Important Feng Shui Tips on Your Living Room
You have a hectic life full of work, significant others, kids, after-school activities, and very little time to relax. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a relaxing space to share with your loved ones? Wouldn’t it be nice to have a sense of relaxed fun in your main shared living space? You can have those things; it doesn’t have to break the bank. Given below are the Feng Shui tips for a living room.
It can turn into a family activity, a living room makeover! How do you make the right decisions to create the right atmosphere without spending much money? Feng shui, ancient Chinese philosophy, PHY, and tradition, may have answers for you.
Its primary concern is balancing physical and spiritual energy known as Qi through the elements: wood, fire, earth, metal, and water.
Using these elements in proper proportion, you can create the balance your living space currently lacks and release positive energy flow while ridding your home (and your family) of negative energy. Sounds pretty good.
Learn Feng Shui Tips for Your Living Room
1. Get rid of the dirt and clutter first
This may be a Westernized feng shui concept, but it makes good sense, nevertheless. Feng shui energy is like water or air; it flows through the path of least resistance. What happens to that flow if there are boxes, clothes, trash, dirt, dishes, and goodness knows what else piled up in the living room? It stagnates.
What happens to your spirit? It stagnates. It is difficult to be cheerful and carefree when your space is messy. This does not have to be a painful, lengthy process, however. Choose a weekend, enlist everyone in the family, and set a timer. Separate the clutter into three piles: trash, charity, and clean.
When the time is up, do what you need with the piles, and then stop for the day. The next day, do a deep cleaning, again employing everyone in the family to help, as it will go much faster.
Don’t forget to shampoo the carpets and cloth furniture, if possible. Start with a very blank slate; only put the big pieces of furniture back. Live with it that way until the following weekend, when you, as a family, can take the next steps.
2. Decide the color palette for the walls
Your living room’s compass direction will help you decide on the wall colors. But it is an east-facing room, and you will want to look at shades of green or turquoise. It is a south-facing room; you may look at oranges, pinks, bright yellows, or even bright purples.
If these bright colors are overwhelming, you can choose one or two walls for a colorful accent and leave the rest a more neutral white. Then it is a west-facing room, grays, earth tones, or metallic finishes are good.
Lastly, if it is a north-facing room, white, all shades of blue, deep purple, or even black are the right colors. Again, if some of these colors are overwhelming, use them on an accent wall. Choose the colors over the week, and do the painting that weekend.
The rest of the steps involved are less work and more fun. Do the following steps at your own pace to avoid burnout. Don’t forget to have fun!
3. Work on furniture placement
Most feng shui for living room guides will tell you to avoid L-shaped sofas. It isn’t the end of the world if you already have one and cannot afford to buy a new one. Try not to arrange the furniture in an L-shape, however.
You want to encourage conversation, so turn the chairs at an angle inward toward the main piece of furniture (usually a sofa or loveseat). One thing that is universally important in feng shui is what happens behind the table. Make sure no one has a door or window at their back.
Doing so creates a feeling of insecurity because the person cannot see what is happening behind them. Always place the sofa next to a wall; if this isn’t possible, create a faux wall by moving a tall table or screen behind the couch to add stability.
Side chairs are safe against a wall but also acceptable in a corner. They do not have to be right next to walls, so you may pull them in a bit to make them part of the life of the room.
A modern concern that Western feng shui practitioners will warn you about is the television. If it is not used, hide it in a cabinet or behind a screen. The people should be the focus of the room, not the electronics.
4. Plenty of light and air
The living room should be a bright and airy place. At the same time, you need to have the ability to control how much light is in the room at any one time.
Please ensure all lighting is on dimmer switches (they are pretty easy to install), and make sure all windows have adjustable coverings such as blinds.
If you want to watch a movie together, you may lower the light, but if you’re going to have a family gathering, you can lighten things up considerably. It is also important to air out space when it is practical.
5. Balance the five elements
In feng shui has five elements: wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. Some experts will tell you that you need to represent every element in every room, while others will ask you to focus on just the aspect connected with the direction in which your room faces.
The best idea is to follow the heart of feng shui: balance. Most modern living rooms are wood-heavy. They have wood floors, furniture, and rectangular shapes (tables, sofas, lounge chairs, etc.). Too much of any one element is not a good thing. Add some of the metal elements if your room has too much wood.
Metal (axes) cut wood. That means adding round tables or rounded chairs, items made of metal and cream colors. Just a few touches will help quite a bit. Another possible problem is too much fire element. Newcomers to feng shui hear that fire and its color red are lucky when it comes to passion, love, money, and power. More is better, right? Buy a red sofa, a ton of candles, a fireplace, and so on.
What could go wrong? What happens when a forest fire has an endless supply of firewood? It turns into a wildfire. Your living room already has a heavy wood element presence.
If you add a heavy fire presence, you are asking for trouble. Too much fire and that passion turn to rage, arguments, infidelity, and worse. There is nothing wrong with lighting a candle or two or having a red accent here or there. Just be careful with fire like you would in real life.
6. Add a few last-minute touches
The best part comes at the end when you decide what artwork goes on the walls, what pictures go in frames, and what plants to add to your home. The artwork avoids images of violence, whether literal, figurative, or abstract.
Peaceful mountains, meadows, or abstract scenes are good. Choose a representation or two of your children’s artwork and frame it. That will make them feel important, bringing a piece of them into the room.
Rotate pictures in frames; go shopping in your old picture albums, and bring out things the family hasn’t seen in years. Lastly, plants with smooth, broad leaves are considered lucky and soothing.