The Spiritual Feng Shui newsletter Issue 16 April 2008 Kids and Creation Get Your Kids to Help Clear Clutter - Without Nagging Also: Feng Shui Tip Inspirational Quotes Dear Friend, Welcome to The Spiritual Feng Shui newsletter for April 2008; it is good to have your company, as always! This month we look at everything you can create, from the very important - your children - to the less permanent but still joyful things like art and business ventures. You et to enjoy the results of enhancing the often-overlooked Creativity and Children gua. If you think kids are more of a Feng Shui hindrance than a help, we show you some easy ways to include them in your practice. We also have inspirational quotes and Feng Shui tips, as usual. May peace and harmony reign for you in April. 0x Feature Article: Kids and Creation - Spring is a time of creation - use the opportunity to make your home its hub! 0x Q&A: The Feng Shui of Nagging - There are pleasant ways to involve your kids in your Feng Shui practice! 0x Feng Shui Tip - Art for Art's Sake 0x Inspirational Quotes Enjoy! Mike Z. Wang Author of The Spiritual Feng Shui Thespiritualfengshui.com Unit 616, 220 Lake Promenade, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, m8w1a9 Main Article: Kids and Creation No, this edition of the newsletter is not a discussion about the birds and the bees ... nor a debate about the Creation versus the Evolution theory! It is about one of the Guas in your home that usually is neglected when people come to a Feng Shui practice - your Creativity and Children Gua. Many people focus on improving their Love and Relationships and Wealth and Prosperity areas, with a lesser focus on Career. The Creativity and Children Gua though, is one of the most rewarding and joyful areas to enhance - and this is applicable, whether or not you have children, or have all the artistic inclination of a sink full of dirty dishes! Enhancing this Gua can help you find inspiration at work, give metaphoric 'birth' to a new business or personal relationship, or finish things you have started. The Creativity and Children Gua is located in the rightmost square of the middle row of your Bagua map (with the bottom of the 3x3 grid lining up with the wall your front door is on, as usual). When you look to improve the energy of this area of your life, you also look at your children's bedrooms (if you have them), wherever you read, create or work; and also your kitchen. You may want to improve this area to help you with a project that is career-related as well - in that case you can work in conjunction with your Career and Success Gua. One of the most important things you can do to stimulate your Creativity sector is to improve the flow of energy throughout your whole home. For those of you that have faithfully been reading these newsletters, you'll already know what that means - cleaning up clutter! If you feel crowded and overwhelmed by all the things in your environment, you won't have the mental space to create anything new. And if you have children you'll realize the truth of this idea - if you clean up their bedrooms, they'll happily play for several hours, getting everything out and messing it up again! The clean slate of an empty floor is so appealing to them. So - do a spring clean, no matter what season it is. If you haven't used something in 12 months and are unlikely to in the next twelve, consider getting rid of it completely. Reduce, re-use, and recycle your old things - just get them out of your home so you have space to think in! Whatever is left over needs to be organized and put out of your vision, until you need it. Metal is the ruling element for this gua, so look into getting some metal or wire storage shelving or baskets for putting like with like. Label your shelves with gold and silver pens for that bonus bit of Chi! If you have the luxury of painting or re-carpeting this gua, go for earthy tones, yellows, or metallic colors in your redecoration. Try a bright yellow feature wall, or changing the trim on your windows and doors to a bright yellow (which usually works in quite well with the neutral tones that many main walls already are). If you are renting, or just don't like the smell of paint fumes, you could look into getting a bright yellow or lovely natural, earthen toned spread for your sofa, or the chair where you do your reading. Choose clay or pottery ornaments, vases, and picture frames for this area as well. It is also a happy coincidence that yellow is one of the best colors for enhancing this Gua, and there are more yellow flowers than just about all the other colors put together! Bringing fresh flowers or flowering potted plants into your home has recently been studied and proven to enhance the creative energy of people working near them. You could involve your children in your practice (it is for their benefit, after all!), by having them help you plant some bright yellow flowers in the garden, to save you money on this enhancement. Try daffodils (it is a good time of year to plant them), or sunflowers, which grow quickly and dominate a space with their happy and vibrant energy. Affirmations are another scientifically-tested way to help you achieve your goals and complete your creations. Choose a statement that describes exactly what you want to achieve in your life (keep it fairly short-term, so it feels achievable). Either write it on a piece of card with a calligraphy brush or something similar, have it professionally designed and printed out, or get your kids to help you write it on, decorate it, and frame it if the decorations allow. Place it in the power spot for Creativity and Children (the rightmost square of the middle row of a room, where the door to the room lines up with the bottom of the grid), in a room that you occupy frequently, or where you do most of your creative work. While you are looking at this power spot (the rightmost square of the middle row in any room)- it is also the ideal place to put your children's collections of books, toys and games within their bedroom or the rumpus/play room. Happily, it is usually out of the way of the door also! Once you give yourself the mental space to allow new ideas to form ... bring the right elements in to stimulate that creativity ... and focus your intentions with your affirmations ... you'll be a veritable steamroller of creativity! Enjoy :-) Q&A: I'd love to enhance my Creativity and Children gua - mostly for my kids' sake. But Feng Shui is about being clutter-free, neat and tidy, and my kids definitely don't fit with those terms! How do I involve them with my Feng Shui practice ... other than yelling at them to clean up more often?!!! You're right, an essential element of the Feng Shui practice is having a space that is uncluttered. But despite the way it sometimes seems, children and neatness are not mutually exclusive terms! You will have to help out in this area for while, but here are some tips to help you out, to begin with. * If things can be easily organized they can be more easily cleaned up. Shop with your children for storage solutions that both fit into the Feng Shui guidelines, and appeal to them. Look for containers and baskets dominated by metal and earth (clay, or just earthen colors). Wire shelving and baskets are quite common - try to find some that are a little decorative. You could also go for yellow, orange, brown or metallic colored plastic tubs. * Involve them in the organization - ask them what toys should go together. They'll be more likely to remember. * Make two designated clean-up times per day - these are usually morning or mid-morning, and night time. Make these a family activity. * Don't see cleaning as a chore - if you enjoy tidying things up, making them shiny and pretty, and your kids can see that, then they will too. Monkey see, monkey do! But cleaning clutter is not the only way your kids can be involved in enhancing the Creativity and Children sector. Artwork is a great enhancement for this Gua, their bedrooms, and the power spot here in any other room of the house. It is also one of the things that children can create by themselves and be proud of. If you give them artwork materials (fabric scraps, paints, colored matchsticks, construction papers) in the guideline colors, you automatically have a doubly worthwhile enhancement (that is a little more color coordinated than when they are left to their own devices!). The kitchen is also a relevant spot for the Creativity and Children sector - this place is all about creation of food, after all. And kids love licking bowls, stirring mixtures, kneading dough, and even playing with the bubbles in the sink while washing up. They are especially easy to involve with baking, as opposed to the usual dinner making (which generally requires sharp knives and hot implements). Make play-dough with them, or cookies, or scones. It is quite easy to find healthy scone recipes on the internet, like Pumpkin and Sunflower, Cheese and Asparagus, or Fruit Mix scones. Growing things is another especially creative activity which is well suited to children. You could either set up a patch of garden where they can grow vegetables to eat, or flowers to place in the house. If you don't have much space, or no outdoor area, kids will love tending herbs or small potted flowers on a windowsill. Mint is a great choice - it can not only be used in cooking, but is a ready made natural deodorizer for the house. And the other benefit of course, is the fact that you get to spend all this time with your kids! They'll love it; but just as importantly, being around their innocence and impressionability is a great way for you to reconnect with what's important in life - creativity, and kids! Tip: Art for Art's Sake Macaroni-drawings and egg-carton creatures may be the exclusive province of kindergartens, but art definitely is not! Artwork is a great enhancement for your Creativity Gua, and this is one enrichment that costs next to nothing. Make your own art to hang on your walls for a creativity boost. Try to damp down that self-consciousness, in hanging something that you created on the wall - just keep painting, oil-pastelling, sketching or photographing until you get a piece that you love. Revisit the techniques you learned in school if you need some inspiration - cellophane and clear contact, crayons and water paints, or scrunched crepe paper can be given an adult and very appealing twist. The sky is the limit! Inspirational Quotes: Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. ~Scott Adams Art is the only way to run away without leaving home. ~Twyla Tharp There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in. ~Deepak Chopra