There’s an art to how to feng shui your bedroom, and it’s based on the layout of the furnishings, bed placement and accessories in your room. The concept is to allow for the life force, or Chi, to flow freely, for better health, prosperity and love. The term Feng Shui can be translated into English as ‘wind and water’. And it’s the practice of harmonizing natural elements and thereby harnessing their energies. If your bedroom has a poor layout, or your body is facing the wrong direction; it is said that you could suffer from poor health or bad luck.
You’ll receive the best benefits of feng shui when you balance the five elements of wood, fire, earth, metal and water. A well thought-out interior design, coupled with good feng shui practices, will help you sleep better, and have a more balanced mood and immune function.
Let’s dig into all the ways to create a feng shui bedroom!
What is a Feng Shui Bedroom?
It’s the perfect blend of furniture placement, symmetry and balance, with plenty of room to walk safely around the furnishings. You should have a secured headboard, matching pairs of nightstands and lamps, and 1-2 houseplants. TV and computers are no-no’s, but serene or uplifting art, and furniture that does not have sharp edges or corners are great. Rounded corners don’t ‘cut the Chi’ so whenever possible, choose round or oval nightstands. Clutter should be removed from your bedroom, and the colors should be muted and natural in shades of off-white, browns or peach tones. All these elements help to create that flow of harmony, peace, relaxation, love and good sleep. Keeping your room tidy also increases the flow of energy. If you follow these practices, you’ll also have a beautifully decluttered bedroom with symmetry and space!
What is the Best Direction to Face Your Bed?
The placement of your bed is so important that it’s called the ‘command position’. This means that you've placed it in such a way so that you can see the entrance door while laying down. Your headboard will not be on the same wall as the door. For instance, if your door is on the South wall of the room, you’ll want your headboard against the North wall. The doorway should not directly open onto your bed. It should be somewhat to either side of the bed, such as 3 feet to the East or West of the side of your bed.
What Kind of Bed is Best?
Don’t place your bed under a heavy ceiling beam or ceiling fan, as this is considered to cut the Chi, or forces a downward pressure as you sleep. A headboard is very important as it’s considered to give you a feeling of support. For best feng shui, the headboard should be solid, not open wood slats or brass-scrolled headboards. Those are considered to have a ‘cutting’ energy that is not restful. Soft fabrics are most highly recommended, as they don’t overpower or be too strong. You want soft, rounded-corner, comfortable items in your bedroom. This greatly assures peace and relaxation.
What are the Bagua or Energy Areas of a Feng Shui Bedroom?
There are 8 baguas that are the foundation of feng shui, plus 1 center square that is considered the heart of your home, which is called the Center bagua. The center is the section that distributes the other 8 bagua’s to the different sectors. Those are Family, Wealth & Prosperity, Health, Helpful People, Children, Fame, Career and Partnerships. The bagua map is literally a map that you can superimpose over the floorplan of your home, to see where your bedroom falls in the map.
How Should I incorporate my Bagua Map?
Once you know what your bagua map is; you can start incorporating items into the areas that you want to concentrate on. Such as, if you want to bring more love into your area you would add the warm colors. Some good choices would be yellow, red, burgundy, pink or orange in accessories or small furnishings. They should always be added in pairs, as this gives balance to the love. If you want to add health to an area, you would incorporate healthy plants or flowers, or green and blue colors, and wide stripes that run vertically. For your Career area, you’d add mirrors, asymmetrical shapes, a small water feature and dark colors.
To can view the bagua maps and learn more here. This link teaches you how to calculate the bagua map for your specific home. If you’d like to see diagrams of good designs vs bad designs, review this one.
How Can I Incorporate all Five Senses into my Feng Shui Bedroom?
Most of us know what our 5 senses are, but do we know how to put them to good use in a feng shui bedroom? If you can find a way to incorporate all 5 you will have really ramped up the good vibes in your room! Smell, touch, sight, sound and taste are all to be considered. So we’ll give you a few tips on how you can add them.
For the sense of smell, you can light a scented candle or diffuse essential oils. For touch, the best is to incorporate soft fabrics that are soothing to your skin, such as bamboo bed sheets. A very beautiful piece of art, or a pair or figurines, or a paint color can invoke calm, and take care of the sense of sight. With sound, you can either play gentle meditation music or soft white-noise sounds of the ocean. And with taste, keep a glass of water with lemon slices on the nightstand, you can drink it before or after sleep.
What Accessories are Best for a Feng Shui Bedroom?
You can first consult the bagua as it will depend on the area your bedroom space falls into. But in general: Essential oils, and soft inviting fabrics that feel soft to the skin, such as BedVoyage Bed Sheets, Coverlets or Duvets. Earth tones are especially good in the bedroom, and most accessories should be in pairs. Examples are 2 decorative pillows, 2 matching nightstands, 2 lamps, chairs, or figurines, as this promotes loving harmonious energy. The goal is to create symmetry of weight and space. Remove any heavy or graphic art, clean out under the bed, and declutter the room. It should feel beautiful, serene, somewhat sparse, and plenty of room to move about.
The Influence of Lighting on Your Bedrooms Feng Shui:
While you might think that bedroom lighting fixtures are inconsequential when discussing Feng Shui, compared to factors like room color, decor, and decorations; it's quite the opposite. Everything from the type of fixture you install, material and design, down to the type of lightbulb can greatly impact the room's Feng Shui. Below are a couple of different ways you can leverage your lighting to have different effects on the Feng Shui:
Yellow vs. White Light
Where a yellow light can bring warmth, comfort, and security to a space, a plain white light has a cleaner, more upbeat feel that is likely more appropriate for an office.
Type of Fixture
An overhead light might cast shadows in the room and feel like a lingering power above you. Using side table lamps lowers the light to the bed level and creates more of a warm, welcoming space.
Material
Remember to avoid two things; metals and sharp edges. Where both of those promote an active and on-edge feel, a smooth, rounded fixture made of wood or softer material offers more of a relaxed Feng Shui feel. It may also match your home decor better. Your bedroom is your personal sanctuary, so make sure you are illuminating the room properly!
How to Feng Shui a Bedroom for Love:
One of the quickest ways to feng shui for love is to give the feeling of ‘space’ for that 2nd person: 2 chairs, 2 nightstands, and 2 lamps. This allows them to feel there is room in your bedroom, and therefore room in your heart for them. Also, a bit of no-brainer but must be said: remove any photos or keepsakes from past loves. Out with the old, in with the new. New sheets are a must as well, as old-energies can linger in bedding. Balance the Yin and the Yang, so that its neither too feminine nor too masculine. Remove any exercise equipment, work related items, and the tv. These all give the impression that your partner is not the most important, and that you could quickly jump to exercising, doing work, or getting engrossed in a movie.
How Can I Declutter My Bedroom Quickly?
Clean and purge! Remove anything that does not follow feng shui rules, such as clutter and work-related items. Schedule a deep-clean as you simply have to declutter in order to do a deep clean. It may feel nice to keep momentos around your bedroom, reminding you of travels, or your kids, or your past. But those can also evoke the feeling of being weighted down with ‘stuff’. So remove unnecessary items, and put them in more appropriate places such as the office or family room. For more tips on how to make your bedroom feel like a hotel on a budget, check-out this blog.
What Feng Shui Should Not be in a Bedroom?
TV, computer, phones. Mirrors that face the bed (they say it invites a 3rd person into the bed). Heavy art above the bed, nightstands with sharp corners, and large looming furnishings, bookshelves with vertical books. Plants are considered to be too yang (strong) no water features, or clutter under the bed. Some feng shui experts don’t advice placing any plants in your bedroom. They feel the active upward-growing energy of the plant disrupts the calm healing energy wanted. Others feel that they do invite positive energy in, but would recommend they be small, and not the type that have pointed leaves or fronds.
10 Things You Shouldn’t Have in Your Bedroom:
It may be unusual to hear, as some items seem to be such good companion in the bedroom but actually create the opposite of relaxation. Items such as books, your laptop, or your smartphone. Family photos give off too much yang energy and are best in the living room or offices, but not the bedroom. These are all sleep-stealers or energy-sucks and are not recommended. Some other no-go’s are water features, which may sound beautiful while drifting off to sleep. But in the feng shui world; water eats fire, which means it will take away any passion in the bedroom.
What to Stay Away From In Your Bedroom:
Clutter is the opposite of calming (we all know that, but often do it anyway!) and wall mirrors are said to push off chi into the opposite direction. Dark colors such as reds and blacks are either too excitable, or too depressing. Staying with neutral tones will help create that calm atmosphere you want as you try to drift off to sleep. Footboards and benches, in the feng shui terms; are said to block progress in life.
If you also have interest in adding at at-home spa to set the vibe for home relaxation and self care; you can visit the article on how to set up your space.
Many of the ideals behind feng shui in your bedroom seem to just be choices that would naturally promote a sense of calm, which leads to great rest. So have some fun, and incorporate some feng shui in your bedroom and see if you notice an energy switch!
Sweet Dreams~
