Decorating your home for Halloween can lift the spirits during the spooky season. However, a feng shui expert has warned that the gloomy additions to your home may be getting you down.
Suzanne Roynon, an expert in the ancient Chinese practice of feng shui, believes that how you decorate your home can impact your emotions, health, wealth, wisdom, and well-being. Here she has shared the Halloween decorating faux pas that may be affecting your mood.
So if you’ve been feeling teary, emotional, or generally stuck in life after hanging up those ghostly decorations, you may have poor feng shui in your home, Suzanne claims. Orange candles, black decorations, and clutter under your bed are key culprits, she says.
Feng shui expert’s tips for decorating at Halloween
1. Stay clear of black coloured decorations
This advice particularly applies if you have been very teary or have had high emotions, Suzanne says. In Feng Shui, black isn’t considered a colour and is, instead, seen as the absence of light. The colour should, therefore, be used in moderation when picking Halloween decorations for your home.
Suzanne, who has partnered with MattressNextDay to carry out this research, says: “In traditional Feng Shui, the deep, dark colours - black included - are regarded as representing water energy and ‘too much water’ can trigger high levels of emotion, tears, and tantrums. It also extinguishes fire and vibrancy so long-term use encourages dark feelings and low mood which may result in anxiety, depression or overwhelm.
“I’d, therefore, recommend using black and other very dark colours with extreme care. Especially in rooms where you spend a lot of time.”
2. Restrict your use of orange-coloured candles
Too many orange candles can impact your mood and stress levels, says Suzanne. Displaying candles throughout your home can bring in the energy of purification, protection, and inspiration. As the candles are burned, they naturally help us relax as they slowly burn up stress and give us soothing energy.
When picking autumnal or Halloween-themed candles, you may head straight for the orange-coloured ones, however, Suzanne has a word of warning – “Filling your home with fiery energy from an orange-coloured candle, for any length of time can have a detrimental impact on mood, anger, stress levels and ultimately lead to burn out and exhaustion.
“By all means, incorporate orange candles for one night, but please don’t use them for more than a couple of days. Unless that area of your home needs a permanent fire Feng Shui remedy.”
3. Decorate your front door, but AVOID dried flowers
When decorating your home, place special emphasis on your front door as this can send positive energy to future guests, Suzanne says. Naturally, this is one of the first things a guest sees when they visit your home, so it’s a great way to help create positive energy from the get-go, the expert adds. She advises adding a gorgeous autumnal wreath or placing a Halloween-themed doormat down.
Suzanne explains: “Creating a welcoming and beautiful entrance to a home is excellent Feng Shui, although I’m always wary of using dried flowers anywhere in a home. This is because they represent dead energy and tend to create stagnation and spiders around them.
“If you’re creating an autumn-themed wreath, try to incorporate symbols of new growth like berries and acorns. This emphasises positivity and rebirth rather than decline.”
4. Use pumpkin lanterns and tea lights to ward off ghosts
Light is one of the most integral components of Feng Shui, due to it impacting how a room feels, Suzanne explains. She adds that Halloween is the perfect opportunity to become playful by placing pumpkin-shaped lanterns and Halloween-themed tea lights around your home.
Bright lights bring ‘yang’ or masculine energy into a home and ward off the dark ‘yin’ forces which, around the time of Halloween, would traditionally include the ghosts and spirits of the dead, Suzanne explains.
5. Never place a mirror opposite your bed
Many Feng Shui experts , including Suzanne, believe that a mirror facing your bed can bring you nightmares, as well as encouraging infidelity, and insomnia. Suzanne explains that it is said that when a person sleeps at night, their soul leaves their body. So when it is greeted by its reflection, it is shocked and subconsciously this can cause bad dreams and nightmares, she adds.
The Feng Shui lore states that placing a mirror opposite your bed can cause both insomnia and increase the risk of infidelity, according to the expert. She says this is because a mirror doubles and bounces the energy in a room, disrupting your inner tranquillity which is essential for a good night’s sleep and may also invite the energy of a third person into your relationship.
Suzanne says that bedroom mirrors should be placed so that you can’t see into it from the bed. She advises using a mirror to reflect your window if you have an attractive view so that harmonious and positive energy is invited into your space.
6. Declutter under your bed
Feeling stuck in life, missing an ex-partner, or struggling to relax? Suzanne advises you to declutter things from under your bed. She believes that the items you have stored under your bed can affect you while you’re asleep in a passive ‘yin’ state as the items may represent or create subconscious blocks in your life.
Suzanne shared some examples: “Letters or cards from your ex-partner will keep you stuck in your current relationship status. Filing and tech [under your bed] will stop your mind from relaxing.
“Luggage might keep you on the go and home can never quite feel like ‘home’. Shoes can leave you feeling restless as your subconscious is continuously moving.
“Ideally, it’s best to keep the space underneath a bed completely clear, but under-bed storage is often essential in today’s homes. With that in mind, only use this area of your home for spare bedding, towels and out-of-season clothes to minimise the impact on your sleep and well-being.”
What is feng shui?
Feng shui expert Suzanne says: “Western Feng Shui is an ‘off the peg’ version which invites energy through a front door. The traditional compass method creates a bespoke plan unique to a house or apartment to identify areas of positive and negative energy, fine-tuning the ‘chi’ or ‘life force’ to support the occupants.
“With this knowledge, specific remedies can be placed to bring balance and harmony to the home and invite improved health, wealth, wisdom, and well-being as well as happier relationships with family, friends and significant others. With Feng Shui, the focus is to promote positive energy within and surrounding a house while clearing any negative energy which can make life difficult for the occupants.
“It makes sense to avoid inviting bad vibes into any home and if they happen to creep in, to ensure the unpleasant energy doesn’t hang around after the Halloween celebrations.”
