I have a love-hate relationship with January.
I love how the new year inspires me to eat healthier foods, rededicate myself to more exercise, and clean out the seasonal clutter from my house. But I hate getting back in a routine after nesting time with my youngest daughter home from college for the holidays.
Worse is the arrival of the credit card and tax bills (a real buzz kill), especially after my “fun shop to drop” behavior that began on Black Friday and didn’t end until my oldest daughter’s birthday on Jan. 3.
With all the Williams-Sonoma Peppermint Bark and red and green peanut M&M’s now gone, the hardest part was reorganizing my house for the new year.
After throwing out empty present boxes and used wrapping paper, exchanging gifts that didn’t fit, and tossing mismatched leftover containers, I was inspired to take a look at my entire home environment.
I wanted to get things back into balance and humming as I entered 2016.
My go-to person to help harmonize my home and my life is Shawne Mitchell. We first met when our children were in elementary school together and she was selling real estate. Via the 93018-girlfriend grapevine, I knew she had become adept at the ancient practice of feng shui as well as helping people align their lives and lifestyles.
She honed her skills over many years of studying consciousness, contemplative practices, spiritual psychology, sacred space and the world’s wisdom traditions. Today she consults, speaks, writes and facilitates workshops.
Years ago, I had read her books — Simple Feng Shui, which focused on manipulating your physical environment to help achieve changes in your life, and Home Sanctuaries: Creating Sacred Spaces, Altars and Shrines with Feng Shui. I liked that you didn’t have to believe in feng shui for it to work its magic.
When I moved into my new home three years ago, I tried to incorporate some of her suggested principals of feng shui — such as the direction of my bed to the door, wall colors, plants and flowers, and artifacts depicting love. Still, I felt I needed a professional brush up.
On a recent afternoon, Mitchell stopped by at my Summerland home for a cup of herbal tea and a tour. Before she suggested any changes, I asked her to refresh me about her journey into introducing spirituality and conscious living into people’s lives.
“Even though I knew nothing about feng shui, as a Realtor I had always been able to sense the subtle energy in a house,” she explained. “Like a tuning fork, I would respond to the emotional undercurrents in the places I went, knowing intuitively whether the inhabitants were happy, sad, loving or angry.
“Over my 25 years in real estate I visited literally thousands of properties, and understood that I was affected by intangible, as well as aesthetic considerations. Similarly, people coming to my home often said, ‘Wow! Your home feels so good!’ I began mulling it over: What is it that makes it feel a certain way?”
At a lecture by Thomas Moore, author of Care of the Soul, she found her answer.
“People endow their home with an energetic signature,” she told Noozhawk.
The insight she discovered was “the permission” to start advising her clients about specific ways to find and create homes that would both please their senses and nourish their souls. They loved it, and her business, Soul Style, expanded in new directions.
Mitchell studied the Black Hat Sect School of Feng Shui, which is based on Tibetan Tantric Buddhism. She traveled the world, conducting her own research on the historical significance of sacred spaces, shrines and altars.
Raised a Catholic, she incorporated what she learned of Hinduism and Zen Buddhism, along with her experiences as a student of Transcendental Meditation and of the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda, into her expanding perspective on home psychology and design.
Gradually, a specific vocabulary developed around her practice. According to Mitchell, Soul Style elements include your home psychology, simplicity and clearing, balance and harmony, Mother Nature, treasures of the heart, enchantments and rituals and celebrations.
As we walked into each room, Mitchell took mental notes. We then discussed how feng shui recognizes that everything is a combination of five elements found in nature: wood, fire, earth, metal and water.
Each element represents specific attributes of chi, or energy, such as color, shape, direction and mood. Mitchell’s job is to help a client balance the five elements in a home. In feng shui, balance creates harmony health and clarity. By transforming your home into a sacred space, you transform your life.
Another important element of putting your home and life into balance is how the world falls into two archetypal categories of yin and yang.
Feng shui attempts to duplicate divine balance in our homes by energizing the yin and yang qualities. Balancing the qualities of the feminine (yin) and the masculine (yang) in your sacred space is one of the keys to enhancing feng shui energy.
Combining attributes from both sides of the polarity usually does this, however. When you want to create a space to complement a specific purpose you can place more yin or more yang energy into it.
Since Mitchell’s visit, I have reread her books and re-evaluated my home based on her observations. I’ve added elements where I felt they were needed for more serenity and balance, and removed those elements that were not adding to my life.
The important takeaway was to realize how we imprint our environment with negative or positive elements, and the connection to nature and to others and ourselves.
“Clearing of unnecessary physical clutter is freeing — emotionally, mentally and spiritually,” said my friend, Carla Tomson, an artist and mom supreme.
“Letting go of clutter that is no longer needed moves energy that needs to flow.”
Mitchell works part time as the marketing director at La Casa de Maria Retreat & Conference Center in Montecito, and blogs for The Huffington Post on contemplative practices.
At 2:30 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 24, she’s facilitating a lecture, “Mindfulness vs. Mind Wandering: Portal to Focus-Portal to Imagination,” with UC Santa Barbara psychological and brain sciences professor Jonathan Schooler at La Casa de Maria, 800 El Bosque Road. Click here for more information.
Click here for more information about Shawne Mitchell and Soul Style, or contact Mitchell at shawne@soulstyle.com or 805.689.1953.
— Judy Foreman is a Noozhawk columnist and longtime local writer and lifestyles observer. She can be contacted at judyforeman@noozhawk.com. Click here for previous columns. The opinions expressed are her own.