Where Energy Flows

Red is the colour of the 1st chakra — the grounding root energy that gives you zest for life. It represents vitality, passion and helps you stay clear and focused in life.

The effect on your emotions is strong as red is stimulating on all levels:

• it is the associated with romance (hearts, and valentines, red candles — anything red is ’sexier’).
• it is motivating - a color for getting things done.
• It helps you get going when you feel sluggish or melancholic and is a great color to have in your surroundings if you constantly procrastinate.
• It helps increase creativity. 

Red can actually be too stimulating for some people: its intense stimulating actions can ‘inflame’ emotions, increasing anger levels (hence the expression ’seeing red’). If you get upset easily, avoid large ‘doses’ of red in your environment.

On a physical level, red is useful if you have poor circulation: if you usually have cold hands and feet, red ‘warms’ you up. It also acts on the muscles, feeds the adrenal glands and stimulates the nervous system.

Red actually raises blood pressure so if you have high blood pressure or heart problems, red would be a colour to avoid (in large doses). On the other hand it is useful if you have low blood pressure.

When and where to use the colour red:

In large spaces, red is womb-like and can be a bit claustrophobic. It is definitely not a restful colour so not suitable for any place  you want relaxation and rejuvenation — like your bedroom (even though red is related to ‘romance’), the family room or den. It is too stimulating for children’s rooms as the main colour scheme — especially avoid red if the children tend to get wound up.

Red is a good for social areas such as your dining room or great room if you do a lot of entertaining and your goal is to encourage lively discussions. Just be aware that in a red dining room, discussions may turn into arguments, and if you want more sedate meals, red would not be the best choice at all.

As small accent colours, red anywhere is great anywhere.

Copyright 2007 Deborah Redfern. All rights reserved.

When things are not going well for you, a feng shui ’cure’ is to move twenty things in your home. This is the number considered to create an energy shift. Whether you change two items or twenty, changing your environment has a powerful effect. The connection between loving your environment and living with greater peace and harmony cannot be taken too lightly. Everything in your environment has an influence – either positive or negative – on your state of mind.

Change can be large or small. An example of a small change might be to choose different objects to look at. By putting some things away or changing them around, you wake up your senses and become more aware of your surroundings, and more ‘in the moment’.

A larger change might be to change your colours. If you have always had off-white walls, imagine what it would be like to throw in a splash of vibrant colour.  Here to you can go big or a bit smaller. Go big by painting your walls. You can change the feel of the room without painting by bringing in spots of colour — those bright red cushions for the sofa, new draperies and even plants.

The thing is, there is a cost to being in an environment that is not inspiring, and this cost can be quite high if it is an area you spend a lot of time in such as your bedroom, kitchen or home office. It can change how you feel about yourself and relate to others, for example, by lowering your energy, making you irritable - and even depressed. This is because the message you might be subconsciously giving yourself is that you are not important enough to have an environment that makes you feel great. Every day you are confronted with some aspect of your living situation that causes you to feel out of alignment with your inner self.

The best feng shui advice is to not put off changes to your environment. Figure out what you don’t like about the room and decide what needs to be done. If you just don’t know, an Interior Alignment™ practitioner can help you sort it out by taking you through a synchro-alignment session or by reading the feng shui of your home. See www.interioralignment.com to find a consultant near you.

Copyright 2007 Deborah Redfern. All rights reserved.