In feng shui, the most important room of the home is the bedroom.
It’s a mirror of our inner self. When we prioritize our bedroom, we prioritize ourselves.
Our bedroom is also the space where we can rest and retreat from the world. A space that encourages us to listen to what our soul desires.
This is why I recently started searching for flights to Chicago.
The hopeful romantic within me wanted to personally drag a beautiful blue and red Oriental rug out of Leslie’s bedroom, down the stairs and out the front door into a snow drift.
I was convinced that the energy of this rug was responsible for the tension Leslie felt in her marriage.
In my Space Doula world, I’m always looking at how our home mirrors our life. And how we can shift the energy in our life by shifting the energy in our home.
If conflict has sprouted up in someone’s life, then I ask questions to ferret out how that conflict is being symbolically anchored in the home. It might look like artwork depicting a battle scene, a large sword hanging on the wall, a door you have to fight with to close, or in this case….
A rug I wanted to drag out into the snow.
Before being on the floor in Leslie’s bedroom, this rug was in the home of her now husband and his then wife. A relationship that was (and still is) filled with conflict.
With my energetic feng shui hat on, I had this conversation with Leslie:
ME: How do you feel about removing the rug from your bedroom?
LESLIE: But I love that rug.
ME: Is there somewhere else you can move it to, so it’s not underneath where you two sleep? I don’t love that it was in a home where there was marital conflict, and now you’re feeling tension in your own marriage.
LESLIE: Not really.
ME: Can you space clear the rug? Place salt on it and then vacuum it up? Bring it outside for a sun bath?
LESLIE: There’s still too much snow outside. Maybe this spring.
I held my breath wishing spring to come early this year!
Two weeks ago, spring finally came to Chicago along with a call from Leslie and news about the bedroom rug.
She had taken the rug outside, sprinkled salt on it, and let the magical combo of salt and sunshine usher away any angry words the rug absorbed in its previous home.
After she felt like the rug was energetically clear, she asked her husband to help carry it back to their bedroom.
As Leslie’s advocate in creating a sacred space for her and her husband, I would’ve been skeptical if this was the end of the story. I would’ve wondered whether that rug was still going to stir up trouble with memories from another space and time.
But, what I heard next was a reminder that most stories have a second act…
Instead of a willingness to help carry the rug back upstairs, Leslie’s husband snapped that she should take the rug to the local consignment shop.
This was the plot twist moment.
After a bit of coaxing from Leslie, her husband dished about the rug. When he was married to his first wife, he was out shopping and fell in love with the rug. He brought it home expecting his then wife to share in his enthusiasm. She didn’t. The rug joined the list of things the two disagreed about. But, that wasn’t the case with Leslie. When she first saw the rug, her eyes lit up in anticipation of it being in their home together. It was that moment when her husband knew why he bought the rug. It wasn’t for his home with his then wife. It would be a gift for the woman he hadn’t yet met, but would fall in love and marry.
Even now as I reshare this story with you, I’m in awe.
It’s such a reminder that you may have a belonging that feels energetically heavy, because it was in a home where there was conflict. BUT, that doesn’t mean you have to let go of the belonging if you love it. A bit of attention and energetic space clearing can remove any stickiness AND make space for another story to emerge
