Cleansing

To enjoy healthy Feng Shui in your living space, it is vital that the home be kept clean and free of clutter.
When the chi energy in your home or workplace isn’t flowing properly, and has become stale and stagnant, it can cause many problems. These could be feelings of depression, differences of opinion, financial losses, relationship problems, and feelings of frustration and lack of motivation. The stagnant energy can also cause ill-health, and people suffer from ailments ranging from the common cold to stomach ulcers.

Stale chi is principally created when the air within the home has not been cleared out. During dark winter days, when windows stay closed for long periods, it is easy for the chi inside the home to stagnate. If there is clutter and dirt, the situation is seriously compounded. This is because winter is also the cold season of yin, when yang energy is in short supply. An excessive amount of yin energy at this time of the year can therefore lead to illness and lethargy.
By cleansing your residence, workplace and aura you can create a proper flow of positive energy and get rid of the above problems. Keeping the home well heated and well lit creates healthy yang energy; besides, it also creates much needed warmth. More importantly, it causes energies to become balanced and fresh. Lively and inspiring music will also add happy chi to the living space. If you’re planning to de-clutter your home, take a look at these 10×20 storage sheds.

Perhaps it is a subconscious need to clean up the home to clear its energies that has led people of all backgrounds and cultures to undertake a thorough cleaning prior to celebrating traditional happy occasions. As it is for Jewish people celebrating Passover, so it is for the Chinese celebrating lunar New Year, and for Muslims celebrating Eid-ul-Fitr after a month of fasting during Ramadan – a practice that is believed to cleanse the body and mind. Almost all traditional happy occasions are times when lights and music are used lavishly. People of the Indian subcontinent, for example, celebrate many festivals such as Vasant Panchami, Ganesh Chaturthi, Navratras, Durga Pooja, Onam and Deepavali, also known as the Festival of Lights.

To enjoy healthy Feng Shui in your living space, it is vital that the home be kept clean and free of clutter. Blocked drains should be cleared. Plumbing represents the arteries of the home, and any blockage can cause serious illness when not attended to. Appliances that have broken down should be repaired or replaced. You should get rid of polluted or dirty water in the garden and if the toilet or bathroom becomes clogged, the problem must be attended to immediately. All of this may seem to be good common sense, but it is surprising how often simple repair chores are put off. From a Feng Shui point of view, this is unhealthy and causes drainage of the energy of inhabitants.

Cleansing When Moving Into a New House or Workplace

When moving into a new home or workplace, you will need to cleanse it because buildings absorb the energies of previous occupants. The curtains and carpets also need to be cleaned as they hold the stagnant/negative energies from previous residents (you can use an upholstery steam cleaner on these to give them a proper clean). These stagnant/negative energies are likely to be absorbed by the people living or working within this space, causing arguments, physical and mental sickness, thus leading to a steep fall in the efficiency of the inhabitants. Use Bissell‘s guide to deep cleaning your home for a thorough routine to getting your home looking the way it should.

Steps to Clean Old and Stale Energy

• Begin by removing items left behind by the previous residents that you do not wish to keep. Put them out for garbage collection, or to give to a charity.
• Dust and vacuum before moving.
• Open all the windows and doors.
• Put on your favorite music and let the cleansing begin.
• You will need to focus your mind on what your aim is and confirm your intentions.
• You need to recite an affirmation as you are smudging. (Smudging is the burning of sacred herbs to rid a person or an area of negative energy.)
• You will need to smudge yourself first so that you don’t leave or absorb negative energies when you leave.
• Start burning a stick of sandalwood incense and as the smoke begins to rise from the incense, move the incense around your body letting yourself be surrounded by the smoke.
• Start at the top of your head and move the incense around your body, letting yourself be surrounded in the smoke. When you get down to your feet, lift each foot and allow the smoke to swirl under the sole of each foot. Let the smoke swirl around and be absorbed by every part of your body.
• Once you have smudged yourself, move to the front of the house and begin the process.
• Allow the smoke to rise and fill every corner, on every wall, over every doorway and window, and in every room of the house. As you are doing this, recite your affirmation.
• Be sure and move the smoke over, around, and under the furniture, as these things can hold energy as well.
• You should work your way through each room, using a clockwise motion until you end up back at the front door.
• End with smudging your body one more time.
• The final step is to place a pinch of rock salt in a corner of each room. This will absorb any negative energy and you will need to replace the salt once a month.

 Tips for Keeping the Home Free of Stagnant/ Negative Energies

• Place crystals throughout the house.
• Place rock salt in every corner of every room.
• Spray the house or workplace with holy water.
• Burn candles or incense, or essential oils in a vaporizer
• Add fresh flowers in vases throughout your house.
• Say affirmations or prayers.
• Move furniture around every few months.
• De-clutter the house or workplace once every year.

Space Clearing Guidelines

• Be clear that what you are doing is space clearing and not space enhancing.
• Think seriously and focus your mind on what you are doing.
• Relax and understand that you are clearing the energies around you, and not praying to or invoking any spirits. This is vital.
• Undertake all space clearing activities in the morning, after the sun has come up. Never undertake space clearing after the sun has set.
• Never do space clearing on an overcast or rainy day. You will always get better results when energized by a dose of precious natural yang energy supplied by the morning sun.
• You can apply space clearing practices to your room, home, or office to lighten the energies that have become heavy with imbalance.
• It is a good idea to develop a routine to your space clearing practices so that you will continually freshen up energies around you. Space clearing done once a month should be adequate. Complete space purification can be done twice a year or at least once before the start of a new year.
• You can use these simple methods to dissolve sick and inauspicious energies, until you can introduce long term changes to improve either the orientation or the location of your furniture.
• In particular, rooms that have been previously occupied by bedridden or sick persons, or a home that has just had a death in the family, will benefit from space clearing rituals.
• Burn incense around the room each time there is a particularly severe argument in the home, since it cleans away any anger that may be lingering in the air and improves relationships. Over the year, it will help create greater harmony in the home. There will be fewer disagreements, less flaring of tempers, and less anger.
• Resist the temptation to perform space clearing rituals for other people. There is an unwritten rule about disturbing the energy of space that does not belong to you, unless you possess a protective amulet. Observing this advice will protect you from being inadvertently hurt by hostile spirits that might be present in other people’s space and who do not know you. In space clearing we are addressing only the invisible energy lines that affect our personal well-being.

Clutter in the Office

Office clutter accumulates rapidly and there are few people who would not benefit from discarding extraneous items from their workplace and streamlining their procedures. Office clutter is not just things left lying about, but also the paper we hoard, out-of-date journals, and non-essential computer files.

Storage

There is no excuse for clutter. There are many storage options, ranging from cupboards which hide computers and printers to simple cardboard storage boxes. Before tidying everything away in boxes or files, it is worth asking the question, “Do I really need this?”

Journals

Professional journals are invariably hoarded but rarely read. Many of these are now available online, and professional organizations hold a complete set in their libraries if an article is needed. If we skim through journals when they arrive and note the issue and page numbers of interesting articles, we can file them and don’t need to keep them.

Desks

Desk drawers harbor a considerable amount of rubbish, but if we throw away old pens and pencils which no longer work, and have special places for rubber bands and paper clips, we will feel more efficient and save the time spent searching for things. It is advisable to have a single tier in-tray, otherwise the temptation is to categorize things into urgent and not-so-urgent, and the latter will never be dealt with. A satisfying feeling at the end of each day is to know that the in-tray is empty and that all mail has been dealt with; it can be energy draining to begin the morning confronted with the debris from the day before. Even if you haven’t been able to finish the work, organize your desk so that it gives the impression that all is under control. Clearing the day’s mail is an excellent habit to get into, and if everyone dealt with bills promptly, the world would be a far less stressful place.

Computers

Computers store an amazing amount of information and if we clear out-of-date files, and backup our working files regularly, we will always have rapid access to the data we need. It can take time to set up databases to print labels for mail, but it is worth the initial effort for the time saved. Random thoughts as well as notes for lectures and workshops should be recorded to help us prepare well in advance and save time and anguish at the last minute. Old hard copy files do not have to be stored in the office and are best removed to a storeroom or cupboard elsewhere to prevent a build-up of stagnant energy.

Books

Many people find books difficult to discard, yet the speed of technological change renders information out-of-date rapidly, and some books, such as directories and unread reference books, should be regarded as disposable items.

Organizers

One of the most useful items in an office is a revolving card file by the telephone. Invaluable for instant access to addresses and telephone numbers, it can also be used to cross-reference suppliers, records, birthdays, marriage anniversaries and other information which, although it can now be stored on computers and electronic personal organizers, actually takes more time to access in these formats. Personal organizers are extremely useful items for both the home and the office, but major difficulties arise if we lose them.

Pandit Gopal Sharma: Born in a renowned family of Vedic scholars and spiritual healers, Pt. Gopal Sharma, an
engineering graduate from the Delhi College of Engineering, is a luminary in many fields. For over a decade, he has been doing extensive research in ancient sciences like Vaastu, Feng Shui, Pyramid and numerous facets of astrology. A much-awarded person and corporate advisor to leading business houses in India and abroad, he has 37 books
on various subjects to his credit. He is the Vice President of All India Federation of Astrologer’s Societies with 120 centers across the globe, and founder President of the Institute of Vaastu & Joyful Living. Pt. Sharma is also the President of Aadi Shankaracharya Vedic Education Society, engaged in the process of establishing an international university near Jaipur in Rajasthan (India), with a mission to impart world-class education in the fields of Vaastu, Vedanta, yoga, astrology and other professional courses. www.panditgopalsharma.com