Practical Feng Shui Tips | 032

Oh, Sarah, I am excited to dive into things all feng shui, but also your incredible story, because it just fascinates me how you've given yourself permission to define things on your terms. And so I want to go back to some of these. It has to be me moments when you were working in the nonprofit sector and all that sort of thing, and you kind of had your it does not have to be me moment, right? So can you take me inside of that?

Sarah Bird Nelson: I love how you just said that, because that is so great. It didn't have to be me, yes. So I was in a lovely job with the most wonderful clients and colleagues that anyone could ever ask for. We had just moved from Boston up to Maine to Portland, and little bit into this move, I started becoming numb on just like my left face, like right here, my left hand and my left foot, all the time. No, it was very intermittent. It was it would just sort of show up and it it was so hard to describe, the only way I could describe it to anyone was that, you know, when you're in a car and the sun's coming in and there and like this, this side of your face is, like, really warm because of the sun. Yeah, that's what it felt like, but from the inside out. And I know that sounds crazy.

No, it doesn't sound crazy. I'm just trying to put that into my body and kind of understand what that might feel like. So when you say that it was intermittent and sporadic, it would just come and go and you couldn't connect the dots of what might be causing it. No,

Sarah Bird Nelson: nothing. I please be scary. Eating, yeah, you know, at first it was more annoying, really was. And one of those, those big moments for me was finally listening to my body, yes, because I don't think I had myself. I know I had not been listening to my body.

Ooh. So had you been an intuitive person up until that point where you had been listening to your body? Or was this and it has to be me moment? You gotta listen to your body. We're speaking

Sarah Bird Nelson: to you. This was a has to be me moment, because I was playing in the world that I'm in now, this spirituality, intuitive, healing, arts, world I was playing and dabbling in that at the time. What do you mean by that? Just like reading and exploring and, you know, just exploring really, I guess mostly reading about it. My mom was a little into it, and so, I mean, at that point, I just was not listening at all, except for this little wake up call that I was having. And I finally found a doctor to take me they thought I was having a stroke. I told him, I'm not having a stroke because I am driving and being a mom and being a wife and a colleague and doing all of this work and traveling, bopping down to DC and Chicago and New York City to see clients and all the Things fully functioning. However, this would just present itself, no rhyme or reason, no timing connection, no sleep connection, no food connection, no connection. So I found a doctor. They first thought that I have multiple sclerosis, and I I didn't quite believe it, and so through a too many tests, funky tests, like where they'd like shock me and do these weird things and MRIs and all these things, they couldn't figure it out. There was no ms presenting itself, and the testing was across a solid year, because nothing was showing up in anything we did, in any changes I made, nothing was shifting, and it wasn't painful. So it was just like I said, annoying. It was just annoying and inexplicable. So eventually the doctors were like, Well, we think it must be stress, and sent me on my way. And again, another moment was I would sit there and say. I don't feel stressed. I'm not stressed like I love the people I work with, the work wasn't my favorite, the actual like number crunching wasn't my favorite, but the people I adored, and the clients I adored, and the traveling I loved, and all of it. But what I came to realize is I am a hyper vigilant doer, and I was in so much doing that I wasn't listening to my body. I didn't realize what stress was. I had on and off meditated, but that never really, I'll put in quotes, worked. I didn't even know why I was really meditating in those moments, and so there I sat with a diagnosis of stressed out.

It's so gosh, you know this story of learning to recognize stress the way that it is presenting in your body and your life, regardless of how somebody else understands stress or interprets stress or validates the existence of stress or this is such a common story, particularly in women and I, I'm really particularly interested in your term. I was a hyper vigilant doer. Hello. My name is Tess. Hello, Sarah. I meet you. I am a hyper vigilant do I write right and right and and that there is this societal belief that women should be superheroes, but you don't want to proclaim yourself as superhero, because then you're stepping out and being too big, you know? And this is just this constant container that we feel like we have to put ourselves in in order to be understood by the rest of the world, and we don't give ourselves permission to be who we are and have our full human experience that is unique to us, whether it makes sense to anybody else or not. So was that really the the seed or the or the big invitation for you to really embrace your body, intelligence and your the intuitive nature of you in a much bigger way, is that the right way to say

Sarah Bird Nelson: it absolutely, I think it was a doorway. I just didn't know it was a doorway at that moment, I was like, bring on all of the healing arts, because if medicine can't help me here, then what can and because I had dabbled, I just knew enough to start exploring acupuncture, stood to start exploring different types of massage,

and I so what was the it has to be me moment when you gave yourself permission to recognize that you were experiencing stress enough to go and seek out help from, yeah, modalities.

Sarah Bird Nelson: That's a great question. I I feel when I, when I look back, I feel like it was me not wanting to have any type of diagnosis, so the moment they said multiple sclerosis. I knew too much about that illness to accept it, and I thought, I don't want to be a diagnosis. And so how can I figure this out? Because if it's not stress, then it's going to keep going, and I'm going to have to go back to the doctors and say, I need, I need more support.

Oh, so stress was the lesser of the evils. Is that what you're saying to me. Okay, so that helped you, when presented with these choices, you decided to embrace this particular description of what was going on for want of a better term, and decide that you were going to be proactive in seeking out other kinds of solutions. Yes, is that the right way to interpret it? Exactly?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Right? Exactly? Yeah. Okay,

so then take me inside how you really embraced, rather than out of desperation, I'm going to go down and dabble with these things. How did it go from dabbling to doing and then doing to real? Believing with the Reiki, yes.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So I did all, like I said, I did all the things, massage, acupuncture, all these different modalities, and one of those modalities was Reiki. Now my first Reiki session, I was it was not a comfortable session, and so my mom said, and my mom's the one that said, Try Reiki. And so then my I go back, and I'm like, Mom, that was weird. I'm not doing that.

What was weird about it?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Um, so I laid on the table, and we didn't really speak much, and then there was a lot of like jingling and jangling and chimes and noise, and it just felt and maybe it's what I needed now, practicing, I don't know I can look at it from a different perspective. However, in that moment, it was so unpleasant. It just right. It just didn't feel right. I, you know, the person was absolutely lovely, but it did not. It didn't I, it didn't do anything, I guess you could say. And then in that time of that hyper, hyper vigilant doer, I was solution seeking,

right for me, as you, as you're saying this, though it did do something, it got you, gave you clarity about what you didn't want,

Sarah Bird Nelson: completely. Yeah, yes. So

it's interesting, isn't it, when we go into a situation and it feels like, well, this didn't do anything, but it actually did, you know, if we're looking at it that way, right? It's just fascinating to me. So okay, so that particular practitioner and the way she interpreted Reiki and your particular energies together was not the right fit for you. So that was, it does not have to be me moment.

Sarah Bird Nelson: That was right. That's not me. So I moved on to another practitioner and

and was it your trust in your mother's recommendation that made you give it a second go? Yes, 100% okay? And then you had a good experience.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Yes, I had an amazing experience. And I continued to work with this woman, and she was wonderful and and I started to feel relief now that wasn't immediate. And, you know, I was like, I said, I, I am a results oriented woman, yeah, yeah. So it wasn't immediate, and I started to learn that I had to speak to my body, and I was doing that through Reiki with her, and then I was feeling relief. So the numbness was happening less often, still happening, however less, less often. And then she

sample of what talking to my body looks like for you. So

Sarah Bird Nelson: at that point, she encouraged me to sit in meditation every morning, and I would talk to my nervous system. I i would tell the story of me being calm and focused and looking forward to that day in a way where I was visualizing my day and visualizing it from a place where there was really no room for me to feel off. Hmm, and I did that. And then eventually she said, I can teach you Reiki so that you can do it to yourself. And in between our sessions, we'll start spreading our sessions out further. And she allowed me, and gave me that permission to fully invest energetically into my being by teaching me Reiki.

And was that the first time that you had invested in your wellness in that way with such dedication, with such dedication. So it was a real turning point for you. It

Sarah Bird Nelson: was and it was one of those moments that carried such focus that Sure, I always exercised, I always again in quotes, ate, right? I did all those things. I would run and, you know, go to yoga class and all of that. But this was tuning into a different part of me, the energetic part, not the physical part that had me take, like a right turn down a different path. Mm.

And so this just felt right for you. You were feeling the difference in your being, yes, so take me into the next it has to be me moment where you went from fully embracing and believing in Reiki as a person and the recipient of another practitioner zone of genius into deciding I want to practice Reiki and help other people to listen and speak to their bodies. Yes.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So as I was, you know, told that I was stressed out, I started, as I was tuning in more to this energetic part of myself, I started to crave some creativity. So my sister in law, at the time, was doing a jewelry gig. So I did the jewelry gig, thinking that would get me out of the house, allow me to meet people and and fulfill this creative side of me, but also still be sales Doer driven.

So you were selling jewelry at parties or, yeah,

Sarah Bird Nelson: people's houses, set up a dining room table. Oh, I see, okay, and sell the bracelets. Okay? So as I was doing that, that took off pretty quickly, and I was like, and I just did it on the side for fun and and remember, we were still pretty new here in Maine, so this was also a way for me to just expand a network and of friends and socialize. Socialize. Yeah, totally. Two young kids got me out of the house. Was so fun. And as my health and connection to Reiki was unfolding, I I did the next class and became certified. And at the same time, that's when I started to pick up this interest in Feng Shui. And in that time I went and I was certified in Feng Shui in Tennessee, and I

said, take me inside of the how you pick it up? I mean, I have a general interest in it, but I'm not picking it. I'm not deciding it has to be me to be a Feng Shui practitioner, right? I need a bit I need, I need a bit more detail. I gotta COVID in here.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Alright? So my husband would say that anytime I felt off, I would ask him to help me move furniture. Be like, can we put the couch over here? Let's switch this room to that room. And at the same time, I'm I'm very into Reiki, right? So I'm very in tune to energy, and so in my exploration of the energetic body, what that means, how that unfolds, I came across Feng Shui and a practice that I had heard about before. I had a few books. I got a few more books, and honestly, none of them really made sense to me. They I didn't know what to do with it. So I found a I don't even, honestly, I don't even know it like popped up somewhere in my life. And it was three and a half days in Nashville, and I was like, Oh, I can take three and a half days away. I'm going to do that. So at that point, it was purely just an interest, yeah. So at the end of that class, at the end of those three and a half days, the the teacher goes around and says, Okay, tell me how you're going to implement this. And by the time she got to me, I had written

a business plan.

Yeah, wow, yeah. I mapped out a business plan and I was going to it was something like, I need to remember style, style, self, space. That's what it was. So style, the whole jewelry thing, and at that point I was, I thought it would be fun to, like clean out people's closets and help them with that. And then the self was going to be the Reiki, and the space was going to be the feng shui.

So I kind of so inspired by this class, oh, that you decided right then and there, I am putting this into practice in my life in a really tangible way, and I'm going to merge it with these two other things that I'm doing right now, the jewelry, the helping people organize their lives, style their lives, and then Reiki with the energy. Wow. Okay, so you read out the business plans, you gave voice to it in a public forum

Sarah Bird Nelson: in this class, and they all were just like, what? How are you good? What you know and and even during the class, I remember calling home twice, and. And saying to Chris, okay, before I get home, you need to remove this mirror and you need to change these pillows,

because I will have the right energy to pursue this if I walk into our space and the mirror is in the wrong place, I

love it. I know. Did

he move the mirror in the pillows?

Sarah Bird Nelson: He did. He He's, he's an amazing man. I don't know what happy mommy, happy life. Totally, he's an amazing man. So patient. So so, yeah, so I was changed, I got on the plane and I was, I came home and sat him down, and I'm always like, this is what I'm doing, and this is how it's going to unfold in all of this. Now, you know, we still, I still kept the corporate job because honestly money, and I still kept the jewelry gig because that was again, expanding my network. Yes. So now I'm standing around these tables selling a couple of bracelets and necklaces, but hearing women talk about how they felt, how they weren't they would never wear that big of a necklace, because that would be too showy. And I started to from an energetic standpoint, stand around that table and really listen to what these women were saying, and talk to them about their energy, talk to them about their homes. And then one night, I came home from one of these parties and I looked at my sales and I was like, wow, it's time to give this up. It's time to let this go. It was a beautiful conduit to get me to this point now and again, I'm still in the corporate world and Oh, I

love that moment of you recognizing I'm not actually supposed to be selling bracelets like this does not have to be me. This is another it does not have to be me moment, and recognizing the purpose of that chapter and your place in it. And I think what I what I love about this part of your story is we often just don't give ourselves permission to walk away from something and say and done and seen right chapter closed, and this is the purpose that it served for me, and it's not a failure that I'm saying no to it now, and I love that you closed that door, opened the window that it presented and and jumped through it, you know, or the door, or however we want to say it, yeah. So, yep, did you leverage those that that circle, that network that you had been connected to in that jewelry business to continue helping these women understand themselves better? So you'd really drafted off of that network that you had created to build your business.

Sarah Bird Nelson: I did. I did and I was starting to get emails where someone would say, I got the bracelet. I love it, and I did this and this and this in my home, and I've started meditating, and my life has changed, yeah. And so those are the people that I started to slowly stay connected with about this work. And it was very conversational.

It was very organic. It sounds like it was very organic. And kind of, there's a natural progression, yeah,

Sarah Bird Nelson: and you've allowed it to be that I did. And you know, I would say that was probably the first time that letting go of something like that jewelry gig was was peaceful that I didn't. I didn't leave it feeling like a failure. It was hard to tell the people that I was doing that with, that I was leaving, but that not feeling like a failure about it, and releasing it in a way that felt good and right to me really allowed me to step into the next, truly, a next version of myself. Yeah, the next

it has to be me. So talk me through how you made sense of these different buckets, you know, of work that you were engaged in, that you were, you were, you know, discovering and swimming around in. So you had your Reiki practice, and then you certified as a Feng Shui practitioner. I'm interested in these two parts of your business, because, from an outsider's perspective, someone that's coming into your business, they may not at first understand how these two things fit together. You. Absolutely. What I love about your business and your career is you giving yourself permission to to hold these two things that you are interested in, the two ways that you help people in your own way and allow your connection with each client unfold naturally. So can you, can you take me inside how that's developed, where you might have a client coming to you for Reiki, and then you may end up helping them with the feng shui or vice versa. How did, how did that sit with you, and how did you get comfortable with presenting yourself as these two seemingly different practitioners?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Sure, it's a good it's a really good question. Is

that the right way to say it?

Sarah Bird Nelson: It totally is and and so I've been doing this for over a decade. It's taken a long time for me to figure out how to weave them together. So at first, I definitely had my Reiki lane, and I had Reiki clients showing up to my studio. Well, honestly, first it was friends and family showing up to my living room. We moved the couch and set up a massage table and pulled some curtains so it felt cozy.

I mean, I think that's how we all start our businesses, though, right? I mean, when I started the blender girl website, it was my mother and my sister reading my blog, and nobody else.

Sarah Bird Nelson: It was a few friends.

We just allow ourselves for it to be that we've all got to start somewhere Absolutely.

Sarah Bird Nelson: And that is how I started Reiki and the feng shui was also really the same. People would ask me to come help with them with their closets, and I would be in their homes, I'd be like, oh, you know what? What about this in your bedroom? Because closet is in the bedroom. What about this? What about that? And all of that slowly unfolded, but I definitely had this mindset of, I have a Reiki practice and a Feng Shui practice. And I would say, which is, I think one of the things that I have had to learn to accept as a compliment was that I really, really know how to listen, and that by by listening and synthesizing what people are feeling and saying, I started to see them intertwining the Reiki and the feng shui. Yeah,

I love the trust that you held for yourself, it was because, you know, a lot of people, when they have two interests or two seemingly disparate careers, well, you have to choose. You're either a Reiki practitioner or you're a Feng Shui practitioner. What are you? You gotta put your time and energy into one lane. Stay in your lane. You know? I mean, there's all these narratives around the, you know, choices that we should be making because so and so went down that path, or that's the path to success, or that's how you get to being, you know, growing your practice, or whatever. Take me inside of of the process you said it took time for you to understand how to weave them together. I just want to understand a bit more about how you deliberately chose to hold them both and give yourself permission that you didn't have to choose between one or the other, like so many people you know, go

Sarah Bird Nelson: down and I mean, even so, even starting a business people will, you know, want a business card, or your fill out a form, and they want your title. I had like, two, three titles. I never knew what to write. Am I doing Reiki? Am I doing feng shui? Am I doing mindfulness, like all of these things? Yeah. So I still don't have a title. I don't I still

don't know what to put on mine either. I mean, there's like, 17 things that I do, yeah, totally

Sarah Bird Nelson: right, yes. So I would say, as I grew into trusting my intuition and trusting the information I was receiving, yes, that that was becoming a real powerful part of my Reiki practice, and then over the global shutdown, I brought feng shui online through zoom, and I taught my first class on feng shui, and I had about 10 to 12 amazing women show up. And strangely, I didn't know many of them. I thought it would just be all my buddies. And as they were described. Having their space related to the areas of their life that we were focusing on in regards to their space. So without getting technical, Feng Shui is based on a Bagua Map that has nine areas that relate to different parts of our lives, so wealth and abundance, health and well being, career and life, purpose, love and relationships, those are a few of them, and I started to realize that I could tell them that they had to put the plant here. But the real learning was why they needed the plant or why they needed the mirror or why they needed to move XYZ or add this, and I really had to tune into their whole being as they're speaking to me and sharing really intimate details about their lives, and I could feel this energy within me, my spine, like lights up when I know something's happening and I'm opening up to some download, and that was happening, and I started to realize that the methodology of Feng Shui is so supported by the energy that we carry as humans, and that when we start to connect to the Energy of our surroundings, our heart and our home without being too cheesy, really start to meld, and there is great, amazing power in that. Ah,

let's dive into some of this power, all right, so that we can get some of your wisdom about some things that we can be doing, oh, yeah, to shift our physical space, to bring in the things that we want in our lives. So what is the biggest thing that people come to you with the biggest concern, or the thing that they want to shift, or things that they want to shift. What are some of the top things that you work with, people,

Sarah Bird Nelson: relationships, career.

You mean improving relationships, bringing in a new relationship, bringing in new love.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So divorce, dating, kids, transitioning, moving to an empty nest situation, kids going off to college or moving out of the house, kids moving back into the house.

Okay? So, so talk us through what our space needs to look like if we want to get out of a relationship that is not right for us anymore.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Sure. So oftentimes when we are looking to exit a relationship, there is an imbalance of some sort. So it can be an imbalance of personal well being. So when you work with health and well being and Feng Shui, and I believe you will fully relate to this test. It sits in the center of the Bagua Map. So when,

I'll bet it does,

oh yes, it does. When you impact health and wellness, it touches all the other areas of your life, yes, right. So when we're getting out of a relationship, I'm typically working on the center of the home, also their health and wellness routine, and just giving them guidance around health and well being, paying attention to their bodies, paying attention to their energy. And then from there, we work on the relationships area. Because often when we're exiting a relationship, whether we want it or not, we move into this energy of lack. We weren't good enough. It didn't work out. You know, my looks, my behaviors, whatever it is. So we come back to love and relationships, that area in on the BOGO map, in their home and their bedroom, and we start to create a sanctuary. So your bedroom can be in that area on the BOGO map, or it can be separate. And we start to create a sanctuary in your bedroom.

So how do you create a sanctuary in your bedroom on a practical there are a

Sarah Bird Nelson: couple things we let go of which this will stir up a lot of grumpiness. Bear with me. Okay, I'm ready. Okay, so the first thing is, if you are in a divorced situation, or even if it's like you know, partnership, boyfriend, girlfriend, any pictures that you have in your bedroom, other than of partnership between you and your current spouse, your current partner, need to go. So really, what I'm saying is, take the pictures of the kids and the family vacations out of your bedroom. I want this room to be completely about you and only you, okay, and if you're with a partner, so say you're not exiting a relationship and you're building a relationship, then there can be pictures of you two on your hike, or your wedding picture or whatnot, but it's not the wedding picture with all the wedding party in it. It's the picture of just you two. Okay, okay. Now what that does is that creates an energy that brings us right back into ourselves, so that there's none of this external energy, none of these external stories that are energetically feeding us. Okay, does that make sense? It

does so. If you are exiting the relationship and you remove the photos, do you put a like, I'm trying to think of like women who are like, right? This is a chapter just for me. You know, I'm gonna fall in love with myself and have a love affair with myself. Like, do you put a picture of you in Italy? Or, you know what I mean, do you do that? Absolutely

Sarah Bird Nelson: can, yeah, okay, yes. Now, anything in that bedroom of yours should represent partnership. So having a picture of, say, You love horses, having a picture of one horse versus two horses. The two horse picture would be better, two horses at the fence right

hanging out with a lonely horse by itself. No,

Sarah Bird Nelson: okay, so your listeners can go walk around their bedrooms and just notice what feels like single so from a decorating standpoint, odds are often more eye pleasing. But on your bed, have an even number of pillows,

and you would have an even like a dresser on each side of the bed. If you were going to have a dresser, you would need the one for the person you want to bring in exactly they have to be matching.

Sarah Bird Nelson: No, because we're not matching. No,

we're different beings. Okay, different being. Queue, okay, yes,

Sarah Bird Nelson: however, I do suggest that they're roughly the same size, scope,

a complimentary they fit together, yes.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So if there's a lamp on one, put a lamp on the other Okay, so that your partner, now that you've exited this relationship, your partner has a space to lay in bed and read. Your partner can get around and get into bed on that side. So, yes,

if you can, you would not put the bed up against the wall, like, like, you know, you can only get into the bed on one side, right,

Sarah Bird Nelson: ideally. Know if you can move it over, move it over. Now, the way I do approach feng shui is that we have to live in our homes, and there are times where closets and windows or, you know, things impede the ability to have the bed away from the wall. But if there is any possible way to do it. That is what I suggest. And so I've

heard all these things over the years about where the bed should be in the room in relation to the doorway. Yes, talk me through that.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Yes. So you want to be lying in bed as if you're reading a book and see what is coming towards you. So doorways, our front door, the door we use, the side door, the back door, doors in our in our rooms are doorways of opportunity, chi, or energy, flows in your door and then moves throughout your home. And that's the same in the bedroom, the energy moves in to your room, and you want to be able to see what's coming. Yes. Okay, so there is what is called the Death position, and that is, gosh, what's that? I know That's so creepy, I rarely use that word. That is where your Well, there's a

death card in Tarot. And it's not always a bad thing, right? That's true. That's

Sarah Bird Nelson: this. This isn't so great. This is where your feet are lined up with your doorway, so as if you're like being carried out. Oh, that's

not good, alright? So we don't want the bed, the end of the bed, to be looking.

Sarah Bird Nelson: At the doorway, right? Like, right in line, in line, right. Okay, yes. So move it a little over so that you can see the doorway. So if this camera is my doorway, yeah, my bed could sit here. So camera right here, okay, my bed in the center here. My bed could sit here because I can see this doorway. Okay, here, ideally, not on the same wall as the door, because I would have to turn and look, yes,

yes. Oh, okay, so you talked about mirrors before, yes. Should there be mirrors in your bedroom? So do they represent?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Yeah, mirrors are amazing cures. Is what they're called in Feng Shui, because they amplify energy. So think about end of the day. You're exhausted. What are you carrying into your bedroom? Because that is going to be amplified. Now the reality is that we are not happily skipping to bed every night. We are often working through our day at the end of the day. And so if you're doing that and there's a mirror hanging out in your bedroom, it's going to magnify that and send it right back to you. So ideally. And again, I will say this 1000 times. You need to live in your home,

okay, but we shouldn't have a mirror in our bedroom,

Sarah Bird Nelson: ideally, ideally

only because it magnifies any stress that you're carrying. And if, if anybody is from, I don't know if you're familiar with Louise Hay hay house, yes, publishing in her book, I think it's you can heal yourself. She talks about mirror work and looking in the mirror and saying, looking in your eyes and saying, I love you. I love you. I love you. So while you're brushing your teeth or washing your face, getting ready for bed, taking some time. I love you. I love you. I love you.

So it magnifies that energy about yourself. Yeah, so where are we allowed to put mirrors? Where? Where should we put like in? The way is the best place to put mirrors

Sarah Bird Nelson: totally in the closet, on the back of the door, so that you can close the door and you know, if they're going to be in your bedroom, have them on the same wall as your bed. So if you can. So if you've got your bed here, your little night stands and you want a makeup table, get ready in the morning table. Put it on the same wall so that the mirror isn't facing the bed.

Got it okay. And so where should we be placing a mirror outside of the closet that's in our you know, sleeping dressing hallway

Sarah Bird Nelson: is a great place where the hallway to the bedroom, like, why in the hallway?

So oftentimes hallways upstairs are like a shot, like they're long and they go from one end of the house to the other, so that that if you think about water rushing, if water came down that hallway, it would have a straight shot down to the other end of the house. And we want to create this me in our whole house. So this meandering energy, this meandering chi, like a gentle river of energy through our home. So you're talking

about a mirror,

putting a mirror at the end of the hallway or on the sides of Bride side, yeah, and

Sarah Bird Nelson: a mirror will what do we do when we walk by a mirror? We stop we look at it, so that slows down energy. Yes,

I see okay, and it kind of just disrupts, but invites, yeah, is that? Is that right? When

Sarah Bird Nelson: you walk upstairs at my house, you take a right, it's a long hallway, and then you go straight into our bedroom, and at the end of that is a big window. So technically, if I didn't have a mirror there, and I was really paying attention to how energy was flowing upstairs, I would come up, and all of my energy would go down the hallway, out the window, and the mirror just slows it down. It's like a gathering spot for energy, right? It's

kind of like fighting the power of the pause. Where do I want to be putting the pause? My time, energy and focus? Okay?

Sarah Bird Nelson: I love that. I've never put those two together. I love that. So, so

just tell me if I'm interpreting this in the appropriate way your space you want to create a space that invites opportunities for you to bring in what you want and grow. And what about Windows? What should we be doing around windows?

Sarah Bird Nelson: So windows are like the. To the soul. Now they function in a couple different ways, like I said, like that story I just told about the energy going out the window. I keep a shade down and I keep curtains closed for that window in our bedroom, so that I'm preventing energy from going out,

ideally, all the time, like the windows, and I do keep that

Sarah Bird Nelson: all the time, and, okay, wow, yeah, unless that's like, where we put our little window air conditioner in the summer. So then, then it's up a little but okay,

so, so that room is dark.

Sarah Bird Nelson: No, I windows on the other sides of the room that let in light.

Okay, so it's the it's the window by the bed, not all the windows in the bedroom,

Sarah Bird Nelson: right? It's Well, for me, it's the window at the end of the hallway. Oh, I

see, I see. I say, Okay, I'm sorry. I was, I was back in the bedroom. The hallway that one remains closed, so the energy that you're working with doesn't fly out the window.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Exactly, okay, because ultimately, what that what likely could happen is I, every time I come upstairs to go to bed or, you know, spend time in my room, it would feel deplete. I would feel depleted because my energy is escaping. So here's where we start to tie it to the energy of our being. Like that would cause depleting energy mirrors when we are not in this positive place and we're having difficult conversations in front of them, that causes draining energy, which is really what we're trying to prevent in the bedroom, so that we go to sleep peacefully. Ultimately, the mirror will impact sleep. So if anybody is not sleeping, well, I challenge you to drape a scarf over the mirror for a month, a month and a half, and just see if it changes anything. And if it doesn't, it doesn't like that's fine. Gosh,

this is, oh, I could talk about this all day long. Okay, so besides, on the sides of a hallway, where is a good place to put a mirror? I'm trying to think of like people put mirrors on top of their fireplace. People put mirrors in the living room above the couch, you know, to make the room look bigger, and all these things that we we do where, where is a wonderful place to put the mirror? So

Sarah Bird Nelson: we talked about doors and connected to opportunity. So energy from the Universe enters through your door, follows you in a great place to have a mirror is on the side. So again, like this camera is my doorway, and I'm coming into my house, a mirror here or a mirror here on

the sides as you're coming in,

Sarah Bird Nelson: yes, will just cause me to slow down a little table to throw your keys. Causes you to slow down and to your point, the pause, yeah, yeah, oh,

getting this. Okay, this is, this is really, this is really, really interesting. So what about if we want to bring in more money, more abundance? I would have to imagine that's another thing that people come to you for. Okay, yes,

Sarah Bird Nelson: so the first thing is, I want you to walk around your home and feel the abundance that is already there. And here's where our energetic body, our heart, our soul, our being, starts to connect with our home. The fact that you have a roof over your head is abundant. Fact that you have four walls around you, abundant, that you have running water, abundant, and we overlook the already abundant energy that we're holding in our life, because it's so easy socially to live in lack I want the next thing my kitchen doesn't have granite countertops like all of these. Yeah, esthetic things that sure make a home beautiful, but really tuning into the abundance that is already around you and

sitting in gratitude and building from what you have already given yourself or the universe has given you all Okay, so that's a that's that's a personal practice, like a meditation, like a ritual that you would walk around your home really notice and pay attention To the things so. So would the next step of that be noticing what? What makes you feel good about your space? What gives you joy about your space? Yep.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So then the next suggestion would be to notice the um. The things you have. So now you've noticed the structure. Now go deeper and start to notice the things that surround you. And you know, notice, I'll go Marie Kondo on you. Does it bring you joy? Get rid of it. Yeah, right. And if it doesn't, then think about why you have it. Now, a good, good place to look is artwork and pictures. Pictures are a big one, and I'll give a quick personal story to illustrate what I mean. And that we were at a fundraiser, I bid on a photographer for a family photo shoot. I won that I buy the cute outfits for all four of us, and no one other than my husband, who was absolutely being kind, the kids do not want to wear what I have for them. And you know, looking back, I mean, my they're adults now, but they were pretty chill kids, not that day. It was a nightmare, like trying to, you know, strong arm the arm them to buckle them up in their car seats, like it was a fight all morning. And so we get into Portland to this fountain, and it's a beautiful day, and their faces are red, and I have steam coming out of my ears, and Chris is just trying to maintain peace and joy for all of us. And we take the pictures, we get through it, we go home, and a few weeks later, I have an envelope show up, and I open it up, and there's some prints and a CD of all the pictures she took, and this woman was absolutely lovely, and they went right in the trash because

it had captured these really stressful little moment in time. Okay, now

she managed to get the red out of the kids, and she did all the good things a photographer would do, and the pictures, some of them, were absolutely stunning. Like I was like, Oh, that'd be a great Christmas card. But no, all I see is my anger, not even the kids being upset. But I could feel like it was just happening in that moment. That's not either

like a glossed over, airbrushed version of your reality. Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So I use that story, it's a real story, to illustrate that if you're looking at a picture and that vacation was really stressful for you, I'd find another picture. Yes, because you don't realize the energy that you're picking up from that picture. It's all subconscious. It all sits really deep within us, and that does not lead to an abundant feeling.

Yeah. So, so then, what can we put into our homes? We've talked about what we can take away, what can we put into our homes that will help us cultivate and maintain a feeling of abundance, to welcome in more abundance. Yep.

Sarah Bird Nelson: So from a traditional feng shui perspective, the element for wealth and abundance is the element of wood. Now there is what is considered dead wood and live wood. There's dead wood that makes up the desk I'm sitting at, the floors, the structures, the coffee table, if it's wood. So that's considered dead wood. That is important to give structure. So if you are somebody who has this churn, constant churn, you earn money, you spend money, you earn money, you spend money. That is about creating a structure. Now, beyond feng shui, that's about budgeting, or, you know, putting your money where you want it to be. So a little different vibe from budgeting. Budgeting can feel restrictive for some, but this is like saying, you know, I want electricity, so I'm going to allocate $150 to the electricity bill every month. I would like water, so I'm going to give this much, and I would like groceries, so I'm going to give this much. So it's just a different shift in mindset. So bringing in wood to that wealth and abundance area of your home, and I'll explain where that is in a second, um, bring structure all right now, layered on top of that is bringing in a live plant. So they also

that's why we made the plot. Yes, so you are.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Nurturing, yes,

something that's nurturing and growing and requires attention and nourishment and light and water and food, yeah, yeah. Okay, yeah, so a plant draws your attention to the necessity for care,

for love, for

Sarah Bird Nelson: I got that. Yeah, snake plant is my go to for anyone who's sitting here saying I don't have a green thumb and

only because it doesn't require much attention and it keeps leaving. Yeah, that

would be a snake plots. For me,

Sarah Bird Nelson: they're so hardy plants like succulents, because they hold water. Water. Fung is when Shui is water, it is the energy of abundance. Is really what feng shui means, and water is abundance. And so succulents hold water. So those are all sort of distinct.

I love that you chose to talk about succulents, because people think of those as like, oh yeah. They're not that pretty. They're like, desert plants. They're like, you know, nothing you know, but you're actually saying that's a really, really good thing to have.

Sarah Bird Nelson: Yes, absolutely. Now having a cactus little quickly, so I don't recommend a cactus. And in fact, we have a cactus from the first time my son went to Arizona, he came back to Boston at the time and had to have a cactus. So we bought this tiny, little cactus in this poor thing, it's still alive. It does not know it's a cactus because it did not grow straight up. It's all curvy, and it doesn't really have prickles on it. It's the ice. I really think that I've talked to it so much about being kind and not prickly that it's like, Fine, oh, I will grow in this weird, mighty way. So, yeah,

it's a sunflower. I love it. Yeah?

So I want to go back to this health and wellness thing, obviously, because I have a particular interest in that, and so many of our listeners do, because they come from the skinny 60 or the decadent detox communities. Yes, I

Sarah Bird Nelson: love the decadent detox, by the way. I think you do that.

So you we taught we sort of didn't dive into the health and wellness thing like so you talked about the center of your home. What is the center of your home? You talked about that? Yeah, that. How can we nurture that so that we are putting ourselves in a container where we are going to achieve and maintain better health. You

Sarah Bird Nelson: just use the perfect word container. So it is the earth element. The Earth is our container. And so looking at that center of your home as a place to hold your intention. So even if the center of your home is in your kitchen, and what

is the center of your home, though, how do you define that?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Yes, thank you. I meant to talk about that when we were talking about wealth. So go out to the road and look at your home and look at it from where the front door sets. So the architectural front door here in Maine, we have a mud room and a front door. We use the mud room door or the garage door. We rarely use the architectural front door, so, and maybe that's even on the side of the house, and not even from the street, but stand back and look at your house. You can do this on Google Maps. You can do it just standing in your front and just sort of find the center of your home. So divide it into thirds this way, and find the center, and then divide it into thirds this way, and whatever room is in the center is health and wellness, health and well being the Okay, wealth and abundant corner. So if you're standing at your front door, look to the back left. It my baby on screen. It looks like I'm pointing right this. It's backwards all the time. So look to your back left corner, and that is wealth and wealth and abundance. Okay, so that's where you want to bring that nurturing plant in the so

to foster health and wellness and put ourselves in a container that supports that agenda or that dream or that goal. What do we have to be putting in the

Sarah Bird Nelson: space? Yes, so it depends on what room it is and how you do it, but using containers such as baskets and whatnot to keep things tidy is really important here. Keeping things the decluttering piece important for health and well being. Again, it touches every other part of our. Life. The other cure that I like to do, and I learned this from my Feng Shui teacher, is to take a clay bowl, so clay represents Earth, so an earthenware bowl, and it can be any size, size does not matter here, and put it in the center of your home. So it might be on the dining room table, it might be on the kitchen counter, wherever it ends up, tell your family we're not throwing anything in there. And instead, sit with that bowl and put intentions into that bowl, intentions for any area of your life, and let your health, your well being. With this bowl, with Mother Earth, hold those intentions.

You mean, like put them on pieces of paper, and write them down,

Sarah Bird Nelson: and you could, I just and leave them there, mentally, put them in so the bowl, mentally,

you just, you just intentionally put them into the bowl, yeah?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Now, if this is vibey for your family, they could all do it. My family is just like whatever mom. They love what I do, but they don't necessarily get what I do, yeah? So I do it for me, for a family, for what we, you know, we want to go back to Europe and travel. We want to do this. So even, like real intentions like that or I am, I would like to start walking more, put that in the bowl, and that bowl, that container represents the element of Earth, holding us, supporting us. Now, the other part of that is to really get grounded in the energy of that which you desire again that brings in the earth element that grounding, stepping on the grass, stepping in the sand, and feeling the vibration of the Earth, yeah, is just as important. And this is where I start to intertwine that energy of heart into energy of surroundings, that grounding and feeling the earth support you in your desires is just as important as placing an intention in a clay Earth and wearable.

Yes, thank you for that. It is. It is such an important practice to be doing that and getting out and connecting in that way. Oh, Sarah, I could talk to you about this all day long. Ah, I always close every episode with the same question, and I am so excited to hear what you're going to say within the context of the conversation that we have been having about the energy of our beings. For somebody who has a dream in their heart and doesn't feel like they have what it takes to make it happen. What would you say to them?

Sarah Bird Nelson: Being in your presence, being present should be your priority. I love it so that is walking around your home and noticing that is doing what I didn't do in the beginning, and feeling and listening to my body that is following the smallest of breadcrumbs that jewelry gig small breadcrumb that led me to a path that I had NO IDEA was available to me. So presence is your priority.

I love that. And going back to what you were saying about listening, the importance of listening to yourself and others, I mean, that's your superpower, isn't it? It is, yeah, and we can't be present unless we're listening. So, yeah, wow, I love that. Thank you so much for this beautiful conversation. This has been lovely. You can connect with Sarah at Sarah birdnelson com, and I gotta tell you, I am going to go away and walk around my house now and feel the abundance so thank you so much for helping me see. You know, opening my mind to this. It's, it's just, it's just been so interesting. Thank you,

Sarah Bird Nelson: Tess, thank you so much. I'm so grateful that we have connected. Likewise, you.