Feng Shui Colors for the Bedroom
Feng Shui is about balance and harmony in our environments. The bedroom is a very important room (we spend the majority of our day there), so many people naturally ask how to improve their bedroom using color selection according to Feng Shui. As we discuss bedroom colors, it is also imperative to recognize the importance of the other rooms in your house. Enhancing your bedroom without enhancing the other beneficial areas of your home does not provide you with the full benefits of Feng Shui. Feng Shui is about balancing the energy in your complete and total environment.
With that said, here are some Feng Shui tips to consider for your bedroom:
Don’t overdo the bright colors in your bedroom. Bright colors are alive and moving, so the more bright colors that are used, the harder it will be to stay asleep. This also applies to plants and especially water. Plants and water manifest yang energy and cause the same issues in the bedroom as bright colors. The colors associated with plants and water are green, black, and blue. Bright colors to avoid are reds, strong oranges, or bright yellows. Florescent colors are out of the question!
Pictures of moving water can also cause problems. If you’ve got a picture of a waterfall, river, or ocean in your bedroom, it’s a wise idea to move it. Unfortunately, aquariums in the bedroom can also cause sleeping issues and should be moved. Although you should avoid red in the bedroom, a little touch of red can spice up your sex life! (Red is fire, so lit candles count as red.)
Dark colors (shades of brown) should be used in the decor of the bedroom, but not on the walls. Painting the bedroom walls a dark color might help you sleep, but won’t help you feel rejuvenated in the morning. Darker colored decor should be used to the point of tilting the room’s ambiance yin, without making you feel like you’re party to a funeral. You don’t have to just use browns, pick darker colors and designs that are relaxing for you.
If your room is already very dark (wood-paneled, for example) and you can’t make changes to it, you might want to consider changing any yellow light-producing light bulbs to brighter, whiter bulbs. Opening the blinds during the day will also dramatically improve the room’s feeling. If it’s dark at night, balance it with brightness during the day. (Clearing any room occasionally by opening all the blinds is extremely beneficial.)
In painting the bedroom, using pastel colors is your best bet. The best colors to use depend on the compass direction of the room’s location. To determine the compass direction of your home, draw your house’s outline on a piece of paper, and split the home into 9 equal sections (3 down, 3 across). Use a compass to find which direction is north, and label each box according to that compass direction (North can be in a corner). Here are the color combinations:
– NE, Center, or SW: Rooms located here should be painted pastel earthy colors, including a light shade of yellow.
I know this might be a letdown, as some of you reading this were hoping to hear painting a room florescent orange would make you an international movie star overnight! But Feng Shui is about balance and harmony, so using light, pastel colors are your best bet when painting the walls.
