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This time of year always reminds me of the early winter of 1998. I was young, single and decidedly independent by nature, when I suddenly realized that it was time to meet a man. For several years I had been happily single, enjoying my solitude (even reveling in it) but now, rather un-expectedly, I received a strong prompting that it was finally time to meet somebody. Understand, I didn’t want to find just any guy. I was ready to find the guy, and just to make sure it was the guy, I wrote out an elaborate “shopping list” of traits I was looking for in this charming individual!
As it happens, I was just moving back to New York City at the time, and I re-inhabited an apartment in the West Village that I had shared with an old boyfriend. We had long since separated, and in the intervening years I had subletted the place to two women who I didn’t know very well. So, when I re-took the apartment, the space was, needless to say, in no way a reflection of my current self. The furnishings were an un-inspiring mixture of old artifacts from my prior relationship, and rather cluttered items from the recent tenants.
I was just starting to practice Feng Shui at the time, and I could see in an instant that the mis-matched, past-heavy décor in my apartment was not the correct scenery for my coming romantic existence. To begin with, all of those items from the earlier relationship were sure to weigh me down mentally and emotionally. And the stuff from the Subletters, while not energetically “charged” in any way, were just the sort of jumbled furnishings that I might wind up living with for a long time…keeping me in the sticky trap of not entirely hating them, while never particularly liking them. None of this was a favorable mentality for the new life I was ready to create. Nor did anything about the apartment convey the specific vibe of “intimacy, excitement and love” that I was looking for in a relationship.
So, with the tender sentimentality of a wrecking ball, I proceeded to throw out every single stick of furniture in the place! I scrubbed down
 all the surfaces, then primed the walls into a clean white canvass. From there I let my imagination soar, and very quickly I created a design scheme that would support my new romantic life – a cozy, colorful, fun space that felt both whimsical and warm. With great enthusiasm I set about executing the design, and while my budget was pretty limited, I was very resourceful with local thrift stores and budget-friendly brands. In a little under two weeks I had turned the space into a delightful little love nest…all set to attract the man of my dreams. And did it work?
Within three weeks of finishing the project, I had my first date in years. A few weeks after that, I was officially seeing the guy from that first date. And several months later we moved in together. Right now he’s in the other room as I write this, because he’s my husband of nine years, and our marriage has been an absolute dream come true. In fact not only has he fulfilled every one of the items on my little “shopping list”, he’s added a whole bunch I didn’t even know existed! My story is tangible proof of how effective Feng Shui can be in the area of romance.
Tips for Romance
Many of the clients I consult with are looking for help in this department. Either they are single and would like to meet somebody, or else they would like to improve the their current relationship. Even for a happy, long-term marriage, there’s no reason not to push it into “fairy tale” territory. Feng Shui is remarkably effective for this. In fact, I would have to place “romance” near the very top of the list of categories that proper Feng Shui can radically improve. I’m not even sure why this is. I’ve simply witnessed it over and over again…starting with my own wonderful experience, eleven winters ago.
While a personalized Feng Shui reading is the best way to insure strong romantic energy in your home, there is quite a lot one can do before that. As a means of providing a list of useful tips, let me start by explaining some of the improvements I made back in 1998 on that little West Village apartment.
- As I already mentioned, I quickly got rid of every item in the apartment that did not support my current vision of myself (which, consequently, was everything!) Now, I’ll admit I was rather extreme in that case, and I rarely advocate anything so drastic for my clients. However, when deciding what to keep versus what to let go, here are two useful questions to bear in mind:
- Does the item in question have “emotional charge”, either from a prior relationship, or some difficult period from your past? Even if the experience wasn’t necessarily negative, it can still feel very much out of synch with the current you. If so, let it go. Attracting a new relationship is all about being the person you are now, and the even greater person you are becoming…not who you have been. (Especially not who you have been with another partner.) And if you are already in a relationship, and looking to improve it, charged items from the past will weigh on you as you seek positive change.
- Do you just plain dislike the item? Sometimes we live with things we don’t like for a long time simply because they are reasonably functional, and it seems inconvenient to deal with them. This is a bad idea. When we do this, we maintain a subtle state of “resignation”, which is the antithesis of what we are looking for in a romantic relationship. Let it go.
- Next, I paid special attention to the bedroom, as this is the epicenter of the romantic energy in a home. Here are some of the changes I made:
- I chose colors that felt sensual and glamorous to me – deep purples and luxurious reds. In fact, I added thick, red velvet curtains on the windows, which were a wonderful addition as winter came on. And for the walls, I didn’t simply paint them a single color, I used cheese cloth to wisp together several layers of complimentary tones, creating a cloudy, exotic effect, like an enchanted sky. (As it turns out, when my husband-to-be first saw these walls, he begged me to do the same thing in his apartment!) However, if you are currently single, the point of setting the correct tone in the bedroom has less to do with impressing your potential partner, than it does with impressing you. You are trying to evoke the correct romantic feelings in your own heart, and see yourself as a gorgeous, desirable being, one who deserves a terrific relationship. The right bedroom décor will help with this.
- I made sure to leave some extra room in the dresser for “him”. Weeks before there was any “him” in sight, I began to accommodate this exciting, wonderful person who was sure to arrive any day now. This is important. Often when I council clients on drawing a new romance into their lives, I notice that they have arranged things in such a way that there is no room for anybody else in their personal space. Frequently their beds are pressed up against the wall, with only one side table, and their own clothing and items fill every last inch of space. How is your fabulous new love interest going to fit into such a bed room?! Make a little extra room for him or her to come in.
- I set up the rest of the space so that two people in love could have plenty of fun there. For instance:
- I found a great love seat for the living room and kept fuzzy throws there, in anticipation of cozy evenings at home in front of the TV.
- I got a nice café table for the dining area, complete with beautiful candles, to create a romantic setting for meals.
- Even the bathroom received some special attention. Not only did I leave a little extra room in the medicine cabinet, but I made efforts not to turn the place into a woman’s boudoir, with perfumes, hair-straightening irons and feminine hygiene products falling off of every shelf! Someday down the road, when I had a home with bathrooms to spare, I could indulge in such a girl palace. But not when I was trying to leave a little space for the coming Mach 3 razors and Armani cologne!
Well, that makes a decent list for now. There is plenty more that one can do to improve the romantic energy in a home, and certainly an advanced Feng Shui reading is one of those things, but the above list is sure to help.
After all, that list has been field tested. And the results were beyond one customer’s wildest dreams!
Have a lovely winter season.
Sincerely,
Past Newsletters:
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