Feng Shui Tips for Decorating Your Home

The entry to a home or the doorway into rooms is where your first view is encountered. Doorways and entrances to anything should feel welcoming. They should be clear and the pathway should allow ease of movement and defines Feng Shui.

The Chi, (or energy flow), should never be made stagnant at this point. Pictures and ornamental decorations in this area should be pleasing and round leafed plants in pots attract prosperity into the home. Another tip to remember is that if you have doorways from front to back that is visible, the flowing of energy should be stopped from escape.

A Feng Shui cure for this problem can be by placing a plant as suggested to the side of the entry: thus creating an environment to capture the Chi flow. The essence of creating good flow and attracting harmony involves placement.

Feng Shui recognizes that small problems can have a major effect on your life and that a well kept home will always have better chi than one where maintenance tasks have been allowed to pile up. The minor problems and inconveniences that plague a poorly maintained home can restrict your freedom of movement, cloud your ability to understand a situation, make it difficult to take advantage of opportunities, and waste your resources.

Think of Chi as an important guest you wish to welcome to your home, and make your formal entry - and the access to it from the street - as inviting as possible.

The principles of Feng Shui can be applied to your garden as well. By applying Feng Shui principles to your garden you can attract positive energy, wealth and good fortune. Given below are a few tips and ideas on how to Feng Shui your garden.

The most important principles of Feng Shui in the garden are curves and proportions. Your house is the Yin energy and your garden is the Yang energy. The Yang aspect in Feng Shui is about light and space. Try to incorporate all the five elements of Feng Shui in your garden as much as possible.

• Use a pond, birdbath or fountain to represent the water element.
• Use a sundial or bronze statue in the garden for metal.
• Use trees and shrubs for wood.
• Use plants or flowers that are red and orange to represent fire.
• Use earth to represent the earth element.

Water features such as pools, ponds, and fountains are beautiful and encourage beneficial chi. They also symbolize prosperity and create yin (feminine) energy.

You can create more Yang (masculine) energy by using garden lights to add light to the garden's dark areas. Remember balance and harmony is the key to a Feng Shui Garden.