, I wouldn't have a problem. If the article said "go through some psychological rituals to make yourself feel more comfortable in your home" I wouldn't have a problem, but it doesn't... it's outright buying into blather. And this is not a beliefs and mysticism blog. I wouldn't be complaining if this were on some Fung Shui site, or some belief centered blog, but this is a design blog, and as a designer, I'd rather not be associated with this kind of hokum.
As for psychology ( @ahleih ) one of my undergraduate degrees is in psychology, so yes, I'm familiar with rituals from a psychological standpoint. But be real, that's not what this article is about. It's about magical mystical force fields and incantations, basically.
Hey, you want to ring some bells to make yourself feel better about that awful, orange sofa you got on Craigslist, be my guest, but don't pass it off as some serious methodology for dealing with a spurious and vacuous topic like mystical energy fields.
I'll gladly, happily wear the jerk hat when it comes to pointing out that this kind of stuff makes absolutely no sense at all, especially on Apartment Therapy. But whatevs. As other psychological studies have shown, confrontation rarely changes minds.
Sounds like you've read books like "Creating Sacred Space with Feng Shui" and you're describing a version of a Space Clearing. She also has a book called Clearing the Clutter with Feng Shui.
@damond I understand your point of view, as a fellow psychology student (bravo, science!). And as a psychology student especially, you should know that you hit the nail right on the head by stating that confrontation rarely changes minds.
You can be a designer, or a fan of design, or a student of design or whatever without subscribing to a set of rituals that you don't agree with. Honestly I've been following AT for over a year now and this is the first discussion I've seen of things like this.
The fact of the matter is, more people have beliefs about this sort of "hokum" (to quote you) than don't; I can offer statistics if you really need them. So can you really blame AT for pursuing a potentially large portion of their reader demographic? And if the comments are to be believed, perhaps the AT community is a proportionate demographic of the whole. : )
I'm not attacking you; in fact, I like you. : ) Remember when "therapy" was hokum?
@ damond : thank you for speaking up for critical thinking skills. More people need to embrace those.
I love how people tout "Science" as some sort of holy infallible pope...Hard core, closed minded scientist are just as dangerous as crazy religious types. Let's face it, no one on this planet REALLY know everything, neither the strict spiritualist or the atheist, discovery happens on a daily basis. We're all on our own trips and in the end are only accountable to ourselves on the kind of lives we've lived...do what makes you happy.
Damond,
Not only are you insulting people's beliefs you're also being culturally insensitive and slightly racist...
What are your ethnic origins? I am sure there are rituals there as well.
You don't have to believe them but you don't have to be insensitive either.
For example:
My partner is 100% full blooded Irish living in Canada. He doesn't believe we should ever move on a Saturday because it is bad luck. We moved to our last apartment on a Saturday and it was damaged in a fire and we half to move again. Now do I think that we were cursed with bad luck? No, but that doesn't mean I don't respect his thoughts on the situation.
Also, do us all a favour and "get over yourself"
Couldn't agree more Aintlifepeachy! I majored in psych too Damond but it doesn't give you lisence to knock other's beliefs. Whatever happened to nprofessional objectivity in dealing with others??