Feng Shui: a Tool for Healing, Inspiration and Self-empowerment

By Pat Heydlauff

Feng Shui is often defined as a Chinese art or a system of natural laws to govern the spatial arrangement, orientation and placement of a building, home, furniture or a grave so that maximum harmony is achieved between the flow of energy of the environment and that of the user. It is believed to bring good fortune and prosperity to those who use its principles.

This may sound great on paper but does it work, and how do you use it are often left unanswered. Simply stated, it does work. If you care about improving productivity, focus and balance you will want use its principles to eliminate negative energy drainers from your life or business and replace them with a vital new energy that will improve productivity, creativity and prosperity.

Highly successful people like Donald Trump, Richard Branson, Oprah Winfrey, and Steven Spielberg, along with the some of the largest companies of the world such as Coca-Cola, Sony, Shell, Procter & Gamble, Citibank and Fortune 500 names like Chase Asia, Paine Webber and McKinsey and Company, actively embrace Feng Shui as a necessary part of their business practices.

Feng Shui principles, when properly applied have a very good track record. Dating back some 3000 years, its principles are perhaps more relevant today and more effective than in Ancient China. If you take a close look at what society is going through today, you will find the need for peace, calm, prosperity and joy rising steadily as everyone is trying to cope with economic terror, world terror and storm created tragedies such as earthquakes, tsunamis and tornadoes. Consider the role of Feng Shui in your life:

Healing: Feng Shui's principle of uncluttering your physical surroundings and mental world provides the foundation for new healing energy to enter your life. This process affords you a way to eliminate many of your energy drainers that are causing stress, sleepless nights and anxiety. As you remove the stressors in your life, you are creating a healthier more prosperous environment. The result is a more relaxed, in control healthier you. Unclutter the following places to make the most impact and create an immediate flow of new energy in your life.

• Remove anything that prevents freely flowing energy to enter your home through your front door and the garage door if that is the entrance you personally use. Positive energy is blocked from entering your home by overgrown shrubs and dying plants. Prune, eliminate or replace them.

• Keep windows washed inside and out and keep curtains open during the daytime to encourage positive energy to enter. Dirty windows and closed curtains prevent you from seeing life clearly.

• On the inside, make sure nothing is blocking the movement of energy throughout your home. Keep doors to all bedrooms open. Each room of your house is in a particular segment on the Shape of Life map (Bagua) and serves an important purpose. If you keep certain doors closed you may be preventing new energy from entering into specific areas of your life such as good health, prosperity and wealth to name just a few.

Inspiring: Feng Shui is so much more than just placement or an art form. It truly is a chosen lifestyle. It is about taking control of your life by taking control of your personal surroundings and your thinking so you can focus on the important things in your life and create the future you want.

When you choose to live your life based on Feng Shui principles, you are no longer a victim of society, circumstances or others. Once you eliminate the energy drainers and clutter in your life you can focus on creating a better tomorrow and attracting the good things in life because you no longer focus on the bad things. The more you focus on bad things or the "not enoughs," the more you get of those bad things. When you focus on the good, you attract the good. Living this lifestyle inspires and motivates you to achieve the best in everything.

Self-empowering: Feng Shui is not only healing and inspiring to the body, mind and spirit but also self-empowering. Nothing makes you feel more empowered than knowing you are in control of the present and your future. Being a victim and at the mercy of others is discouraging, depressing and dispiriting. Being in control, anxiety free and confident helps you develop and maintain a "make it happen" attitude. Incorporate some of the following into your daily and weekly schedule to maintain and strengthen self-empowerment.

• Create a quite space in your home or office where you can empty the thoughts in your mind and rest in the absolute noiselessness. This allows new thoughts to enter that will ignite and energize you.

• Read something motivational every morning, even if it is for only a few minutes. Check out YouTube for two or three minute motivational messages by your favorite authors or spiritual leaders. You will be inspired all day long.

• Learn to creatively journal and do it often. Creative journaling is not the recording of daily events like a diary but rather a written form of meditation or prayer. What you record is you thoughts, ideas and insights. This is how new ideas and action plans are generated and a calm peace is created within.

A Feng Shui lifestyle provides you an "I can do it" or "I will make it happen" approach to life. By using its principles, you can create a personal environment that will provide you a peaceful sanctuary in your home where you will be more efficient, effective, productive and at peace.

Feng Shui is the use of positive energy in your personal or workplace environment to bring about desired results.  The more positive energy you have, the happier you will be and the more successful you will be at whatever you choose to do with your life.

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