A season for Feng Shui and getting ready for the harvest and for the stillness of winter.  This is Fall.

Whenever you feel the urge to undergo a cleaning overhaul during this season, especially in this time of COVID, it is undoubtedly a profound connection to and a call from nature. We are after all, intimately intertwined with nature’s cyclical process. Nature’s changing.

We can feel it – we are slowly moving from summer to autumn, cooler nights, some warm days, some cool days, wind and storms snap dead branches and pick off dying leaves, clearing the way for Winter as roots dive deep into the Earth for warmth.

The Feng Shui energy of this season is one of clearing, sorting, releasing, and harvesting. Take a look at it from the farming perspective: in late summer we harvest, sort what we will keep and what we’ll sell, take note of what worked and what didn’t, rotate and ready our fields for the next year’s growing season.

The same goes for our spaces, our bodies, our spirits, and our minds.  The energy of nature rises to grab the sunshine and take it deep into the roots for winter, then leaves fall bringing clarity as the land on the ground to become compost for the next growing season.

Autumn is likely called “Fall” because of the “fall of the leaf,” the clearing Nature does as we glide into winter.  This natural turn of the Earth in response to our distance from the warmth of the sun is what we’ve all adapted to over the last 200,000 years.

In its highest and purest form, good Feng Shui is the delicate alignment between inner and outer worlds, human and nature.

Stagnation in any aspect has the same result: it turns to compost to make space for new life and new growth which is a polite way of saying, stagnation is decay and death. If we adapt to the changes and use the energy of nature that compels us, we thrive more easily.

By changing any one of the mind/body/spirit/space of our lives, we change all the others.  Changing our mind with calm and openness, changing our body with detox with exercise, clean air, water and food and plenty of rest, our spirit with the beauty that brings us joy and our spaces with cleaning and de-cluttering, removing that which no longer serves us and the wisdom of Feng Shui, we will transform our lives.

Here are some time-honored tips to guide you to take full advantage of Nature’s detoxing for Mind/Body/Spirit & Space and get ready for harvest and stillness

(Note: While even sleep is a detoxification of the body, if you are planning to embark on a full-body detox, note that summer and Winter are not the most conducive to a proper detoxing the body on a major scale. Before undertaking any major detoxification, be sure to consult your medical professional.)

Detox Your MIND

We shape our realities through our thinking and subconscious mind.

To cultivate a healthy mind space:

• Take a daily sabbatical from electronics, even just for the few hours before bed, which will give you a deeper sleep, the key to a vibrant day.  (a 30-day electronic detox will amaze you!)
• Tune out the video and audio noise, politics, and stories. They will still be there, guaranteed.
• Use “circadian lighting” which changes as does the sun moving across the sky, warmer color in morning and evening to allow for melatonin production.
• Change the color of your lightbulbs to warm white, using “daylight” or “blue” light only during 10-2 in the daytime.  Otherwise, you signal your body to stop the production of Melatonin and can disrupt your sleep cycle which could lead to weight gain and other worse health issues.
• Meditate

“Meditation” is a social buzz word, with benefits and methods touted far and wide. The many methods available can be difficult and “results” fleeting.  Struggle and effort is counterproductive.  You cannot struggle to get to calm and peace.

“You cannot struggle to get to calm and peace.”  Fawn Chang

My recommendation:  start simply and where you are. You can reach this still, small, intuitive space with one 4-second breath.

• Take just one soft, 4-second breath in and slowly out.
• While doing so, if you can, gently direct your awareness to space in the middle of your head, behind your eyes. Try it now. Did you notice anything happen in your body?
• There, you did it!  That’s how easy it can be.  Build upon that and in no time you will begin to feel the benefits of meditation.

This simple process has enormous benefits for your health. Your senses will become more aware of the Nature around you.  You’ll be able to hear the wind in the leaves, notice the weather within the sky, the sunlight as it changes the colors of our world throughout the day.

Another bonus, when used in conversation or conflict, the people around you will pay more attention, see you as more intelligent, and they will even look different.

Try this each time you become riled, or need to make a decision, or find yourself in an argument. Try this frequently throughout the day, and before bed.

• Every time you remember: pause, stay silent, and breathe for 4 seconds.

That is the beginning. After doing that for a week, your body will be primed for more and you will find it easier and easier to access that silent peace that is always within you.

This will all allow you to make space to listen to the still small voice of your internal guidance.  Doing this you will make space for the parasympathetic rest, restore & create an aspect of our nervous system. You will discover first what your heart truly desires, and the joyful place in which you create the life you’ve been dreaming.

Detox Your BODY

According to an online article by Challenor Acupuncture, 

“[Feng Shui] sees the human being not as separate from nature, but as an interrelated and integral part of it. And like nature, which is harmonious when it is in balance, so too the human body is healthy when it is balanced.”

Fall is a perfect time to reset the intestinal gut flora. Although Spring is the best time for a body detox as the energy on Earth is rising and helping toxins to leave the cells, fall is also a prime season for detoxing the body and cells. (See Note above)

Feng Shui is a small branch of Traditional Chinese Medicine.  Both have known for thousands of years that the gut and the brain are connected and the health of the mind and body depends on the health of the gut.

Eating with the seasons is how we humans lived and evolved over the last 200,000 years. As fall nears we are drawn more to hearty stews, beans, root vegetables all of which flaunt the colors of fall, signaling the nutrients our bodies need to provide strength and internal warmth.

There are many ways to detox the body and the best ways are those that are gentle. Detox symptoms often resemble illness and flu-like feelings of achiness, fever, stiffness, headaches. These are signals you may be detoxifying too quickly.  Remember: life was never meant to be a struggle.

I have tried nearly every detox on the planet and while I am sure that they worked, I didn’t feel a whole lot better.  Remember: Life wasn’t meant to be a struggle and struggle for health works against our brain setpoint and our subconscious programming.  After trying everything, I am now using a simple trio of products called Triplex by Plexus.  The system is easy and gently helps to balance blood sugar, weed out the bad bacteria, and replenishes the good bacteria. It consists of a yummy “pink” drink (colored with beet juice) I mix with 16 oz. of water that helps to balance blood sugar, cut cravings, and reduce cellular inflammation, a Pre- and Pro-biotic capsule called Pro-Bio and the “kick out the bad guys” capsule is called BioCleanse.  I love how my body is responding with clarity of thought, joints, and mind.  If you would like information, reach out to me Fawn@FawnChang.com

Detox Your SPIRIT

 “Spirit lives in matter. All matter. Where else would it live?”

― Mike Carey

Spirit by definition is intangible. What nourishes our spirit changes from moment to moment, day to day, and season to season. It is like the wind and the water (the translation of Feng Shui).

A cluttered or stagnant spirit is the worst of toxins. Stuffed emotions, stagnant voice, not being heard or lack of freedom to follow…you guessed it…your spirit.  Here is where no matter what we look at no longer makes us joyful or feel alive.

The most harmful of spiritual toxins is a toxic relationship.  Many of us stay in stagnant and spirit-drenching relationships past their expiration date for many external reasons: convenience, money, obligation, society, cultural reasons, “a known devil is better than an unknown devil”-sort of thinking.

What is the answer? How do shift where have we allowed ourselves to stop laughing, creating, and having fun? How can we release the demons that plague us from the past and into the present?

Here is a secret:  THE #1 most difficult thing I have encountered with my clients is…drum roll…fear of choosing themselves. Fear of disappointing another, fear of retribution, fear of guilt, blame, shame…darn it.

Most relationships are built from expectations, even if they start with freedom, at some point the old subconscious programs of our childhood and upbringing begin to run the show and kill our spirit.  We run around in circles of the past.

What’s the answer? Get curious, be open to what’s actually going on in front of you, choose the 4-second breath, use a disrupter to change your focus.  I just learned a 4-sentence way* to reprogram those subconscious programs that are sabotaging your spirit.  The habits we have formed are stored in our brain and this may be an advanced move but I think you can do it.  It requires you to realize that you are the thinker of the thoughts, not the thoughts.  This helps you get to the 35,000 ft view of what’s going on, rather than down in the weeds of the old programmed habitual ways of behavior.

When you begin to feel the uncomfortable habitual thought-pattern:

• Notice it.
• Say to yourself:
  • This is just the habit mind, this is not me.
  • This is just the habit voice, this is not me.
  • I dismiss the habit voice and urge NOW
  • I move my attention

I have been teaching this “distractor” method for years, have a few thoughts of happiness, joy, etc. cued up for these times.  When you move your attention, move it to something peaceful, joyful, happy, laughter inspiring, but MOVE IT!  This process halts the “machine” of the habit that was installed due to your perceived need for survival, blending into the surroundings, or a zillion other things.

Once halted, you will have more freedom in your mind, body, and spirit to be who you truly “Be.”  Isn’t that all we really want?  To be free to be who we are, and loved for just that?

Other “tools” to detox your spirit in the face of toxic relationships or events that drain your spirit:

• Shift your focus from the rabbit hole of the story of right and wrong, and look again at rich layers of color and texture melding and separating in an abstract portrait, engage body senses to distract you back to lightness of spirit: caress the fine texture of your favorite journal and start to write all these mundane and unscheduled joys.
• Take a pause and ask the Heavens, “What else is possible?” or “Help me to see this differently.” I have found that these two questions, paired with the 4-second breath, allow something in the intangible space between two people to shift, open up and an unexpected lightness can occur.
• Seek something that does uplift your spirit: it’s always around, the variegated colors of a leaf or flower, the scent of your favorite perfume, laughter, silliness, birdsong, beauty wherever you can find it or plant it.

These little things may SEEM nothing but ARE in the truth of the fabric of spirit itself. By attention to beauty, we shift ourselves into the state of higher immunity and vibrant health is by embracing their uncharted beauty can you finally cleanse your soul.

Detox Your SPACES

The Feng Shui energy of this season is one of clearing, sorting, and harvesting.

In my experience, the biggest block to my clients’ when doing a Feng Shui clearing is the reluctance to choose “self” first.  What that means is getting aligned with the way you want to live and releasing all that doesn’t match or serve that.  Then making the choice to let go, without regret, without fear, and without the guilt of placing someone else’s wishes in place of yours.

Truly this is the hardest part. The most injurious of all toxins is a toxic relationship, one that would fold you into origami to make the “other” happy rather than be true to your heart and life.  Toxic relationships come in all forms, and the simple sneaky ones are those that we believe have “expectations” of us.  Notice how I said that, “we believe” have expectations.  Usually, a quick decision is all that’s needed. Those who truly love you will honor your wishes for how your spaces need to look to foster your happy life.

Once your spaces align with you, you will sail into the happiness, health, and wealth and then see how many friends come around because you are showing up as YOU!

In this season, thorough cleaning and clearing is the best way to be ready for the harvest and snuggle into Winter’s magic.

1. Start fast (Marie Kondo’s method) or start slowly by clearing and cleaning a drawer that you use every day. It could be in your kitchen, a drawer for your undergarments, even socks. When you see this cleaned little space, it will surprise you and inspire you to do more. Clear out everything that is broken or damaged and not beautiful. Clean the drawer itself, return only what you love, what matches, and what you need. Release that which does not make you happy saying, “I release you.”  Let it go knowing that you have made the right choice and that what you need will show up for you in just the perfect way when you need it.
2. Bring fresh air and daylight into your room by cleaning your mirrors and windows. This does not only creates a cleaner appearance for your space but also avoids stagnation where negativity can metaphorically foster.
3. Clean air filters and drains.
4. Freshen up with Paint. Make it fresh.  In many parts of the world, the whole house gets a new painting and color scheme ready for the Winter Holidays.

6. Allow at least 1/4 of the space to be open and available. 1/4 of the bookshelf, closet, filing cabinets, or drawers. This creates ease of flow and invites more goodness into your life as you are preempting a welcoming for future possessions. Nature abhors a vacuum, so create the space for “nature” to fill it with what you want:  more clients, more space, a new romance.  (Join me for Romancing the Home Webinar to learn how to call in your beloved.)
7. Be sure your metal objects work perfectly (scissors, knives are sharp, car is in order).   Because we create that which we see, Feng Shui recommends that you do not display knives or swords unless you want to create the energy of conflict or sharpness.
8. Bring warmth and life into your home, avoid “dead” branches and plants for longer than a few days. Décor of Autumn colors warm the body as the sunshine wanes. Yellows (Earth energy) ground us and bring comfort and gathering, inspire proper digestion of food, ideas, and relationships.  Red and oranges (Fire energy bring warmth (bodies perceive spaces to be 3-7 degrees warmer in these “warm” colors).  Plenty of rich light brings clarity to our mind/body/spirit and spaces.

Join me at FawnShui.com where I show you how to arrange your spaces to create a home for beauty. I teach the power of the easy and simple, how to grace your world and relationships with the power of your own beautiful indomitable spirit…and I also share all I have learned in my own world studies of Mind/ Body/Spirit and Space and the intricate connections.

Discover how to transform your life, learn more about how to integrate feng shui and the body’s idea of beauty in the design of your spaces for a harmonious lifestyle in the modern context. Join our Facebook Page where we can help you understand how to nudge your spaces in the divine direction. Post photos and ask questions to gain insights on the simple shifts you can make.

Go to FawnShui.com where you’ll easily transform your spaces to transform your life.