Do things feel a little stuck?
Does life feel a little more difficult than it should?
Perhaps your house needs to be energetically cleared. As we move through our daily lives we sometimes inadvertently bring negativity home with us. Or sometimes energy just gets stuck and over time it turns sour or bitter. Or sometimes the positive qi is blocked and just can?t seem to get in. Clearing a house helps banish the bad energy and bring in the good.
Feng Shui professionals around the country say that their most common consultation is a house clearing. But if you don?t have a professional in your area then you can do a clearing yourself. There are many ways to clear the energy in a home. It can be done with smoke (sage), sound (bells), scent (incense) or salt. Whichever method you choose the results are the same; negativity leaves while joyful and harmonious energy returns to the home.
Clearing with smoke (called Smudging) is very effective. In this ancient Native American ritual you take a sage stick, light it and carry it around the room. The sacred smoke clears the negative energy. You may state aloud that you want to banish evil and negativity, and that you want positive energy to enter. If you would like more information on clearing with sage (besides my little booklet on Sage & Smudge) there is a wonderful, comprehensive book on Smudging called Sage & Smudge: The Ultimate Guide, by Diane Ronngren. If you are uncertain at all about clearing with smoke this book will give you detailed instructions so you know you are doing it correctly.
A clearing can also be done with sound. Clanging a loud bell through a house will certainly rid it of ghosts and old, stuck energy. In fact the original reason that shopkeepers put a string of bells on their door was not to alert them of a customer but to scare away any ghosts riding on the backs of people who were entering. This type of clearing has to be done a bit more often than clearing with smoke or salt but it is still very effective.
Scent, in the form of incense, is usually used to attract a certain kind of energy. Spicy incense attracts exciting, prosperous energy, floral scents attract sweet, romantic energy and clean scents, such as lavender, cleanse a space. You can also find specially formulated incenses for Romance, Fast Money, Family Protection, etc. The incense is burned in a room to imbue that room with that particular energy. Incense is great for clearing small spaces.
And finally salt is a wonderful method for bringing a space back to a neutral state. This is really helpful if a place hasn?t been cleared in a while, or if negativity seems to return quickly after a clearing or if the space was occupied by someone else. Salts can be sprinkled, or dissolved in warm water and sprayed in the room. There are different kinds of salts for different purposes but a good sea salt will do the job if you don?t have anything else on hand. Sprinkle salt and leave it for 24 hours and then vacuum it up. You can also mix salt with baking soda and bath in it to clear yourself of negativity.
Try your hand at clearing the energy in your home. And let me know the results (donna@fengshuiform.com).