Feng Shui(ing) my Bedroom – From Beginner to Beginner

After attending day two of the Happiness and it’s Causes Conference at Sydney’s Town Hall, one of the practical components of the day was about using the powers of Feng Shui. So today I am going to be Feng Shui(ing) (I’m really not sure if that’s a word) my bedroom whilst I write this. Keep in mind, I am no Feng Shui expert, I am just putting into practise what I learnt at the conference as well as from a couple of google searches.

The first step for Feng Shui(ing) my room is to find out what my number is. No not that number (my room already knows what that number is). You need to find out your Kua number, which is based on your birth date. You Kua number can be worked out like so.

KUA NUMBER FOR A FEMALE:

1. Add the last two numbers of your year of birth and bring it to a single digit.

2. Add your single digit to number 5. (and bring it to a single digit if required)

3. This is your Kua Number!

KUA NUMBER FOR A MALE:

1. Add the last two numbers of your year of birth and bring it to a single digit.

2. Deduct your single digit from number 10.

3. This is your Kua Number!

Keep in mind, this is based off your Chinese Year of Birth, so those born in Janurary and Feburary need to be a little cautious and find out which Chinese Year they were born in, as the dates vary from year to year.

Using your number, you will be able to place yourself in the East Group or the West Group.

• The East Group Kua numbers are 1, 3, 4 and 9.
• The West Group Kua numbers are 2, 6, 7 and 8

From working out if you belong in the East Group (like me!) or the West Group, you will be able to figure out which directions work best for you and which corners and areas of your space (whether it be your whole house, or someone like me who lives with their parents, just the bedroom) create the best energies for your life. You might need a compass for this, or at least a good sense of north, south east and west.You will also need to divid your room into sections, which corralate to aspects of your life.

Putting this into practise, the first shocking thing that I noticed was that this section of my room, is my section for love,marriage and relationships.

The first reason why this seemed alarming was because my section for love is found in my closet(could Feng Shui be trying to tell me something?) but what also is alarming, is that this chest of draws contains all the stuff my ex has given me over the years that I just shovered in there to forget about and haven’t thought about since. This also includes a birthday present from him, which was a jumper/sweater from his college in USA. (how it got past me that he has narcissistic tendencies is beyond me sometimes) This is the first thing that needs to go from my love area. The second thing that needs to be removed is a photo of my gay friend Michael, in which he framed, signed and gave me for my birthday. Items also found in the love section include boxing gloves,Introduction to Psychology of Health textbook and a lot of rubbish and clutter. (It’s almost like a bad omen) The number one Feng Shui rule is to remove all clutter. It however, is still in a closet, but seeing as my parents refused to assist me in transforming the guest room into my new room, it will just have to do.

My love section is now clutter free, ex-boyfriend free, boxing glove free and health psychology free. It is clean, organised and with plenty of calm symbols, pictures of friends and spare draws (to invite someone new into my life, hey I can dream)

The next area that I am drawing my attention to is my area for Money and Success. Looking at the space of my room, it could be argued that I do not even have an area for money and success as my room is not really a square space. Pointing this out to my overly positive mother, she believed that I was in fact was lucky and 2 areas for money and success. (though I think this statement might have come from a dread of having to help me move my furniture into the spare room.)

Seeing as changing bedrooms is not an option, I will have to work with what I have. My desk located in one corner is a cluttered mess and contains photos of friends and candles. It does not scream success. This has been removed and replaced with a clear desk with just a lap-top.

The sections of my room for calm and health didn’t need to much fixing, well nothing I could do immediately, (other than move my candles over there) but it is very much a working progress, now with my ex-boyfriends stuff in the bin and most of the junk from my room gone I feel better already. Bring on the positive energies and if that doesn’t work, well at least it made cleaning my room less of a chore.

What are your opinions on Feng Shui? Have you DIY Feng Shui-ed your living space? Have you ever considered putting Feng Shui into practise in your home/bedroom? Or better yet, had a professional to come in a do it for you?

A Sense of Community.

Whilst I was travelling through the USA, I learnt that the USA and Australia are really nothing alike. Many Australians are under the assumption that USA is similar to home, but once being there I realised how wrong I and everyone else who makes this statement really is. There are a lot of differences that separate the two, more than just some common phrases that differ. (Yes we call them jumpers, not sweatshirts, thongs, not flip-flops, the list goes on)

The main thing I noticed was attitudes. In some ways Australian attitudes are much more laid back and in some ways America’s are. Australia’s are not accustom to paying for service, so we find the tipping culture a bit hard to grasp. We are known for this. It is no coincidence that when I was in New York, if anyone found out I was Australian (usually my accent was enough to do it) they would add the tip onto my bill for me, usually at 20%. ( I always thought it was 10%, apparently I was going around insulting people, I didn’t mean to I swear)

I found Australia, more closer to England I guess. We aren’t socialist and very far from it, but we are definitely a social welfare state and even our right-wing people wouldn’t really disagree with this (they just disagree to how much of a percentage we should be) We all think Medicare is the best thing ever, even the right-wing. I am sure there was debate when Gough Whitlam implemented our medicare system, I guess we are all just use to it now and see its major benefits to our society.

One thing, I wish Australia was a little more and that America wasn’t at all, is community based. I found the emphasis on community in parts of South East Asia liberating and truly inspiring. I think these 2 stories kind of sum it up.

When Hurricane Katrina hit, help didn’t come straight away and when bodies needed to be cleaned up, a lot of people claimed, it’s not my job as these horrible jobs, got passed around.

After the tsunami that hit Thailand in 2004, little girls as young as 6 years old, lined up and passed the bodies down the line to help identify the deceased. They worked together as a community and there were very few people that were not part of this collective effort.

This sense of community, I feel is missing from my life and I am envious of countries that do have this sense of community. I never felt loneliness in countries like this, loneliness never seemed to be felt by anyone. Sometimes I feel like the West always tries and forces it’s way of life onto others, but perhaps we should be taking a leaf out these other cultures books.

A 20-year-old girl in Cambodia.

Right now, I have some friends who are travelling through Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Seeing their pictures and status updates on facebook is not only making me incredibly jealous but bringing me back to the greatest experience of my life.For me to recap this experience I will have to take you back to 2009.

2009 – Me a 20-year-old girl, with minimal direction in life, a student. (very similar to me now actually, just add 2 and a bit years and change student to unemployed) I had recently gone through a break up, had my wisdom teeth removed and spent weeks in bed from reactions in surgery, had an old friend pass away and get a bit down in the dumps. After the friend passed away I decided life was too short to live like this. I had some money saved as I worked way to much, so it was time for adventure.

After much consideration (about 45 minutes) I deferred Uni, so I couldn’t change my mind. I now had the free time and the urge to experience something different. Being the charitable person I am, I decided volunteering somewhere would be a good way to gain perspective. My first thought was Mexico, however my parents first thought was no.

My next choice was Cambodia and in all honesty I am not sure why it wasn’t my first choice all along. Having studied the Khmer Rouge 3 separate times in high school (once in year 7 for English, in year 9 and 10 for Asian Studies and year 11 and 12 for Modern History) I had always been fascinated by this country and its sombre history. So in the next couple of weeks I organised to volunteer in Phnom Penh teaching kids English for 6 weeks and travel around independently for a few weeks on my own to Vietnam and Thailand.

5th of September 2009 came and I was at  Sydney International Airport with my parents at 5am. Turns out when your flight is at 8am and they tell you to be there 3 hours before, they don’t really mean this, as the airport hadn’t even opened yet. I waited outside the airport for about 30 mins until the doors finally open and I jump in line to check in. (so turns out there probably wasn’t any need to run) After a scary few hours waiting nervously at the airport with my parents, whom constantly let me know that I didn’t have to go through with this, they would take me home, no questions asked. But it was something I had to do. I was scared, but in a good way.

I arrived in Phnom Penh and got to my guest house fine. Turns out 3 of the 6 people on the flight from Singapore (where I had a layover) where volunteering with me too. It was a relief to meet some people straight away.

Volunteering with these kids was one of, if not the most eye-opening experiences of my life. These children had been through terrible hardships, someone from my privileged upbringing could not even begin to comprehend.  However these children were some of the most beautiful and happy people I have ever met. They had such a childlike innocence that I lost well before  the age of 11-17 which they were when I had the pleasure of meeting them. They were smart, great dancers, unbelievably cheeky and had such a sense of community that at times, I found myself envious of. I know that may sound strange to some, but they had a great sense of community you just don’t find in the Western World. Phnom Penh and Cambodia has a completely different way of life to the Western World.

I can honestly say that I learnt a lot more from these kids about life then they ever could possibly learnt from me. They were great kids. It’s been over 2 years since I was there and I still miss them.

My trip to Cambodia also opened me up to other wonderful travel experiences. The other volunteers that were staying at the same guesthouse as me, were the best people that anyone could hope to meet when you travel. Over those 6 weeks, we became a family. A family with lots of sisters and only one brother.

My plans for travelling alone on the weekends when I wasn’t teaching these kids, didn’t really happen, instead a had a wonderful group of people to experience the journey with. Together with these people I explored Phnom Penh, including the Killing Fields, S 21, the king’s palace as well as many bars and restaurants, some cultural, some not so cultural.

I also travelling to Siem Reap with them, visiting all the temples as well as a trip to the Angkor What? bar. Oh it had to be done.

Some of the Family (i’m second from the right)

We also experienced the joys of the beaches of Sihanoukville (known to us as schnookumsville because of how someone pronounced it the first time they tried to read it) and the joys of the Mekong Buckets.

Mekong Buckets – containing one pair lemonade, one part red bull to about 10 parts cheap whiskey. (they really do look like the Mekong too)

I guess for me, this trip really was a once in a lifetime adventure. Going alone, I learnt so much about what I am capable of, so much about Cambodia and the world around me. So much about life and how other people live as well as learnt a lot about a group of people I otherwise would have never had the pleasure of meeting. It really was the greatest all round experience with a great mix of culture, growth, learning, fun and adventure. I recommend Cambodia as a must see destination for anyone that is interested in travel. After being around Europe and the USA since, I think Cambodia will always still hold that special place in my heart.

Narcissism – A Western Epidemic?

Narcissism is not a new concept. The term was first coined in 1887, named after Narcissus from a Greek myth about a man who was punished to love his own reflection for all of eternity after rejecting all other romantic partners, because he never found any that matched up to his perception of himself. However narcissism is a growing epidemic of our time. It is predicted that 1/6 people in Western Society have some degree of narcissism, with around 20% of these people having serious problems with narcissim.However it is very rare for a narcissist to see that they have a problem, meaning most narcissism goes undetected, with those being treated usually brought in by family or friends who cannot cope anymore.

Everyone has narcissistic traits, everyone is a little self-absorbed at times but to some these can become extreme problems. Attention seeking, manipulation, thinking others are manipulating you, lack of empathy for others, lack of care for others if they do not have the same opinions as you and emotional abuse are all commonplace to those that have problems with narcissism.

However it has interested me to learn that problems with narcissism are a lot more predominate in the West then they are in Eastern culture. Narcissism is not a problem commonly associated to Eastern culture. fascinating.

After a conversation with my good friend last night I have put this down to two different possible reasons and I am undecided as to which one it would be.

My friend commented that in Eastern culture these problems would not be documented as much as they would in Western culture, as mental health and other personality disorders are really looked down on and viewed different. They are more a fault of the individual. This may be true.

However I personally think it could be the different doctrines of these different cultures. Western Culture focuses on the individual, where as eastern focuses on the collective. Western culture encourages everyone to be individuals, do things for themselves, achieve things individually and that you only really yourself. Eastern culture focuses more on the collective. The individual state is not as nurtured as the state of being in a collective group. Your viewed by your memberships.

Perhaps us in the West could be taking a leaf out of our friends in the East’s book.

For more information on how to spot an narcissist.

http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2008/08/04/how-to-spot-a-narcissist/