Room-by-Room Series: The Living Room

We kick off our room-by-room Feng Shu and turn the living room into a magnet for connection with simple layout choices, better storage, and clear visual boundaries. Practical steps help you hide work, calm toy overflow, and choose art and photos that lift the mood.

• why living rooms shape family connection and flow
• balancing multi‑use roles with visual closure
• right‑sizing furniture and clearing circulation routes
• circular seating, command position and soft textures
• lighting dark corners and using mirrors with intention
• storage that calms, toy rotation and nightly resets
• choosing photos and art that support togetherness
• gentle reminders to keep clutter light for easier rest

Check out my reels this week on Instagram to see my living room layout and join my mailing list for the extra bonus tips I’m sending out

@everyday_feng_shui

www.everydayfengshui.co.uk

Lots of love,

Speak soon,

Rachael xx

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hello@everydayfengshui

@everyday_feng_shui

www.everydayfengshui.co.uk

Transcript

Welcome & Series Kickoff

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hey, I'm Rachel. You could say I'm a modern day Feng Shui consultant here to help you transform your home into a space that truly supports and uplifts you. My passion is showing you how to work with your home to unlock its full potential. I'm here to show you how to tap into the power that your home holds and make this powerful practice simple, accessible, and something everyone can use. Hello and welcome back to the Everyday Feng Shui podcast.

Why Living Rooms Matter for Connection

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Today I'm going to be talking to you about um the beginning of a new series which is going to be Feng Shui room by room, and today we are starting with the living room. So if you follow me over on Instagram, you will have seen that I've been dropping some um living room feng shui tips into my um Instagram reels this week, and I'm going to be doing that for the next few weeks, and we're going to cover things like the living room, the kitchen, the bedrooms. I'll do one on children's nurseries, and we'll talk about hallway, so all the different kinds of rooms of your home. So we've done the areas in previous weeks, so you know, your north area, your east area, and what they all represent, and what to do in those spaces. And now we're actually going to go into the specifics of the rooms so that you can combine the two things together and um and really know how to kind of supercharge those spaces in your home. I'm really sorry for the croakiness of my voice if you can hear that. We have had the new term germs in our home at the moment. Um, thank you to three children returning to school. Um, but bear with me with my voice and we will get to the living room. Now, if you think about the energy of a living room, what are they designed to do? They're designed to be a place of coming together, a place of connection, it is where exactly as the name says, is where people are supposed to spend most of the time that they when they are in their in their homes, and that is usually people together is where people connect, and we really want that space to reflect the that togetherness. We want to kind of um not only do we want to support that the energy of the room as it is designed, we actually want it to magnetise that as well. We want it to pull that energy in, we want you to want to spend time in there with your family, and we want your family to want to spend time in there with you, and we do that in a number of ways.

Too Many Roles, Not Enough Flow

SPEAKER_00 2:48

So the biggest thing with a living room, it can be so easy to overfill the room. It's kind of you know, um, maybe you're somebody who wants their children to spend most of their play time down in that communal space, and they don't therefore have too many toys up in their bedrooms. That's certainly true in our house. We have fewer things, or certainly did when they were younger. Um, you know, we would have the main toys downstairs in our living room because we wanted them to play and be down with us, and then obviously, you've got furniture, enough furniture for everybody is really important so that nobody ever feels like they don't fit because not only is that just generally not a very nice um feeding, it also kind of energetically makes somebody feel like they're left out and not wanted. So making sure that there is enough seating for everybody in your home, even if it's you know, even if it's bean bags and stuff, that they're cozy, they're lovely. Um, but making sure that there is somewhere for everybody who lives in the home is really important. So balancing that with not overfilling that space is really, really important. Again, I say this knowing that you know we're living through this phase of life at the moment where you may have your children's toys down there, you have obviously gonna have your sofa, most people have got a TV, you may have your working from home space in there, you may have um it might be your workout space. I mean, our living rooms potentially fulfill a huge number of different roles, and if you feel like your family are a little bit disconnected at the moment, then the first place I would be looking would be your living room to see if we can resolve some of that in that space. So look at how many different hats is your living room wearing. Is it a toy room? Is it a playroom? Is it your actual um relaxation space? Is it your gym? Is it your workspace? So really look at what's in there and just have a think about how that is filling that space. So let's go into practicalities of that because we cannot avoid the fact that we need somewhere to work, we cannot avoid the fact that we our children have toys. Um, so practical elements

Hiding Work and Multi‑Use Zones

SPEAKER_00 5:19

of that. If you have got to have a workspace in your living room, try and put it somewhere where it's not being seen, it's not like the centre focus of the room. So we want to try and I was gonna say hide it, but we don't want to hide it, we just want to make sure it is tucked away and out of the way so that when you are in that relaxation space, you're not, you know, you haven't got work watching you. If you are in a position to be able to put computer monitors or laptops away in drawers and end up at the end of the day with a relatively clear desk in that area, a hundred percent do that. Um I've talked about this many many times in many different forms, one of them being about um putting away children's school uniforms at the end of the day so that they you know there's that clear define between work and home or school and home, so that the thing that may be causing you a little bit of stress in your life is not you know this this constant overarching being watched from it. If you can't um put your things away, you can buy uh relatively cheaply actually, room dividers and room screens, which would be an amazing, amazing they can be really beautifully decorated actually. Um amazing choice for anybody who has got you know a room that does multiple different things, and it may be that you've got a treadmill in there that's really important for you and your health, and that is something that you don't want to move from your living space, but you could put the treadmill up and put it behind a screen, for example, or if you have got a workspace, you could put your workspace behind a screen. They can be concertina so that when you're actually working, you don't have to sit behind the screen, you can put the screen away, and the screen only comes up at the end of your work day when you are ready to switch off and go into your next part of your life, which is in you know, you want to use your room for your living room rather than your workspace. So it's really important to try and find that balance between all of the different hats that that room uses.

Space, Scale, and Furniture Choices

SPEAKER_00 7:31

In that, we also want to make sure that we are not cramming our living rooms full of too many things. It needs to be a room that has got space for the energy to flow around it. It's really important. These rooms are holding, you know, our bedrooms mainly contain the energy of us as individuals, so they don't have to work as hard, but a kitchen and a living room, such a communal space that that area has got to be able to circulate that energy really, really smoothly. It's really important. So, again, think about your furniture. Is there too much in there? Have you got too much seating? Have you got too many tables? Have you got does it all just feel a bit like can't fit through must squeeze to get through that gap? Or you know, there needs to be space, and again, I say this knowing that you know a lot of you here that listen to me are in the UK. We do not have the biggest homes in the world. This is not what the UK is known for, and especially now, anybody living in these new built homes, um, you know, they are built small, and there's no there's no getting away from that. You can't help the size of the room that you've got, but just think when you're replacing your furniture or you're thinking about your furniture, make a choice on your furniture based on what space is available rather than getting the biggest of the things because what you're gonna end up doing is filling that space so much that it's already energetically bursting at the seams. You know, if you walk in and feel like all of this furniture is imposing, that is going to shift the energy in the room. You still want that room to feel like there is space and there is light and there is you know this this beautiful kind of high-level effervescent kind of energy rather than feeling like bogged down by what's in there. So, again, practically, how can we how can we make that work? No, you don't need to go out and buy new furniture. Oh my goodness gracious me, you don't need to do that. But maybe you have got one chair that nobody ever uses. Maybe you have I mean this this is the exact situation that we actually used to have. We used to have a big sofa and two chairs, um, and they were big chairs, and nobody sat on nobody sat on the chairs, even if it was all of us, and we would cram onto the sofa, nobody used the chairs. So, actually get rid of put on Facebook Marketplace, sell anything that furniture that people don't use, don't keep it, make allow that space, and it's not gonna make a difference if people don't use it anyway, right? So grab yourself a few extra pennies from selling a chair that isn't used by by people, um you know, children's toys. We live in this culture at the moment

Toy Overflow and Rotation

SPEAKER_00 10:24

whereby there is just an abundance. Children these days have so much stuff, and there is a huge amount of evidence out there that actually says that children that have too many toys won't play with any because they get so overwhelmed. Um, and it's really difficult balance, isn't it? Because you don't want you know, you see all these amazing things that are marketed, and you're like, Oh, my children would love this, and they'd love that, and you end up with this house and this room that is just overflowing with things, and maybe you're not at a point whereby you feel that you can get rid of anything, and again, that is fine, there is no judgment coming from me, but maybe you need to consider boxing some of their toys away and putting them into a rotation. Another really lovely thing to do is if you do box some of them away in the evening when the children are in bed and you may have good you know half an hour to yourself, and again, this is something that I'll even like to do now is I'll put something out on the coffee table that is that we haven't looked at for a while, so that when they come down in the morning, there's this like a new thing, it's excitement, and it gives them something new and exciting to do um in the mornings. So we've talked about not making the room overwhelmed with too much or too big furniture, we've talked about trying to balance the um the uses of the room and kind of closing off uh areas that are to do with specific things that are not the coming together, so closing off the workspaces or the gym spaces.

Seating Layouts and Command Position

SPEAKER_00 12:04

So now we will have a look at um how we arrange that room. So if we're wanting to create um spaces that are inviting for connection and conversation, then kind of circular shapes is what we're looking for. And so your furniture and your seating, try and arrange that in a way whereby people aren't directly facing each other. We want them to be kind of in a rounded shape. Um, chairs rather than being next to each other or opposite each other, angle them just slightly um next to each other, but then slightly so that your feet would make a triangle. And that's a really lovely way to kind of invite that connective energy. The other thing to do with your seating is to think about how many of those sort of main seating areas can see the door. So this is a theory that we use in most rooms, including the bedroom as well. Um, and it's about the command position. So the theory is that if we have our back to the door, then our guard will always be up because we can't really see what's coming at us. So a way to make people feel more relaxed in your living room and relaxed in your space is by making sure that as many people as possible and as many of those seating positions as possible have a view of the door. Now, in my own living room, um we actually have got a corner sofa and it's halfway down the room, so I've got a really long living room, and to try and section that up to make it more cozy, we've got a corner sofa that is positioned at the bottom end of the room. So there is a seat on that sofa that that person's back, if they sit there, is towards with with their back to the door. Now, funnily enough, it is the one seat on that sofa that nobody gravitates to. So it's a really interesting um, well, I find it interesting anyway. It's interesting theory, but we've done it like that to try and create different zones within our living room, and actually it works really nicely. Um so try and keep as many of those sort of main seats, the main places that people would sit, so that they have got a view of the door.

Softening Yang: Textures and Shapes

SPEAKER_00 14:25

The other thing you can do, the energy in the living room is usually a yang energy, an active energy because that's where people spend a lot of time. Um, so to soften that down, you can use some really lovely soft, fluffy cushion covers and throws, and try and just soften everything up a little bit. Um, it's a really again a really lovely way of making it feel that little bit more relaxed. I know that again there's quite quite a lot of strong feelings out there about things like scatter cushions and such. Um, but it's a really lovely way of just bringing down that like high energy stuff. You want to bring it into a more relaxed and calm and open energy. If you have got coffee tables or side tables in your um living room, then a really good choice if you are replacing them is to choose round or oval um shapes. Round, preferably oval is okay. But if you can avoid square, then I really would do because round shapes are very much um, you know, it's about a cycle, it's the flow, it's a beautiful kind of soft energy that goes around a circle, whereas in a square it's a bit more. And we don't really want that in an area whereby we are trying to harbour connection and togetherness and you know that kind of family-oriented thing. If you're playing a board game at a square table, it can be a bit more, you know, somebody's further away from it and this, that, and the other. Whereas if you're a round table, everybody is equidistant. A lovely kind of leveling shape is a circular table. So if you're replacing your coffee table and you've got the option of going circular, then I would absolutely recommend that you do that.

Light, Dark Corners, and Mirrors

SPEAKER_00 16:19

Again, if you have got a living room whereby um maybe you've got a small window and it's a big space, or you have got like corners that are just a little bit darker, try putting a lamp, or there are some incredible. In fact, I keep seeing them, and I need to um look for my own home. Um amazing rechargeable, like wall lights now where you can place them behind plant pots, they're like almost like up lighters. Um, so there's those, or there's kind of I don't even know what you call them, but they're like vertical bars with lights in them that go down um on a wall and they're rechargeable. So even without plug sockets now, mind blowing. I mean, I'm old, but just how quickly everything is changing is just it's amazing. And what you can buy now is phenomenal. Um, but if you need to brighten up a darker corner, then that's a really, really great choice to get one of these rechargeable lights and bring that into a dark corner because that will really lift those sort of stagnant kind of areas. Another way to lift um spaces that just need a little bit of extra light or energy or something like that is the use of mirrors. Mirrors are your friend in Fenchway. You just have to be just a little bit careful about where you put them. So in your living room, using a mirror to reflect light or to bring um, you know, to add something to a wall is a really, really great choice. Above a fireplace, they are perfect choice. Um, just be really mindful, as with any mirror in Feng Shui, what it is reflecting. So if, for example, you are in your um young child era and you have got a corner of your living room that is where you put your um children's toys, maybe you've got, you know, those joyful

Storage That Calms: Cube Units

SPEAKER_00 18:21

play kitchens and things that are too big to put in boxes and actually tidy away out of sight. So sometimes they can feel they can still make everything feel a bit chaotic. Now, if your mirror is reflecting that kind of space, that is what will be amplified. That's the energy that will be amplified. So when you're placing a mirror in a living room, try and have it reflect the calmest point in the room, or the point whereby you spend the most time as a family, or the happiest point, you know, something that is really lovely. Try not to let it reflect your workspace or you know, an energy that we don't really want to kind of amplify. And the last thing really, um, on that note, going back to children, is one of the most game-changing hacks, not like hack, something the hack. But when I had young children, or then young children that had, you know, boxes and boxes of toys, we would just put everything in a basket and it was an open-didded basket. And even if things were just in there, because that was easy, it never felt particularly calm because it just looked like a basket that was overflowing with stuff, to be honest. Um, so one of the best things we did, one of the absolute best things we did was get a big um, we actually ended up

Photos, Art, and Emotional Energy

SPEAKER_00 19:47

using it, and we still do have one that we use as a sideboard y type thing. Um, it's a Calax unit from IKEA. There's a little plug for them, but you can get them everywhere now, I think. Um, cube storage, whereby they've you know you've got all of those boxes, box holes, and you can put boxes or baskets in the holes, and it's essentially like having lots of baskets with lids on them. And that would be one of my absolute top recommendations for anybody who is in the thick of their toy era right now, is getting a piece of furniture whereby you can put toys in the boxes, you don't have to organise it, you can literally throw it in the boxes and put the boxes in the holes, and you can't see it, and it just will change the way that that room feels, and it was just a lifesaver for me, a mental lifesaver when I had three children of three different ages, so three lots of different toys, and it was just wild, and it was a game change are so in an effort to not make this last another 40 minutes or so, like I did last week. Um, the last two things that I will, or the last few things I will speak about. One is family portraits. Now, living rooms are just the most beautiful place to put family photos that can be um individual photos. So, again, there's a lot of research at the minute that talks about the importance of children seeing themselves within the family home, and that's not necessarily as them as babies, it's as they grow. So seeing themselves on the walls at the age that they are is really, really important, and this is something that I'm awful at, and I'm actually going to make this my sort of focus for the back end of this year is to put some more pictures up and make sure that they are current. Um, so that is absolutely a top tip. With your living room, now how do we put this? How do we say this? I'm just gonna say it. We might not always get on with certain members of our family. Now, if you have got photos in your living room of family members who you don't particularly get on with, that will be changing the energy of that space. You only want to be putting or displaying, having the photos is fine, keep them in an album, don't be rid of them, keep them for memories, but they don't need pride and place in your home. If you, when you're looking at a photo that is

Daily Tidy Rituals and Closing

SPEAKER_00 22:12

on your wall, if it brings you anything other than absolute joy or pride or something positive, then don't display it. So if it is let's think, um, you know, it might be it might be uh extended family photo whereby you know you might have old Uncle John who was judgmental or always made you feel bad about yourself, you don't need that in there. That is not what we want, that's not the energy that we want to invite. You want the happy, joyful things, and it could be your wedding day, it could be your engagement day, it could be graduation if you loved university. If you didn't love university and you've got a photograph of yourself on your graduation day, that's not gonna be doing your energy in that room any good at all. So, again, when we're talking about choosing photos for these spaces, and if you're gonna put photos of your children up, for example, ask them like what's their favourite photo, what do they love? Because actually that's gonna lift them. And we all know if we are parents that you know if our children are in a great mood and in a great space, then we're all gonna be better off. So, in that in that kind of um in that same mindset, involve them in that process of choosing what photos to put up. We want them, we want the pictures on the wall to be happy and joyful. And again, if you've got photos of you um with your children, maybe you were going through some postnatal depression or just you know a really hard time, that's going to be what you remember when, or that's gonna be the energy that is like that that you bring in when you see those photos. So choose really, really carefully what you put on your walls. Only choose what is super positive and amazing. In terms of artwork, um, again, artwork's an amazing thing in Feng Shui. It's um a really powerful tool. We want to try and avoid anything that's too abstract, and we want to try and make sure that we're avoiding anything that is lone or solitary because we want that lovely connective together energy. So things like um paintings of elephants and like a family of elephants is just a gorgeous thing to have in a living room if you don't want to put family portraits up, um, or if you want that in addition to them. So there's some really, really beautiful choices out there, but a lone tree or a lone wolf or um a woman on her own or something that's completely abstract that you're like, what even is that? You know, that's and it's a confusing energy, and we don't we don't really want to bring that into our home. So again, just make sure that you really love what you have got. Um and the final thing with living rooms, I suppose, is just making sure that you keep them as clear from clutter as you can. Now, again, I say that as somebody who has got three children. I know that they are the hub of the home, it's where my children gravitate to at the end of the day. Children do not understand the concept of put something away, don't put it down, put it away. So very, very quickly and very, very easily those spaces become full of other things. So I would urge you to try and keep on top of just encouraging them to at the end of each day picking up the stuff and going and putting it away because they're a busy room. Living rooms are a busy room, they've already got a lot of energetic energy in them, and to have more and more stuff just limits the flow of the energy around that room. So keeping them as clear of stuff as we can, or at least having stuff put into those boxes with the lids on, it's gonna make a huge, huge difference to how people can relax in that room. And if people are relaxed, they're gonna be less edgy, and if they're gonna be less edgy, everybody's gonna be happier. So I hope that helps slightly with living rooms. We've covered a lot of information in there. Um, you can check out my uh reels from this week on Instagram, which will actually show you my own living room and how we have done it in there. Um, and I'll also be emailing out to my mailing list with just some little extra little bonus bits as well this week too. So hopefully by next week I won't be quite so croaky for you, and I will have my voice back properly and I will be able to speak just slightly easier. Um I haven't decided what I'm gonna do next week. Maybe we'll do the bedrooms next week because those are so important in Feng Shui. So, yeah, let's do bedrooms next week. Um I hope that you all have an amazing week, and I'll speak to you soon.