The Art of Decluttering and Organizing

I just finished listening to this book:

"The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing" by Marie Kondo

And put the words into action.

The author recommended to start decluttering process with clothes and do ALL clothes around the house at once, but I decided to start with school supplies and all papers around the house. I actually declutter my closet regularly, but all papers and supplies were really annoying and it was a project I was putting aside for a while.

I like the idea of this book not to clean by areas but declutter by subject, like clothes, books, etc. So I walked around my entire house and collected all school supplies, pen and pencils, etc. and decided what to keep, donate or discard. I have to tell you - I had lots of papers in recycling bin and a bunch of trash.

Then an interesting event happened. After I cleaned all supplies and papers from my son's room, he came to me and asked to help him to declutter his closet. It was a huge surprise to me because usually he does not do this. So we cleaned his closet too. 

Then I moved to books. I have lots and lots of books. I still have problems to get apart with some but I feel some kind of relief to let go of some old books, which actually just were taking space and collecting dust. Eventually I plan to keep only books I really like or plan to look for references in.

I don't think I will be following book exactly but I gained some ideas and mostly inspiration to start decluttering again.

According to Feng shui cleaning and decluttering bring new opportunities into people's lives.

 I still have lots of areas in my house for tidying up but I already started feeling a surge of energy and a wind of good changes.

Would you join me with your decluttering project? 

Thank you for reading and please share your ideas on decluttering.

  

Feng Shui for Health, Wealth and Happiness

I am a big fan of Feng Shui for years. I arrange my furniture and enhance special areas in my house. I even did not buy some houses, just because they had features which were not good according to feng shui books.

Some people think that feng shui is some voodoo thing. I believe that if it might change your life for better, why not try?



I read lots and lots of books about feng shui. Out of all I found most useful two books: "The Practical Encyclopedia of Feng Shui" by Gill Hale and "The Illustrated encyclopedia of Feng Shui" by Lilian Too.

As in any part of my life I made my simple ways of following feng shui.

In general I try to declutter and clean as much as possible. So it creates positive flow of energy.

I calculated Kua numbers for each member of my family and make sure our beds and desks located in auspicious positions. You can calculate your Kua number here.

I try to avoid "poison arrows". You can easily figure them out. Just make sure there are no sharpy edges pointing to you while you are asleep or toward the entrance to your house. There are different ways to "deactivate" these arrows - with plants, mirrors, windchimes, screens or walls.

I use compass method. I place symbols of good fortune in order to energize areas and help to increase good fortune for all of us.

I created my own list of different symbols and arrange my stuff like decorations, pictures, etc around the house according to feng shui.

Compass direction	Element		Enhancers
South	Fire	Reputation	light, fireplace, burn candles, wood, red color, phoenix, horse
North	Water		water, black and blue color, aquarium with fish, earth elements, tortoise, painting of water
East	Big Wood	place of sons	big pieces of wood furniture, trees, green dragon, green color, plants, water elements
West	Metal		gold, silver, pot of gold, coins, metal things, cranes
South East	Small Wood	place of daughters	water elements, plants, green color
South West	Big Earth	Mother/Marriage and Romance corner	large decorative urns and water vessels, pots, crystals (amethyst, quartz), ceramic teapots and vases, bright light, picture of mountain or mare, candles, symbols of love, mandarin ducks, horse, fire, stones, all from the ground, globes, matching pairs, happy couples pictures, metal, wood, peonies, peaches, flowers, hearts. NO water
North East	Small Earth	Education and Scholarships	decorative urns, crystals, ceramic teapots, vase, water, earth, wood, mountains, books
North West	Big Metal	Most important corner, place of family breadwinner - Father	earth or metal elements, gold, silver, coins, mountain, globe, metal wind chime, chinese coins, 3 leg toad, horse, grand chair. NO Fire, NO to much light, NO red, NO water.

This is a very short on feng shui but if you are interested purchase or borrow a book from a library and start your own journey.

Thanks for reading.