How to Create the Ideal Bedroom Arrangement Using Feng Shui

A Feng shui bedroom layout embraces the primary function of your bedroom, which is to serve such activities as sleep, relaxation and sex. Feng shui bedroom principles incorporate the right elements and furniture placement to enhance your overall health and well-being. These principles ensure the continued flow of chi energy through the balance of yin (female) and yang (male) energies.

Bedroom Feng Shui Layout

There are many guidelines for auspicious bedroom feng shui. Try these feng shui bedroom rules for best results.

Reduce Clutter

To create chi balance, you must first rid your bedroom of all clutter and work-related equipment. Dirt and dust create stagnant chi which can result in such things as illness, disharmony within your relationships and loss of wealth.

Feng shui expert Alison Marks of 6 Figure Home Office agrees, saying, "One of the biggest stress producers in most of our homes is… CLUTTER! Even if you consider yourself a hopeless clutterbug, give yourself the gift of creating a clear and clean sanctuary in your bedroom. Be ruthless!"

Use Correct Bed Placement

The feng shui rules for bedroom furniture placement are specific and should be followed. If the size or configuration of your room, especially window location, prevents you from following feng shui guidelines, then you can apply corrective feng shui cures and remedies. Bed placement is the most important design aspect of your bedroom.

As the largest piece of furniture in the room and the place where you rest, the bed is particularly important. The wrong placement can jeopardize your health.

• The ideal placement for your bed is diagonal across from the door. This placement gives you privacy and also allows you to see anyone entering your bedroom.
• Never place your bed directly across from the door. This placement puts you in a sleeping position where your feet point toward the door. This is known as the coffin position and is the worst possible position since it's considered the position of death and is inauspicious.
• Avoid placing your bed in front of or underneath a window since chi energy enters and leaves a room through the windows. If your bed is in this pathway, the chi energy will flow over you as you sleep, causing a restless sleep.
• Don't place the mattress directly on the floor. This is inauspicious since you're in the main pathway of the chi energy.
• Never place your bed on a wall shared by the bathroom.

Correctly Place Additional Bedroom Furniture

When it comes to other bedroom furniture, you want to follow the same feng shui placement rules as you follow for any room in your home.

Marks is quick to remind, "The bedroom is the most yin place in a home. Think of a comfy cave: dark, cozy, small. There should be a sense of enclosure, and freedom to move within it." Keeping that goal in mind, there are three main rules for your bedroom, which advise against:

• Placements that block natural pathways and doorways
• Placements that create poison arrows directed toward the bed. Poison arrows are created whenever you place an armoire or dresser so that the sharp edge of the corner is angled directly at the bed.
• Cluttering the bedroom with too much furniture

Fix Poison Arrows

Sometimes you can't avoid poison arrows in your bedroom layout, particularly in a small bedroom feng shui layout.

• If you can't avoid placing furniture that creates poison arrows, then you can remedy this by suspending a multi-faceted crystal ball from the ceiling so it is between the poison arrow and the bed.
• Another solution is to use a runner for a dresser to conceal and soften the corner edges.
• Place nightstands on either side of the bed; just be sure that the nightstand isn't higher than the mattress since this creates a poison arrow targeting the bed.
• Chairs and other pieces of furniture should also be set in the bedroom according to these guidelines.
• If your armoire doors have mirror insets, place it where it doesn't reflect the bed. If this is unavoidable, cover the mirrors when sleeping.

Properly Place Mirrors

You can use mirrors in the bedroom, but with great discretion.

• Avoid placing a mirror directly across or over a bed. You simply don't want to reflect the bed in a mirror. This invites a third party into your marriage or relationship and results in infidelity.
• Some practitioners believe that a mirror can also startle the soul when it steps from the body for its nightly astral travels.
• If you must place your bed so you don't have a direct line of sight of the bedroom door, place a mirror so you can see the door from the bed, just be sure the mirror doesn't reflect the bed.

Don't Make Your Bedroom a Work Area

Work and sleep don't mix, so don't place a desk in your bedroom. This is a poor idea for a feng shui optimized bedroom. For good health and rest, keep your work separate from this rest area. Electronics are out, too. They contribute electrical currents to the room that can disrupt your sleep.

Ban TVs and Electronics

Most feng shui experts believe that all electronics should be banned from the bedroom. Marks agrees, noting, "I want to say a special word here about televisions. Get it out of the bedroom! You're inviting strangers into your bedroom every time you turn the TV on, bringing that often harsh outer world into your private chamber. Perhaps more importantly, you are distracting yourselves from each other."

Feng Shui TV and Computer Placement

In a practical world, televisions and laptops are often a necessary evil in your sacred bedroom space. It's impossible to get away from technology, so a compromise solution is to place your TV in an armoire or another cabinet that can be closed when you're finished watching TV for the night. Close your laptop when not being used and store inside a nightstand or drawer. That way, they are at least out of sight and your space while you rest.

Choose Appropriate Bedroom Wall Colors

When it comes to color, Marks believes, "Color is usually used to enhance a particular kind of energy (element) or to balance the yin/yang relationship. Some feng shui consultants work with color a lot, others not so much, saying that there are more powerful ways to affect the energies. Personally, I love color and use it a lot because it can have a tremendous impact on how we feel in a space." Decorate the bedroom walls in color, texture, patterns, and artwork. Use feng shui compass directions to aid you in color selection.

• Choose colors that are restful.
• Soft colors like cream, peach, and pale pink are good choices.
• A soft yellow is considered particularly beneficial.
• "Blues are nice," Marks adds.

Choose Restful Wall Art

When you select wall art, choose subjects that are happy and restful. Nature images and themes in twos, such as two mandarin ducks, swans, or peach blossoms, promote romance and a relaxing atmosphere.

Select the Ideal Bedroom Location

The ideal location of your bedroom is far from any doors that open to the outside world. Avoid bedrooms with sloping roofs. If you have to sleep underneath a sloping roof, you can use a canopy bed to weaken the effect. A canopy can also provide protection from other negative ceiling elements, like bright light fixtures, a bathroom on the floor directly above you, and a ceiling fan.

How to Feng Shui Your Bedroom: Tips and Tricks

Feng shui for your bedroom improves with the following tips and tricks.

• If your bedroom must also double as a workspace, then select furniture such as a secretary or other cabinet style desk that can be closed and out of sight when not being used.
• If your armoire has mirrors and can only be placed directly across from the bed, then cover the mirrors while sleeping.
• A solid headboard will ensure you have a sound restive sleep since it serves as a wall to insulate you from the outside world.
• You can activate various areas in your life by placing feng shui elements and object in your bedroom. For example, you can activate your wealth area in the southeast sector of your bedroom by placing three metal Chinese coins tied together with red ribbon. Improve or enhance your marriage or relationship with a carved pair of rose quartz mandarin ducks on your nightstand.
• Don't crowd your bedroom with items that don't belong there.
• Keep clothing neatly in drawers and closets.
• Routinely clean underneath dressers and beds.
• Don't store things underneath dressers or beds.
• Don't use your bedroom as a storage area.
• Never place water features or paintings of water scenes in a bedroom. This provides too much yang energy and creates a restless sleep.
• Never place live plants in your bedroom since these stimulate and attract too much yang energy.
• Use subdued, indirect lighting, like that provided by table and floor lamps. Avoid using harsh overhead lighting.
• Avoid placing your bed directly beneath exposed beams. These create a cutting effect that result in poor sleep and even illness. If there's no choice, you can add a pair of flutes with red ribbons at an angle so the open end is pointing upwards along the overhead beam.
• Remedy any poison arrows created by sharp angles of furniture with multi-faceted crystals or rearrangement of furniture.
• Avoid open bookshelves; books create a poison arrow effect. Remedy by adding either glass or wood doors.

Feng Shui Small Bedroom Layout

Not all bedrooms are ideal candidates for feng shui layouts. Most American homes weren't built with any feng shui considerations, so the challenges are always present when trying to create an auspicious feng shui bedroom layout and design. This is especially true of small bedrooms. Space is a premium in small bedrooms. This includes wall space that's often broken up by doors and windows.

To Scale Furniture Choices Prevents Cluttered Look

The first thing to avoid is a cramped and clutter feel. Downscale the bed size to fit the room, such as a full-size bed or even a twin or XL twin bed. Instead of opting for two bedside tables or nightstands, go with one. Wall sconces are better choices and even wall mounted bedside tables. These pieces of furniture prevent a cluttered looked.

Remedies for Bed Against Window

If you don't have any choice but to place the bed in front of a window, there are a few feng shui remedies to lessen the negative effects.

• Choose a solid substantial headboard that can serve as a wall. This will shield you from the rushing chi energy traveling in and out of the window.
• Set the headboard a few inches from the window, to allow enough space between the bed and window so the chi energy can move freely in and out of the bedroom.
• Blinds and Closed draperies will prevent the chi energy from rushing in when you're trying to sleep. Just be sure to open each morning to allow revitalizing chi energy to enter the bedroom, preventing it from going stale.

Remedies for Bed Opposite Bathroom

A bed placement opposite the bathroom door is inauspicious since the waste energy generated in the bathroom is inauspicious. A few solutions include:

• Keep the bathroom door closed at all times.
• Place a full-length mirror on the inside of the door to contain the sha chi energy (negative energy).
• If after these remedies you're still suffering from a restless sleep, place a folding screen between the bed and bathroom door. The screen should be opened, so it doesn't have any corners (poison arrows). You can fold it away in the morning.
• A multi-faceted ball suspended from the ceiling between the bed and bathroom door will disperse the negative chi energy.

Bedroom Decorating and Décor

Everything you place in your bedroom has a profound effect on the flow of chi energy. You want to ensure auspicious energy flows easily between the bedroom door and windows. By keeping this natural pathway free of clutter and large pieces of furniture, such as chairs and armoires, you'll prevent stagnant chi and enhance all activities that take place inside your bedroom. Marks' last bit of feng shui advice for your bedroom is to "please understand that there's no such thing as 100 percent perfect feng shui. Use these principles to do the best you can with what you have and resolve to enjoy your home and your life!"