How to Use Feng Shui to Bring Good Vibes Into Your Living Room

For thousands of years, people have tapped into the principles of the ancient Chinese art of feng shui to bring balance to their homes and harmonize the people who live in them with their surroundings. Whether you believe in the practice’s promises of bringing wealth and prosperity into your life or not, though, it cannot be denied that utilizing feng shui to decorate and rearrange your home can be beneficial in many practical ways. At its heart, feng shui creates a visually balanced space and promotes better flow that influences the way you use and interact with your environment. As a result, your home won’t just look better–it’ll feel better, too.

As one of the areas of the home that receives the highest amount of foot traffic, your living room can definitely benefit from a bit of feng shui. It’s where your family gathers and is a place that is primarily used for entertaining guests. Fortunately, creating good feng shui in your living room isn’t difficult at all. Read on below for a few tips:

Consider the space’s function

Living rooms are multipurpose spaces: some homeowners primarily view them as a place for entertaining, while others think of them as a cozy retreat for relaxing. Either way, as the phrase itself entails, the room is for living–and defining your intention behind that word can help dictate the way you rearrange the furniture and decorate the space.

If you love having people over, using bright and lively colors in your living room can help get you and your guests into a more festive and celebratory mood. If the room is for your family to unwind at the end of the day, muted neutrals and subdued hues can give off a serene and peaceful vibe.

Let there be light

Lighting is one of the most important elements in interior design, and it unfortunately isn’t often employed by homeowners to its fullest advantage. The lighting that you have in your living room doesn’t only serve to illuminate the space; it can also dictate how the room looks and feels when you’re in it.

In feng shui, light provides energy, and that energy is absorbed and reflected by those inside the room. Ever notice how you tend to lower your voice and speak in hushed tones in a dim room, while you feel more comfortable conversing normally in a brightly lit one? That’s lighting at work for you.

In a living room, it’s always a good idea to use light in layers. This gives you more flexibility over how bright the room is at any given moment. Steer clear of overhead lights, which can cast an unflattering glare. Instead, employ living room corner floor lamps, such as our Alvis Edge, to cast a gentle glow in usually shadowy areas. Standing at 72 inches when fully assembled, this modern shelf and floor lamp in one is designed to fit in any corner that needs more light.

Alternatively, you can employ a pair of Fancy Edge living room corner floor lamps to light dark corners and showcase your favorite decorative items. Having two of these living corner floor lamps adorning the space creates a much-needed sense of balance–and they’re highly functional, too. Just like our Alvis Edge, the Fancy Edge is designed to fit in any corner of your living room and features omnidirectional LED light poles that offer three lighting modes, giving you control over the direction and the temperature of the light in your living room.

Clear and declutter

Clutter affects us all negatively–that much is a scientifically-proven fact. According to research, messy rooms can trigger the production of cortisol, also known as the stress hormone. Elevated levels of cortisol in the body, in turn, trigger our fight or flight response.

In feng shui, it’s said that the state of your living room reflects the lives and moods of the people who use it. If you’re looking to bring in more peace and calmness into your life, then, it’s a good idea to tidy up and declutter the room to create a harmonious space where everything has its own place and purpose. You may be surprised at how much better you’ll feel when you let go of things you don’t need, use, or love.

Rearrange your furniture meaningfully

One of the most important tenets of feng shui is harmonizing objects with the people who use them. This principle also applies to furniture. In a living room, grouping pieces of furniture together isn’t just vital to creating a good flow of energy; it also helps conversations happen more easily between the people in it.

When rearranging your living room, you’ll also want to take note of the “command position”. This means that all seating areas should have a clear view of the door, allowing everyone to clearly see who’s coming and going. Hanging a mirror in front of pieces that have to be faced away from the door allows the same view.

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