Creating Sanctuary

November 22, 2009

Using universal techniques from Feng Shui, Vasstu and Intuition
to create space you will love to live in.

In architecture school we studied the creation of space. It was a balancing act between the loud cries of structural engineers, mechanical/electrical/plumbing engineers, contractors and owners to bring something beautiful together that met everyone’s needs.

In the days after completing my master’s degree, which was largely a study of historic buildings in the Eastern U.S. and Europe, I determined that I wanted to really understand “sacred space.� From the construction of the Ziggurats of Mesopotamia to the missions in Latin America, to Feng Shui and Vasstu (a Hindu tradition of space design to promote harmony) from the ancient Orient, I wanted to learn how “sacred� was defined in architectural language.

What I discovered was that, like religions—many of which share some basic tenets—the creation of sacred space in just about every culture involves a simple set of ideals that everybody can use to create space. This somehow allows us to become the beings we are destined—and hopefully, determined—to be.

The key ingredients:

Clearing
What you collect in your clutter-drawer, your closets and your beliefs represents what stands between you and your real self. Only clearing out what is no longer needed can clear the way for new things to become. The challenge comes in remembering the difference between WANT and NEED.

Before you start “making,� you have to “unmake� what you no longer need. Sit with your space, feel what’s not right, take it away. Gift it to someone who will love and cherish it, sell it, donate it—but don’t put it in a box to deal with later. To put something off until later just means you have issues you are choosing to repress.

Inside of your space and yourself, in every nook and cranny, if it doesn’t serve you, be rid of it. Think about why you kept it past its time of usefulness. It is likely that you will see a pattern that develops. This pattern will help you identify what you want to change about yourself, on the inside, which is ultimately the reason why we do this exercise.

Intention
It is vital that when you begin to create space around you, you understand how you want to use that space.

Will it be:

Ceremonial? (Often, entries and dining rooms.)

Comfortable? (Usually bedrooms, living rooms, and patios.)

Functional? (Kitchens, laundries, garages, guest bathrooms, guest bedrooms.)

What do you want to come from your effort of creating the space? Will it be the perfect room for romance? An art studio? Do you want to feel less compressed?

Then, determine in which of these rooms you most need to create a space that “sings� for you. This space needs to take priority over all others.

Start thinking about what you’d really like to see there. Begin going to garage sales, flea markets, stores that you LOVE, and fill that space with things that inspire you. Do layaway if you need extra time. Just set your intentions and DO IT.

You will find that it will start growing without your input, just from the energy you used to create your intentions.

Once you have that room done, determine which one should be next. Work down the list. Multitask and do multiple rooms if you are fired up. Listen to your needs and try with all your heart to fulfill these desires.

Secondly, clean it. From tip to toe. If there is anything bugging you about it, fix it. That light bulb has been burned out for a year—that’s long enough, change it. Set your intentions to create a “flow.� Then manage it so you keep the flow always moving.

Detachment
We normally live a life that has cause and effect relationships. Our emotions sometimes get negatively aroused by an object that reminds us—even if only subconsciously—of something that was painful; for example, you have a chair around that belonged to your spouse prior to the divorce. We can use this understanding to clear and create an environment that we really want to be in.

What I have learned about these relationships is that the most amazing things happen when we want “for the best� rather than for a specific outcome. Like prayer, we attempt to ask not “for my mom to be cured of cancer,� but rather “for my mother to accept with ease and grace, the lesson of her sickness, so she can be healed with as little pain and suffering as possible.� This leaves the doors open for real miracles, because it is not presumed that the outcome you were assuming is best, actually is.

But What About the “Rules�?
Ask a Feng Shui master in Black Hat Sect, Compass School, Nine Gates, or a Vasstu practitioner what to do about your bad romance luck, and you are going to get four different answers. Likely, you’ll get as many different answers as there are divisions within the practices. Each practice has its own “fixes,� which are strategies employed to alter the energy flow within a space toward a desired outcome. Why? Because historically, these studies were done within specific politico-social-ecosystems.

For instance, the predominant winds in Taos may come from a different direction that the predominant winds in a mountain village in Mongolia, which means the people living in these places will associate different cardinal directions with the element of wind. Also, emperors, fighters, merchants and peasants all had access to different levels of education and medical knowledge. So, what an emperor could intellectually process and afford as far as fixes was vastly different than the farmers in the regions the emperor controlled. What became clear, in every caste, was that the local witch-doctors, shamans and healers found local and indigenous plants, elixirs, stones and the like, that seemed to solve problems within their specific system. Thusly, these traditions got passed down within each “tribe.� Though the fixes are different in two locations, they still work.

What’s this Mean to You?
You can pick the system within which you want to work. As long as you set your INTENTIONS, have DETACHMENT, and are CLEAR, you yourself can heal what ails you.

Think about painting the living room purple if that’s what you’ve wanted to do for forever. There is a reason you want it, and you may not even know it. Then, when you do it, watch what happens and document it. This will tell you what the doing of it means. What purple means. What living in a purple room means. What changes? What doesn’t?

Pick a practice, buy a book, try some of the remedies. What color represents water to you? Is it green instead of blue? Fine. If the book says put blue there, you put green there. Because it has to matter to YOU. Every time you look at the “remedy,� think of what you are calling in by putting it out there and acknowledge it.

Then watch what happens.

Trust in your inner voice—there is a reason why it tells you to do these weird things sometimes, to take a chance on something invisible that you want to believe in. You want to believe you can change your destiny. You can only change it if you try, believing you can.

I can implement many of the traditional forms of Feng Shui, Vasstu, Native American shamanic fixes, sacred geometry…that’s my job. What I want is to give you the tools to heal your own space and know that you can adjust it anytime you want. All you have to do is make up your mind and feed the idea of change. Then be open and available.

Rachel Preston is an architectural designer whose focus is on technology-free green design, historic preservation and creating spaces of sanctuary. You can email her at intentiondesign@gmail.com or visit her website, archinia.com.