Feng Shui is a system of harmonizing everyone to their surrounding environment and energies. It teaches us how we can balance the energies in spaces, such as at home or your office. The Chinese words Feng Shui means Wind & Water. These are two natural elements that flow, move and circulate everywhere on Earth, which are essential for human survival. Chi is another element with that and is necessary for life-giving forces. Wind and Water are the direct carriers of this Chi and all living objects contain this lifeforce.
There are lots of ways to make your work environment more inviting and productive by implementing Feng Shui methods and maximize your productivity and efficiency. With Feng Shui, objects in a room are arranged according to the flow of natural energy. The concept also involves using colours, materials, and the layout of a space to create a favourable ambience.
Benefits of Office Feng Shui
Whether it’s a home office or an outside workspace, you probably spend a lot of hours in your office. Feng shui proponents believe that employing its principles in your office can bring about productivity and success. An office that’s inviting, organized, and aesthetically appealing can make work more enjoyable.
The 5 Elements of Feng Shui
In feng shui, there are five elements that attract energy and need to be balanced. These include:
- Wood: This element channels creativity and growth. Trees, plants, or green objects can represent wood.
- Fire: This is the most powerful element. It creates passion, energy, expansion, boldness, and transformation. Candles or the colour red can bring the fire element into a space.
- Water: This element is linked to emotion and inspiration. Water features or blue items can represent this element.
- Earth: The earth element signifies stability and strength. Incorporate the earth element with rocks, carpets, old books, or things that are brown or tan in colour.
- Metal: Metal unites all the elements, while offering focus and order. Use objects that are metal or white, silver, or grey in colour.
How to Bring Feng Shui to your Office: From incorporating specific colours to placing your furniture in the proper spot, there are many ways to bring feng shui to your office. Here are some tips:
- Understand the Bagua Map: The Feng Shui Bagua map is one of the main tools to analyze the energy of a certain space. Bagua is the feng shui energy map of your environment that shows you which areas your office, desk or home are connected to specific areas of your life.
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- Stand inside your office with your back to the front door. Now look straight in front of you. The section of your house in the far-right corner is the relationship zone. The part in the far-left corner is the money sector. And work yourself around the map. This works the same with your desk.
- Use the Bagua to guide you; imagine your desktop divided into a nine-part grid, as in the Bagua map. Choose several areas of your life that need a little extra boost, and use the following tips to attract good energy to those areas.
- Remember, clutter blocks creativity, so leave a minimum of 50% of your desktop clear at all times. Only choose one to three sections to focus on at a time; don’t try to home in on all nine sections at once.
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- Outside Office Entrance:
- Remove any obstacles clients may face in navigating into your office.
- Create an official entrance which is easy for clients to locate
- All signs are easily seen from the parking area
- Road signs with good design complete with attractive landscaping
- Make the entrance to your office a clutter-free zone.
- Place floor lamps or wall sconces on either side of the outside door.
- Add a plant on either side of the entrance door.
- Outside Office Entrance:
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- Reception Area:
- If you a reception area, you want this space to be inviting. The reception area should instil confidence and calmness in your clients.
- Provide updated magazines and replace worn or tattered ones.
- Tidy up during the day if necessary.
- If you don’t have a reception area and clients enter directly into your office or your office is located within a large corporation, you can still create an inviting entrance into your office with plants and lights.
- Reception Area:
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- Declutter your desk and work environment: According to feng shui, your business prosperity and work performance can be amplified by decluttering and establishing order on your desk. Productive chi cannot flow if the articles on your desk are blocking its movement and cluttering up your mind as well as your workspace.
A few tips can help you ensure the best possible results when implementing these practices throughout your office. These include:
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- All desks remain clean of empty drink cans, coffee cups, and water bottles
- Take everything off your desk and clean up any cluttered areas around it. Only keep out items on your desk that you use daily
- Limit the paper lying on your desk. Place your other papers and items somewhere other than the top of your desk like in desk drawers, file cabinets, desk drawers and/or storage cabinets.
- Trash is kept out of sight and emptied nightly
- Chairs are correctly placed beneath the desk
- Keep windows and fixtures clean
- Dust and Vacuum regularly
- Keep the bathroom clean and free of any plumbing issues
- Keep the bathroom door closed at all times
- Replace burned-out light bulbs and light fixtures
- Replace worn or torn furniture
- Hang artwork which is visually appealing, positive and career-enhancing: Surround your office with images and objects that are inspiring, such as pictures with mottos or images that symbolize what you want to accomplish.
- Choose the right colours: Feng shui office colours should create balance without being overwhelming. While Green is your feng shui office colour for success and the colour of wealth, some other popular and soothing shades are:
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- White
- Soft Yellow
- Sandstone
- Pale Gold
- Pale Orange
- Pale Green
- Blue Green
- Opt for natural lighting: When possible, use natural light from windows. Yellow-tinted and fluorescent lighting can bring about fatigue. If you must use artificial light, opt for incandescent, full-spectrum light bulbs.
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- Most offices provide two types of lighting, overhead and task lighting. Most offices don’t have much ambient lighting other than general overhead light fixtures. This can present a more sterile environment that isn’t necessarily the best feng shui approach.
- If you want to add warmth to your office space, add a table lamp either on your desk or a credenza or console table, or set a floor lamp that is no taller than your cubicle walls to provide greater work light and warmer lighting.
- Placement of your desk in a room or office: In the practice of feng shui, the prosperity, success and happiness you experience in your business life is extremely influenced by the position of your desk.
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- The prime desk position is the Command Position, which is achieved when your desk is located diagonally across from the entry to the room, so you are able to see all of the room’s doors and windows when you sit in the command position. Having visual control over your workspace gives you a much greater degree of true control over your work life.
- Further enhance your position by anchoring one end of the desk to a wall (meaning that end of your desk touches the wall). Keep in mind never to sit with the door opening to your side though, since this creates poison arrows.
- You can produce strong feng shui backing by positioning your chair so your back is against a solid wall thereby giving you the widest possible view of the room. If this isn’t possible, try placing a row of lush plants behind your seating area.
- A comfortable chair with a high backing is ideal for feng shui. It’s believed that a high back creates support and protection.
- Never ever sit with your back to the door. This is a big feng shui don’t. The reason is you can’t see what’s coming up behind you. You could become the victim of office politics and backstabbing. If the configuration of your office is a cubicle and not something you can control, then place a mirror on your desk so it reflects what’s directly behind you. This way you won’t be startled or blind sighted by unexpected business turns.
- You want to take command of your room and need to place your desk so you can see everyone who enters. This is the position of power and gives you control. If you hold important business meetings in your office and need to win over clients, coworkers and your boss, make sure you take the North sector of your office during the meetings. North is the controlling direction and whenever opposed by any other direction; the North is said to always win. The person sitting in the Southwest of the office will be powerful. The boss chamber should be in the Southwest of the office.
- Once you know your personal Kua number, take advantage of your best working direction and face your lucky direction.
- Avoid sitting with your back to a window or your desk beneath a window looking out. The first doesn’t support your work while the second position will allow too many distractions outside and keep you from your work. Always sit with a solid wall behind you for the best career support.
- Office desk facing a wall is a symbol of facing obstacles. Just like a big wall right in front of the main door is bad. Similarly, when you sit facing the wall it symbolizes obstacles. If you have no choice, then place a beautiful picture of an open and low area like a beautiful garden or bed of flowers.
- Beams symbolize oppression and being under pressure all the time, which is the last thing anyone wants to face in the office. So, move the desk away from the beam above it. If you cannot do this then do this simple cure, you can paint the beam the colour of the ceiling or stencil it with an “uplifting” design such as clouds or birds in flight.
- Chairs facing one another means confrontations. If you sit facing one another in a cubicle then it symbolizes confrontation. This could create arguments and quarrels. The simple cure is to place a rooster on your desk.
- If there is a pillar, sharp edge of a wall or open shelves or L shape desk facing you that’s facing you then place a plant near your desk. While you can place any plant, a Lucky bamboo plant is an excellent option.
- Buy some live plants: Live plants bring many positive elements into your workplace. They improve air quality and bring a little of the natural world in. Green plants encourage personal and business growth and Green leaves symbolize wealth. If a plant dies, remove it and replace it with another. Some great plants for business feng shui are the lucky bamboo plant, a jade plant, a peace lily or a moth orchid. You can place plants anywhere in the office. But the best location is southeast of the office. The element of Southeast is wood. This is the wealth corner.
- The element of water: Did you know that water is the most powerful symbol of money in feng shui? Its sparkling Chi energy is beneficial for your health and prosperity but you must be careful that you keep the water clean at all times. Small fountains that are designed for a desk are great, or you may even consider purchasing an aquarium. Another way to incorporate water into your business is the use of any artifact that depicts water, even a picture will work.
There are many ways that you can get rid of negative energy in your office, and Divinity World would be happy to help you embark on this journey to bring productivity, progress and prosperity into your office and benefit your colleagues with success at work.