Your bedroom is your safe haven; it is where you go to after a long day. Not only that, this is where you sleep, making it the place where you spend more than a third of your life.
Besides the fact that you probably spend more time in your bedroom than all of the other rooms in your home combined, the quality of your sleep itself is critical for the rest of your day. A few of the many benefits of sleep include aiding your brain in functioning properly, helping in the process of heart and blood vessels repair, and allowing you to function at your best during the rest of your day.
Because of all this, we will take an in-depth look at your bedroom and how you can make the most out of it.
Organizing the Room Feng Shui Style
Feng shui is the practice of placing the furniture and other aspects inside a room in a way that manipulates the energy within it to the benefit of your health. The main tenet here is to allow the chi to continue to flow by balancing yin (female) and yang (male) energies. This becomes even more understandable when you appreciate that every object has its own energy, be it a piece of wood or an intimate locket, and feng shui tries to direct this energy in a manner reflective of the processes that are happening inside of us, mirroring who we are and where we are headed.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at how feng shui attempts to achieve just that in your bedroom.
Bedroom location
The best place for you to situate your bedroom in the first place is in the most secluded area within the entire house. Basically, you want to isolate your bedroom from the outside world as much as possible, which means placing it as far as possible from any doors that lead to concrete pavements and asphalt roads.
Clutter
Assuming that clutter can be a major road block to everything good, feng shui encourages to get rid of anything that doesn’t make you serene and calm. Naturally, this might be difficult for most of us, so , here are a few ideas that can help.
- Keep a maximum of two books per individual. After all, it’s a bedroom, not a library.
- Avoid having any laundry or hampers anywhere around you when you are sleeping.
- Anything that might be distracting to you while relaxing should be covered, closed, or removed.
For instance, if you can make do without a TV in your bedroom, then, by all means, do that. The same goes for your computer, exercise equipment, dog kennel, and so on. Nevertheless, if you must have one of these things present, the least you could do is to find a way to block it out while you sleep; whether it’s through the use of a lightweight folding screen, a fabric that drops from the ceiling, an armoire that closes and hides its inhabitants, or through any other means is entirely up to you. Keep your room clean at all times as dust and dirt can result in static chi, which can be deleterious.
Bed position
According to feng shui, there are several factors to take into consideration when trying to figure where to place your bed, the first of which is being familiar with the commanding position in your room, also known as the power position. The commanding position is the spot that is situated diagonally across from the entrance to your bedroom. This position permits you to see who is coming through the door without letting you be too exposed. It is important to emphasize that the bed should be diagonally across as opposed to directly in front of the bedroom door. Laying your bed in alignment with your bedroom door and having your feet pointing towards that exit is a feng shui no no; it is dubbed as the coffin position. However, if your room is forcing you to place your bed in the coffin position, the best thing for you to do is to place a piece of furniture, like a high bench, between you and the exit.
Another factor to take into consideration is the position of your bed relative to the windows of your bedroom. For example, you should avoid situating your bed beneath windows given that windows are some of the primary escape hatches for the chi energy in your bedroom, and during its escape, the chi energy is bound to cause you an uneasy sleep. Also, you want to make sure that the wall supporting your bed from behind is not shares with a bathroom.
Use of mirrors
It is highly advisable to get rid of, or at least cover, any mirrors in your room while you sleep, especially as mirrors reflect chi. However, if you’re insistent on having a mirror in your room, then just don’t place it at the foot of your bed because this is seen as enabling third parties to enter the bed between you and your significant other, which, some say, may lead to infidelity.
Arts and photos
The artwork hanging in your bedroom ought to be calming, relaxing, and beautiful. With this in mind, steer away from any energetic pictures, including ones about racing and others with plenty of water in them. Instead, try hanging your favorite piece of art straight across from your bed so that you wake up to something beautiful.
Alternatively, you can hang up artwork that demonstrates what you hope to achieve in life, which could be more success, romance, or serenity.
Conversely, you should shy away from photos that are family related. The bedroom is supposed to be about you and your significant other; you have the rest of the house to put up pictures of that vacation you all went on last year.
Desks and electronics
In the same vein that you want to avoid sleeping beneath a window due to the disruptive chi energy that will flow over you, you don’t want any energy buzzing and whirring around you, including electric energy. Therefore, not only should you minimize the amount of electricity coursing through your bedroom, you should also avoid having electricity surging behind your bed as much as you can. For example, rather than using an electric alarm clock, you can rely on one powered by batteries.
A big part of applying feng shui to your bedroom is making it exclusively for sleep. Consequently, turning your bedroom into a work station is one of the fastest ways to injecting the wrong kind of energy into your sanctuary. With that said, don’t place any work desks in your bedroom as long as it can be avoided. Worst case scenario, if you have to have a workstation in your bedroom, you can resort to desks which you can fold and hide away the minute you’re done working.
Other bedroom furniture
When considering where to place the furniture inside your room, take these couple of points into account.
Along with energy pathways, don’t obstruct your own physical pathways or doorways.
Make sure that none of your furniture is creating poison arrows towards your bed. In feng shui, poison arrows are the result of the sharp edge or a corner of a piece of furniture aiming directly for something.
Colors
No one can deny that colors have a visceral effect on all of us, particularly when we spend an extended amount of time in them. Hence, you need to be selective when it comes to the color that will adorn the walls of your bedroom. On the one hand, you can choose to go with something that is warm and soothing, such as cream, peach, or earth. Alternatively, you could decide that you want a cool, chill color like light blue and greens; these are colors that help create a tranquil mood. In case you’re trying to inject more romance into your relationship, then perhaps pinks and dark reds are more for you. Regardless of what you choose, just make sure to stay away from bright colors as they tend to be too energetic and cause a restless environment.
Lighting
The basic rule is this: in the morning, you want plenty of natural light to flood your bedroom; in the evening, you should aim for softer lighting to caress the elements in your bedroom, which where candles can come in handy; and at night, you want to be enveloped by complete darkness for a good relaxing sleep.
Picking the Bed and Mattress
Out of all the things in your bedroom, the bed is the most important, hands down. As a result, let’s dive into what makes a good one and how you can identify it, followed by a close inspection of how you can pick the perfect mattress for you.
The Bed
- Before talking about your bed’s comfort, let’s get its look out of the way. A potent style statement can be made with the use of a headboard, particularly a solid wooden one. Besides, they provide you with good energy as they offer support for the top of your body. On the other hand, footboards shouldn’t be your go to preference, unless your bed is lying in the coffin position.
- Having discussed the look of the bed, let’s talk about how it feels. To start with, whenever you buy a bed, you should always take into consideration the mattress that will go with it. For instance, spring mattresses work best with spring beds, whereas foam mattresses are used more often with slat beds. Because of all of this, you should aim at buying the mattress and bed simultaneously.
- For those of us with back problems, our best choices tend to come down to either slat or spring beds.
- Although an item’s price is usually a good indicator of its quality, this is only partially true when it comes to beds. Apart from the price, you should assess each bed on its own merits. A case in point would be judging a slat bed based on the quality of the slats. So, the next time you’re buying a slat bed, check and make sure that the slats are supported in the middle as well as on the edges. Otherwise, they can move apart or collapse.
- While figuring out how big or small you want your bed to be, you have to take two factors into account. Firstly, you need to consider the size of the room and how the bed will fit inside. It would not be a good idea for you to buy a bed so big that it crowds your room and makes it difficult to traverse the room. Secondly, you shouldn’t be too thrifty with the size of your bed either. Not only do you want a big bed in which you can toss and turn, but you are also looking for something that a significant other can do the same within, be it now or in the future.
- Assuming that you’re running out of storage space in your bedroom, you can always buy a bed with storage space underneath it, or a storage bed for short.
The Mattress
Unlike the bed, where you could afford to save a few dollars as long as you maintained good quality, you shouldn’t shy away from spending a considerable sum on your mattress. At the end of the day, it’s going to be the main support for your back when you’re tired and fatigued.
There are numerous types of mattresses out there, and the type you eventually settle on will largely depend on your own preferences, weight, and sleeping style. Nevertheless, here are the main qualities of mattresses and what you should look for in each quality.
- Mattress firmness. This term indicates how much your mattress either gives away under your weight or resists it. Despite what you might think, soft mattresses are not good for your back and can exacerbate your back pain: they don’t offer the necessary support that your back needs. Conversely, an extremely firm mattress may keep your spine in alignment, yet it also exerts a significant amount of pressure onto your hips, shoulders, heels, and head. Consequently, you want to find a mattress that falls squarely in the Goldilocks zone for you.
- Mattress supportiveness. A supportive mattress is one that’ll keep your spine in alignment. Ideally, such a mattress will prevent any part of your body sagging or sinking while making sure that none of your joints are stressed. Innerspring mattresses may be supportive at the beginning of their lifetime, but as they age, they lose that quality. Fortunately, there are other options that can give you the sort of support you’re looking for: memory foam, latex, and airbed.
- Mattress conformability. As the name might suggest, this quality describes to what degree a mattress molds itself to take the shape of your body. This is the best way for your body to be full supported without having any pressure exerted on your joints. Again, memory foam is one the best types of mattresses when it comes to conformability. You can also check out waterbeds and innerspring mattresses with memory foam overlays.
Closets and Storage Space
Regardless of how much storage space you have, there is never enough. The best case scenario is for you to be able to install a closet in your bedroom, yet this may not always be feasible. Therefore, let’s explore some of the options you can try out.
- Garment racks. A sleek, slim, and cost-effective solution for your clothes, garment racks offer you a trendy way to get organized while contending with limited space.
- Under bed storage. As we mentioned earlier, you can purchase storage beds and stuff them with your blankets, comforters, sweaters, and other essentials. It might not be the best thing for you chi, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
- B Bookshelves don’t have to be used for books only; they can come in handy when you are looking for a place to stash your shoes, shirts, and other everyday items. Additionally, they’re cheap cost and simple set-up make them all the more attractive.
- Floating shelves. Floating shelves are a God send for anyone looking for an easy storage solution in an already cramped room. The fact that you can set them up anywhere you want is enough to explain their appeal.
- Upside-down shelf brackets. They are cheap, and by installing them upside down, you can create a large expanse of storage area for your clothes.
- Drawer units. Instead of buying heavy dressers, why not use small drawers and storage chests? It’s cheaper and gives you more customizability.
- Hanging hooks. One of the oldest tricks in the book, coat hooks can be used to store anything from your coats to your umbrella to that shirt you’re planning to wear tomorrow anyway.
- Trunks + storage benches. Just as you can purchase a storage bed, there is plenty of other furniture out there that hides layers of storage space beneath its façade. You can use it as extra storage space and as an actual bench/ piece of furniture at the same time.
Walk-in Closets vs. Wardrobes
Now that we’ve discussed some of the more unorthodox storage ideas out there, it’s time for us to wrap up this chapter by looking at a quick comparison between the two primary forms of storage: walk-in closets and wardrobes.
We can begin by seeing what wardrobes have to offer. To begin with, wardrobes are nothing more than exterior closets that you buy separate from your house and can take with you when you leave. Unlike a clothing rack for example, wardrobes offer you the capability to hide your clothes yet avoid any clutter. Their versatility and portability makes them an attractive option to some, especially those who are on the move a lot.
Our second contender, walk-in closets, gives you more open space to play with. They are built with space that is already present in your home, and their open layout makes it easier for you to find what you’re looking for. Unfortunately, since they come with the house, they stay with the house.
Whichever option you decide to go for is up to you and your house’s available space.
Throughout this chapter, we’ve seen what you can do to make your bedroom a sanctuary for relaxation. In the next chapter, we’ll see how you can do the same for your children’s room, bearing in mind that their needs are different than yours. Whether your kids are still infants or they’re teenagers finishing high school, we’ll see how you can decorate their room and make it nurture their development.
For a full list of chapters, click here.
