Fengshui (pronounced fungshway) is an ancient Chinese art of placement that is thousands of years old.

And although many Westerners have now heard of fengshui, most of them are still confused about how to implement it in their homes.

This article contains 85 easy fengshui tips to enhance prosperity and happiness in your life.

Ready? Roll your sleeves up and let’s get to work!

Feng Shui Basics

Does All This Stuff Really Work?

Fengshui works even if you don’t understand or believe it. But the results will take less time and be more successful if you approach Fengshui with an open mind.

Despite metaphysical aspects of fengshui, much of it is just common sense.

For example, if you enter a dark foyer, you feel uncomfortable and your first response would be to turn a light on. By doing that, you've implemented a Fengshui “cure” to correct an unpleasant situation.

If you sit at your desk with your back to the door, you’d feel uncomfortable and distracted knowing that someone could come up behind and startle you, so you position your desk so that you can see the door when sitting at it. This, too, follows Fengshui principles.

The goal of fengshui is to create harmony and balance in your environment. This involves positioning furniture in comfortable arrangements, eliminating clutter, establishing convenient traffic patterns through your home, and other sensible ways to make life easier.

Our homes mirror our internal state. Your home can reveal a lot about you. If, for example, an area in your home is cluttered, you’re probably experiencing blockage or confusion in the part of your life that corresponds to the cluttered area. A cluttered desk might indicate a troubled career.

CH’I

Ch’i (pronounced chee) is the vital energy that animates all life. When ch’i is gently flowing through your environment, it creates prosperity and abundance in different areas of your life.

Fengshui works on removing obstructions in your home that are interfering with the proper circulation of ch’i in a way that nurtures our lives and brings us health, wealth, and happiness.

YIN AND YANG

In Chinese philosophy, there are two fundamental energies that are omnipresent, existing in everything: yin (feminine) and yang (masculine).

The goal is to create balance so that neither force dominates.

Yin is considered to be receptive and inward-oriented. It’s restful. The yin force is present in darkness, silence, water, curved shapes, and cool colors.

Yang is assertive and outward-directed. It’s stimulating. The yang force is present in light, noise, fire, sharp lines, and warm colors.

By combining the two energies in your home, you create a balanced, harmonious environment. But in some cases, you may want to emphasize one of the two energies.

For example, you might choose to create more yin energy in your bedroom to create a peaceful, restful space. So you add more soft, curved furniture, install low-level lighting and paint the room blue or green.

The Five Elements

Chinese philosophy holds that the world is composed of five elements—fire, earth, water, wood, and metal. By incorporating these five elements into your environment, you can bring balance into your life.

Each element produces a specific effect. Fire stimulates, earth stabilizes, water softens and blends, wood expands, metal strengthens and concentrates. But too much of one element can have a negative effect. Too much fire in a room can create tension and instability; too much metal can cause rigidity.

If you notice a dominance of one element around your home, you can counteract its influence by adding other elements.

In some cases, you might want to adjust the elements in your home in a way that will bring the conditions you desire. For example, add metal objects in your study to help you concentrate, water (aquarium, for example) to your living room to help you relax.

Types of Feng Shui Cures

The following is a list of different types of cures:

1. Unblocking Cures

They promote clarity and eliminate obstacles.

These cures include cleaning, eliminating clutter, repairing, and furniture arranging.

2. Activating Cures

They stimulate energy and redirect the flow of ch’i.

These cures include moving objects such as wind chimes, mobiles, fans, or electronic equipment – including phones, computers, stoves, TVs, etc. Even physically walking through the rooms can stir up energy and encourage movement in different areas of your life.

3. Stabilizing Cures

When energy moves too quickly, it can produce sudden changes and instability. These cures slow down or concentrate ch’i so it’ll nourish different areas of your life properly.

These cures include heavy statuary, rocks, large pieces of furniture, and square shapes.

4. Augmenting Cures

They promote growth and increase.

These cures include live plants, wooden furniture, and mirrors.

How To Get Positive Energy At Home? (Feng Shui)

Fengshui links each room of your home with an area of your life, depending on the room’s primary purpose. For example, your bedroom is associated with love and relationships. The study, where you work, corresponds to your career.

Below are some Feng Shui adjustments and cures that you can apply to each area of your home.

#1. Front Entrance

This is where Ch’i enters from and nourishes your home. A large, easily accessible front door will allow more ch’i into your home than one that is small and difficult to find.

This is why it’s important to make the entrance to your home as appealing as possible - including your sidewalk, porch, yard, front steps, etc.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Front Entrance

1- Clear away clutter and obstacles that obstruct access to your front door.

2- Put higher wattage light bulbs near your front door to make your entrance clearly visible.

3- Keep your front entrance in a good state. Fix broken doorbells and make sure your door opens easily.

4- Put out a welcome mat. This simple gesture will make your front door feel more welcoming for guests, but also for ch’i to enter.

5- Hang a wind chime between you and the street or a noisy neighbor. Wind chimes send unpleasant vibes away from your home.

Related: How to Get Rid of Clutter One Room at a Time The Eco-Friendly Way?

#2. Entryway

The area just inside the front door is as important as your front entrance. It allows ch’i energy to flow into the rest of your house.

If you enter the house and encounter the wall, you’ll feel blocked, and this is how ch’i responds, too. To adjust the situation, a picture with a distant view could expand the area.

Also, make sure your foyer or front hallway is well-lit and cheerful.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Entryway

6- Install adequate lighting.

7- Use a warm color like yellow or orange to paint your entrance area.

8- Eliminate clutter and organize your front hall closet, if you have one.

9- Keep stairs, doors, and other architectural features in good condition.

10- Place a circular glass bowl or jar near your front door where you can put your keys, sunglasses and other items. Symbolically, circles represent harmony and glass improves communication between the inhabitants of the home.

11- Hang a circular mirror in your entrance area.

12- Hang a photo that signifies friendship to the right of your front door.

#3. Living Room

Make sure that ch’i is going to flow smoothly into your living room and that the pathway into your living room is unobstructed by clutter, furniture, or other barriers.

Living rooms are usually where you entertain guests and socialize with other people. Therefore, this room is connected with your social life. The condition of your living room reflects the quality of your social life. The more cheerful and comfortable your living room is, the more positive your social life becomes.

But your living room is also important for your well-being since you spend a good amount of time there. So keep this area clean and decorate it attractively.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Living Room

13- Arrange furniture so that, when seated, no one’s back is to the room’s main entrance.

14- Don’t position furniture so near the room’s entrance that it blocks passage into the room.

15- Arrange seatings in a way that enables people to communicate easily with one another, without having to shout or lean forward to converse.

16- Provide a variety of lighting sources, for a different activity like reading, watching a movie, etc.

17- Place three throw pillows on your sofa. The number three symbolizes activity and change.

18- Place a live plant in your living room. Plants symbolize growth, life, and well-being.

#4. The Kitchen

Kitchen is the area that provides nourishment for you and your loved ones. In Feng Shui, the kitchen is connected with prosperity and money. A clean, efficient kitchen, where everything works properly, suggests a comfortable financial situation.

Fengshui considers the stove the focal point of the kitchen. It’s where food is prepared and money is generated.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Kitchen

19- The best position for the stove is that which allows the cook to interact with other people and his back is not to the kitchen’s entrance. But if it’s not possible, try not to cram the stove into a corner in a way that will make the cook feel constrained.

20- Hang a mirror above your stove. By reflecting your stove, you’re doubling its wealth-generating capabilities.

21- Hang a mirror beside your stove. If your stove is positioned in a corner and you feel cramped while cooking. A mirror will create the illusion of more space.

22- Use your stove regularly, even to just make tea, to generate wealth.

23- Keep the passageways through your kitchen clear to allow ch’i to flow smoothly.

24- Declutter and organize cabinets and pantry to improve efficiency and reduce confusion or discord.

25- Make sure all appliances are working properly.

26- Keep your kitchen neat and clean (especially your stove) to prevent health risks and financial decay.

27- Fix a leaky kitchen faucet. A dripping faucet in the kitchen can cause money to slowly leak away.

28- Place living plants in your kitchen to increase your prosperity. For best results, choose a plant with round leaves.

29- Install adequate lighting. Brighter lights stimulate positive ch’i and prosperity.

30- Replace a burned-out light bulb in your kitchen. Broken or nonfunctioning objects can diminish the positive effects of ch’i and interfere with your ability to attract wealth.

31- Illuminate dark corners in your kitchen. Hang a light-catcher from the ceiling in a shadowy corner to reflect light into the darkness.

32- Install a ceiling fan or place a portable fan in your kitchen. It’ll stimulate ch’i in order to promote activity in financial areas.

33- Place a small water fountain in your kitchen. Water promotes growth and reduces stress and helps you relax, so you digest your food better.

34- Place a wooden container on your kitchen counter. Wood cures encourage growth. An open bowl or container suggests that you are open to receiving abundance.

35- Empty the kitchen trash every day. This practice keeps germs from lingering in your kitchen but also clears away what you don’t need or want.

Related: How to Start a Zero Waste Life? (A Beginner's Guide to Trash-Free Home)

#5. Dining Room

The dining room is where we nourish ourselves and interact socially. In this sense, dining rooms can combine the qualities of the kitchen and the living room. In Feng Shui, the dining room condition indicates the quality of your finances and social life.

A cluttered dining room can suggest confusion or stress in both areas of your life. If you don’t have a dining room in your house it doesn’t mean that you have no friends or money. But you can still apply the following tips to where you eat meals.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Dining Room

36- Avoid arguments during meals.

37- Don’t watch TV or check your phone during meals—focus on interacting with your fellow diners or enjoy the moment if you’re eating by yourself.

38- Clear away the clutter.

39- Repair broken furniture.

40- Hang a picture of a landscape with a distant view in your dining room. This is especially beneficial if your dining room is small doesn’t have a window. It opens up the enclosed space and expands your financial opportunities.

41- Hang a rectangular mirror in your dining room. The mirror expands the room—and your money-making ability. For best results, place a rectangular mirror as this shape symbolizes growth.

42- Position the chair of a person who wants to increase his income so that he faces the entrance to the room when seated.

43- Place four chairs around your kitchen or dining table. The number four symbolizes stability, this will help you to stabilize your finances and save money.

44- Use a yellow tablecloth on your kitchen or dining table. Yellow represents gold as well as the sun’s life-giving rays.

#6. Bedroom

The bedroom is the place where intimate, private activities like sleeping, dressing, making love happen. The more comfortable your bedroom is, the better your love life gets.

Broken or worn furnishings and clutter can signify breaks in communication, confusion, or a relationship that has withered.

The bedroom is also linked with health. It’s where we rest at the end of the day and rejuvenate ourselves.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Bedroom

45- Avoid keeping or using screens (phones, computers, or TV) in the bedroom. They can create mental clutter and bring influences from the outside world.

46- Position the bed so you have a clear view of the door when you’re in bed, but not too close to the door that you may feel you don’t have enough privacy.

47- Don’t place your bed directly under a window where drafts can cause illness.

48- Move your bed if it shares the same wall as a toilet.

49- Don’t store things under your bed.

50- Eliminate clutter and clear passageways through your bedroom.

51- Keep closet doors closed to prevent personal matters from becoming public knowledge.

52- Install dimmer switches on lamps so you can adjust lighting for different activities or moods.

53- Illuminate dark corners in your bedroom. Dark corners sap positive energy. Position a lamp so that it illuminates a dark corner of your bedroom.

54- Place two pink or red throw pillows on your bed. The number two and the colors red/pink are cures to attract romance.

55- Hang a picture of a romantic couple in your bedroom to help focus your intention on enhancing your love life.

56- Choose rectangular, wooden frames for pictures. The wood element helps to promote growth in an existing relationship or attract new love into your life.

57- Hang a picture of two swans in your bedroom. Swans mate for life. Therefore, it’s a good image to improve your love life.

58- Remove photos of people other than you or your romantic partner. Pictures of other people distract your energy away from your romantic partner.

59- Put red or pink silk sheets on your bed. Silk appeals to your sense and is conducive to romance. Red and pink stimulate loving feelings.

60- Put on a small amount of perfume before going to bed. Jasmine, rose, ylang-ylang, musk, or patchouli are scents that are linked with love and passion.

61- Put a live plant in your bedroom to stimulate growth in romantic areas. For best results, choose a plant with pink or red flowers or one with rounded leaves.

62- Install a ceiling fan or place a portable fan in your bedroom. Fans stir up ch’i and keep your love life from growing stale.

63- Hang a circular mirror in your bedroom. Circle shapes promote harmony, and mirrors open up new possibilities.

#7. Bathroom

The bathroom is where personal cleansing takes place and where wastes are flushed away. But it’s also where ch’i can be flushed out of your home. This is why you need to minimize opportunities for ch’i to flow out of your house taking prosperity along with it.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Bathroom

64- Fix faucets and showerheads that drip or toilet that runs. They’re wasteful but they can also cause your money to leak away, too.

65- Close toilet lids and shower curtains to cover any visible drains that can suck ch’i.

66- If a bathroom is next to your work area, hang a small mirror on the outside of the bathroom door. This deflects the positive ch’i that’s generated in your work area away from the bathroom and prevents it from going down the drain.

67- The presence of water creates strong yin energy. Balance it with bright lighting to add more yang energy.

68- Keep your bathroom clean, neat, and well-organized.

69- Set a live plant on the tank of your toilet. The plant draws ch’i away from the toilet, keeping it from being flushed away.

70- Hang an attractive picture on the wall above the toilet.

#8. Study/Home Office

Working from home has become increasingly common in recent years. In feng shui, a study or work area in your home is associated with finances and career.

If your work area is cluttered, you may have trouble attracting new opportunities or money.

Feng Shui Tips to Improve Your Study/Workspace

71- Position your desk so you can easily see the entrance to your work area when seated. If your back is to the door, you may feel uncomfortable and have difficulty concentrating because someone might come up from behind and startle you.

72- Put a live plant in your work area. Plants promote growth and encourage career success and financial growth. For best results, pot the plant in a shiny golden, silver, or copper container.

73- Install adequate lighting. Brighter lights stimulate positive ch’i and prosperity.

74- Replace a burned-out light bulb in your office or work area. Damaged or non-functioning objects in your work area can cause financial obstacles.

75- Illuminate dark corners in your office or work area. Darkness saps positive ch’i and diminishes its power to produce wealth.

76- Combine the colors red, yellow, white, black, and green in your work area. These colors correspond to the five elements. Combining them establishes balance and can help you improve your earning capability.

77- Clear the passageways to and through your work area to your ability to generate wealth is enhanced.

78- Place a paper money bill on your desk and put a stone or ceramic paperweight on it. This cure is especially beneficial for people who struggle to save money. The weight symbolically keeps money from disappearing so quickly.

79- Frame paper money and display it prominently in your office or workspace. This obvious symbol of wealth will help you attract money. For best results, choose a golden-colored frame.

80- Move your desk if it shares a wall with the toilet. This prevents money from going down the drain.

81- Hang a wooden wind chime in the window of your workspace. The wind chime’s movement activates stagnant ch’i and stimulates your money-making potential.

82- Display awards, trophies, et cetera in your office or workspace. These reminders of your past achievements enhance your self-confidence and help you become even more successful.

83- Empty the wastebasket each day. Don’t let clutter and waste accumulate where you are working to generate money.

84- Eliminate clutter to make room for money and new opportunities.

85- Clean up your digital files. Make room for new money-making opportunities.

Personal Chi: Work On Yourself, Too

Make sure your personal chi is balanced and positive by taking care of yourself —emotionally and physically. You may consider trying the following:

1. Aromatherapy
2. Color therapies using different colors
3. Light therapy by spending time outdoors
4. Massage & chiropractic treatment
5. Exercise and Yoga
6. Meditation and visualization
7. Positive affirmations
8. Breathwork

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References

• Portions of this article were adapted from the book 10-Minute Feng Shui: Hundreds of Easy Tips and Techniques for Prosperity, Health, and Happiness, © 2002 by Skye Alexander. All rights reserved.