How to Feng Shui: Create an Altar, Your Sacred Space - Part II

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

An intention to increase the vibration of your life and the planet

Step 1

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Just a few things to mention as we begin.

Know where your altar items are from. This is not a good place for thrift store bargins – you do not know about the energy impressed on an object (no matter how perfect it looks). It is your desire to build a Sacred Space with energetically-sound inspirational objects. You have no way of knowing if the thrift store item is there because it is connected to a very sad story or if the giver just did not like it.

If you use cut flowers on your altar, please change the water every day and remove the flowers after three days – regardless of how they look. You may pull the fading flowers from the bouquet and place the rest in a vase in another part of your home. Consider altar-worthy silk flowers.

Clean. Feng Shui likes clean, as do Sacred Spaces. If the item is washable, do. If it is not, try placing it outside in sunlight for a few hours – that will energetically clean it. If an item is too fragile for the heat of the sun, placing it in salt will serve to clean an altar-bound treasure also. Once your Sacred Space is arranged (for now) remember to occasionally clean and dust the items.

Be flexible with the items you choose. It is very OK to like an item today and feel nothing around it in a couple of months. It is OK to alter your altar!

You do not need to have an item in each and every life area of your Sacred Space. Begin to set up your altar once you have one item, one object can an altar make.

Ready? Yes, we are.

Using the Feng Shui Bagua (morphed into a three-by-three grid) we locate the nine life areas to determine how to place objects on the altar. This is easy. (Keep reading – you have made it this far!). I will walk you through it, easy step after easy step.

Each step that you read in this article will have to do with a different life area. I’ll list for you the particular life area, the number associated with that area, the element, the colors that most strongly resonate with that life energy, and the location within the 3X3 grid. Also I will make some suggestions for possible objects you may want to place just to give an idea to get you started. For a greater explanation of the life areas visit How to Feng Shui: Nine Life Areas (see Resources below).

Set an intention to read this for fun knowing that if it is of value to you, you may come back and read it again.
Step 2

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Fame and Reputation, the number is One, Fire is the element, and Red the color (center back of 3X3 grid). This is the area about Self – think One and up. A feather, balloon, hot-air balloon, bird, butterfly, airplane, volcano, pyramid, red candle, your power animal are all possibilities for altar objects. You may use a real ‘whatever’, an image of one, or a three-dimensional representation of one.
Step 3

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Relationship; the number is Two; Earth is the element; Red, Pink, and White are the colors (back right corner of 3X3 grid). In this area remember to use two of whatever you choose. Two birds (more like doves, less like vultures), to red/pink/white candles, ceramic hearts, stones, chocolate Kisses.
Step 4

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Children and Creativity, the number is Three, Metal is the element, White and metal (gold, silver, bronze, copper, etc.) are the colors (center right of 3X3 grid). Photos of children in your life in metal or white frames; if you are a writer, three sharp pencils; if you are a musician a three-dimensional note or a likeness of your instrument. An item resonating with what you do in a creative sense or what you would like to do.
Step 5

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Family, the number is Four, Wood is the element, Green is the color (center left of 3X3 grid). An image of a tree or four trees (lush, and healthy – not autumn, wintery; or Bonsai, please); images of family in wooden frames; four Lucky Bamboo stems; cut flowers; a small wooden house.
Step 6

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Helpful People and Travel, the number is Five, Metal is the element, Grey and silver are the colors (front right corner of 3X3 grid). A small silver box with the names of your helpful people – those who support you on any/every level. A small globe of the world, a map of the country you plan to visit, a bell to ring. An image of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., the Dalai Lama, or whoever you know to be a helpful person to your life.
Step 7

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Career, the number is Six, Water is the element, Black and Dark Blue are the colors (center front of 3X3 grid). A fountain with the flow toward the center of your Sacred Space. Octagon or irregularly shaped mirrors, an image of flowing water, a memento (or six) of your career, flowy black or dark blue fabric.
Step 8

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Skills, Knowledge, and Wisdom; the number is Seven; the element is Earth; and the color is Blue (front left corner of 3X3 grid). This is the section of an altar for a deity, god, or spiritual leader – image or three-dimensional: Buddha, Jesus, Mary, Quan Yin, Ganesh, Gaia, Lakshmi – use images that have religious or spiritual meaning for you. A Christian cross or Tibetan prayer flags. Placement here of an inspiring book is supportive.
Step 9

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Abundance and Prosperity, eight is the number, the element is Wood, and the colors are Red, Purple, Green, and Gold (back left corner of 3X3 grid). Another good section of your altar for a fountain – flow of water toward the center of your Sacred Space. Add something to your altar here that makes you feel abundant – a bit of jewelry, a piece of amethyst, a gold nugget, image of a redwood tree or a forest. I have a gold sign that reads ‘Joy’. Think big.
Step 10

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Health, Nine is the number, the element is Earth, and the colors are Earthy (yellow, orange, brown, rust, etc.) (center of 3X3 grid). An item resonating with your exercise program; fruits and veggies from the miniature aisle of your neighborhood craft store, nine pebbles, write a clean-bill-of-health for yourSelf. Consider your physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual health.
Step 11

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As you go about collecting and placing objects on your altar to create your Sacred Space remember to set your intention for that which you wish to get closer to in your life and for what is realized in your life now that you are grateful for. Your intention, your thought is where the power is. Where thought goes, energy flows.

In gratitude and with an intention to serve.