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HOW YOUR HOME CAN BRING LOVE & ROMANCE

WHEN YOU LIVE IN A CLEAN, uncluttered home your mind should be free and clear. When your place is filled with inspiring colours and beautiful objects of the soul, life should start to move more easily and effortlessly. Yet sometimes, despite all your best efforts, that just doesn’t happen. You might still feel stuck, caught tight in the middle of problems, frustrated and depressed.

Of course a house can’t fix everything in your life (sometimes you have to look for answers outside your four walls) but it can often give a helping hand. By using techniques from feng shui and other forms of house-healing, it might even help you solve your problems – in the most surprising and unexpected ways. In the next couple of chapters we’re going to look at some surprisingly simple tips that might just help some of life’s most common dilemmas. Let’s start with the one that is probably the most important – and the one which usually causes the most problems – relationships.

LOVE AND RELATIONSHIPS

Whether you want a new relationship or would like to improve an existing one, feng shui has some straightforward tips for improving your love life.

Presumably you will have already checked the marriage area of the home and, if it is missing or truncated, have taken steps to pull it back into the house. If possible, you should also have moved your bedroom to rite marriage area or put your bed in the marriage corner of your bedroom. If you haven’t done so yet, check out the initial guidelines for feng shui in Part Four. Having sorted out the basics, here are some more things you can do:

FENG SHUI FOR RELATIONSHIPS

• Boost your marriage area by placing a beautiful bright light in the corner – a glittering chandelier is ideal (providing it suits your house) or check out stunning modern lights. A large lamp would work too, with a vibrant (ideally red or pink) lampshade. Add a vase full of gorgeous sensual flowers – pick blooms in romantic shades of red and pink.
• Check again to make sure you are not filling your bedroom with things that represent your work – or a past relationship. If your bedroom is dedicated to the past or your career, it will leave you wedded to your work or a past love. Keep your bedroom just for sleep. If you have to work in your room, screen your work corner off and switch off the phone at night.
• The images with which you surround yourself are very important. If the pictures around you are of solitary people or lonely landscapes (however beautiful they may be) you are symbolically cutting yourself off from relationships. In your bedroom it is essential you choose pictures of couples or soft, romantic landscapes.
• Choose soft materials and gentle, rounded shapes for your bedroom. Curved lines usher in feelings of harmony and love. Your bedroom should be a sensual retreat so choose furniture, coverings and, particularly, your bed, for comfort above all else. Fabrics should be sensuous and feel good against the skin; pile your bed with sumptuous cushions and pillows for lounging.
• Candles represent the element of fire and also symbolize passion. Choose red candles if you’re looking for a wild love life; pink for romance – or, even better; have a collection of various pinks and reds for the full range of emotions. Their light is soft and soothing – and may get your love life glowing.

HELP FOR SPECIFIC PROBLEMS

If you have a particular difficulty in your love life, try these tips.

ATTRACTING A NEW PARTNER

• In her book, Interior Design with Feng Shui, Sarah Rossbach relates a ‘cure’ for people who want to get married – but I guess it would work simply for a new relationship as well. She points out that if you’re already in a relationship and want it to stay happy and contented you can follow the same advice. You need to obtain nine objects from a newly married couple or have the couple touch nine of your own objects, either on their wedding day itself, or within 90 days of the wedding. Then visualize yourself acquiring the bride’s marriage chi as she hands over the objects. Put the objects in the marriage position of your bedroom.
• Many people find it hard to attract a new relationship because they are not sure what they truly want – or feel worried they will repeat past mistakes, or are simply scared of the commitment of a relationship. If you feel your past is preventing you from finding love, it could be worthwhile talking over your fears with a therapist or counsellor. Often a fresh perspective can totally change the situation.
• You can also adapt the exercises given earlier in this book to discover what you truly want and need from a partner. Think about past relationships (what you liked; what you didn’t like; what patterns repeated themselves). Try the miracle question technique (see Chapter 6), thinking how you would be and feel and act if you met your ideal partner.
• Put together a ‘love map’ (just as you did with the treasure map in Chapter 6) and hang it in your marriage corner. Ask your house for guidance. What is holding you back from having a relationship?

REKINDLING A ROCKY RELATIONSHIP

• Check your home and particularly your marriage area for things that may be quite literally unstable. Say a precarious three-legged table, overly delicate vases or ornaments which could break if you even looked at them. You should make sure your house is filled with unequivocal, solid, permanent, earthed things which cannot budge or be shifted.
• You need to weigh your relationship, and your marriage area in particular; down so put something very stable in the marriage corner of your house – maybe a good solid four-legged table or a big plump sofa (something that is well rooted to the ground and doesn’t wobble). Add something hearty like a big earthenware pot or a solid statue or stone to the marriage corner of your bedroom (if your bed isn’t already there).
• Check the fabrics in your bedroom – are they flimsy, delicate and floaty? Replace them with something more robust. Perhaps some luscious thick velvet curtains or a beautiful warm woollen blanket tucked in tight; or a weighty quilt or comforter.
• Check there aren’t too many doors in your bedroom or marriage area – if there are, maybe cover one or two over with a rich thick curtain or tapestry.
• Look at your desk as well. Make sure there is nothing flimsy which can be blown away on it. As with the house, your marriage area is in the far right-hand corner – put something good and solid there, maybe a photo of the two of you in a thick heavy frame. Weigh it down even more with a solid red pot with a healthy plant or a big beautiful stone.

CALMING A VOLATILE RELATIONSHIP

• If you’re always fighting and would like a little peace and quiet in your relationship, start by choosing soothing colours in your marriage area and (if it’s different) your bedroom. Although feng shui usually recommends warm pinks and soft reds for bedrooms, if a relationship is too sparky try soothing blues and greens to settle the energy.
• Pictures again are important so take down the dramatic landscapes or the photos of flamenco dancers and passionate lovers and choose something which is more light-hearted and fun: photos of children playing innocently can be very calming. Feng shui experts also recommend images of letting-go – pictures of birds being released, of balloons taking off, of boats launching from a dock.

ENTICING PASSION INTO YOUR LIFE

• Fire is the element that governs passion so stock up on the candles, particularly spicy tones of red or bright pink. You don’t need to surround yourself with images from the Kama Sutra or buy erotic prints – but do pick paintings or posters that use passionate colours and a passionate technique. Abstracts can be full of life, vigour and passion.
• Hot up the colours in your bedroom using passionate reds – not necessarily all over but as accent colours.
• And anything flame-shaped is good too – an exception to the feng shui rule of soft shapes. Think about triangular or diamond-shaped cushions maybe, or put a throw folded or diagonally across your bed so it makes a triangle or diamond.

TO SAVE A RELATIONSHIP

• If you really feel your relationship is on the rocks, if you are on the verge of separation or even divorce, you need to step back, gain some objectivity and look at the whole situation without being drawn into recriminations and anger. You are looking for clarity in your life so start by cleaning once again. Above all, clean the windows (the eyes of the house) so you can see with pure vision. Get rid of the cobwebs, make sure your lights are gleaming and that there are no broken light bulbs.
• Keep your bedroom brightly and clearly lit – avoid shadows and half-light.
• Try the miracle question technique again: how would you know if your problem had been solved; what would be different; how would you act; how would your partner act; how would your friends and family act? What would it take for a reconciliation?