This is a repost of my article that appeared on

Although I don’t have any linguistic rules to back me up, I feel like it’s not coincidental that the word “HOME” includes the word “OM” and has the same prefix as the word “HOLISTIC.”

Holistic living is being more and more embraced with conscious eating, preventive and alternative medicine, and simplicity. Holistic implies being ‘whole’ or looking at the ‘whole’ picture by looking at our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing as a whole, not in parts.  Historically, in the West, we have put a priority on physical health, while in the East there has been a focus on spiritual health.  Both are now being embraced and united with a holistic lifestyle.

And now our home is becoming to the forefront as another component of living holistically.  More and more people are realizing that their home can be a source of healing – a place of essential change.

Our home is second to our body as our physical dwelling on Earth.  It is so closely related to our mind and body that the two have oftentimes throughout history been used interchangeably in religions, architecture, and in dream analysis.

And this I know is not coincidental.  For the last four years, I have gone to people’s homes to help them with energy flow, clutter clearing, and even color selecting.  And what I realized early on is that our home is a mirror of ourselves.  And as we make changes to our home, we are making changes to ourselves.

The energy patterns within our self – physically, mentally, and emotionally – are also present within our home.  Have you ever had a great massage or bodywork where you left feeling great.  And upon returning home, you fell right back into your old patterns – maybe your shoulders started to slump forward again or your breathing returned to being labored.

If the energy flow in your home is ‘off’ then the energy flow in your body will be off. Energy flow in your home can be affected by furniture, accessories, clutter, and the quality of energy.

Here are a few things to consider to make your home part of your holistic lifestyle.

1. Furniture blocks: For the best feng shui, you want the energy to ‘meander’ through a space.  So imagine yourself as energy (because you are) coming through your space.  Do you bump into any furniture? Do you hit corners sticking out? Are there tight places that feel constraining?  Too much furniture can be major blocks of energy.  And if they’re in your house, then they’re in your life in some form.

2. Emotional Clutter: Clutter is stagnant energy.  So if you feel stagnant in any area of your life, then there’s probably clutter lurking somewhere in your life that has taken form.  If it’s your love life that’s stagnant, then clear out stuff from past relationships.  If it’s your career that’s stagnant, clear out your office. If it’s your body that’s cluttered, then clean out your cupboards, fridge, and clothing closet.

3. Inventory Your Accessories: Like a great outfit, accessories are essential. They can make an outfit.  But if overdone, they can ruin an outfit.  So is the case with accessories in your home.  Take inventory of the accessories in your home.  You should love everyone of them.  Don’t use accessories to distract.  I find that people who use too many accessories in an outfit are subconsciously trying to distract the attention away from them personally and to their clothing instead.  Don’t let your accessories distract you.  Love everything in your home, including yourself.

4. Clear the Energy:  No one likes to sit at a table in the restaurant before it’s been cleared by the people who sat there before. And no one certainly wants to live among the energy of the previous owners of their home. You don’t want to be subjected to the energy patterns of those before you.  If you have never cleared the energy in your home, now is the time!  It’s quite simple and effective.  Sage smudging is the most common method by which you light the end of a sage bundle and waft around your house.  Add your intention to the mix as well.  You can also try my hand-blended Smudge Spray which is quite effective as well and smells fabulous.

So as you become more conscious of your diet, exercise, spirituality, and so forth, become conscious of your home as well.  As you love your home, you will love yourself.

photo credit

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Tisha Morris is a feng shui expert, life coach, and the author of Feng Shui Your Life. For more information, visit www.tishamorris.com.

Each month as I prepare to write my Newsletter, I reflect on the past month and muse upon the upcoming.  In my three years of sending out monthly newsletters, I’ve never experienced such a shift in one month as I have this last month. Changes are taking place at a whirlwind speed. I hardly recognize myself.  And I hardly recognize our Planet as it changes daily with the Middle East being the epicenter.

The changes are taking place on every level. For me, the swift changes began shortly after I got my hair cut much shorter. While that doesn’t seem to be a big deal, it is.

You see it’s a physical expression or example of what we all are undergoing personally, locally, globally, and planetary.

We are all freeing ourselves from something.

Freeing ourselves from our own Gadhafis and the Mubaraks.

Freeing ourselves from our inner demons.

Freeing ourselves from our own oppression.

Freeing ourselves from our shadows.

Why?

So our inner light can shine. So that we can be the beacon of light that we are.

So that our Planet can be the beacon of light that she is among the Universe. (Just as each country makes up our Planet, our Planet is but one part that makes up the Universe. Each piece is essential for evolution.)

So that we can experience the joy of life, the joy of the physical experience that we signed up for on Planet Earth.

And so that we can connect with and acknowledge the light in everyone that we encounter.

For we are all, consciously or unconsciously, seeking the feeling-experience of Oneness from which we came from and that we truly are.

It is because of this concept of Oneness that as the unrest goes on thousands of miles away that we are sleeping restlessly and undergoing our own personal battles with the truth.

In some we are victorious.

In some there is bloodshed.

But in all it is worth it. And it is inevitable.

We can no longer sit quietly and watch the injustices that go on next to us. We can no longer NOT speak our truth. And we can no longer NOT be our true self.

We are simply moving to a place where we will have no choice but to BE LOVE.

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Photo credit: MOHAMMED ABED/AFP/Getty Images

Tisha Morris is a certified life coach, feng shui consultant, energy healer, yoga instructor, and author of 27 Things to Feng Shui Your Home (Turner Publishing).  For more information, visit www.tishamorris.com.

Also check out the NEW Feng Shui Your Life eWorkbook. NOW AVAILABLE!

And the time is NOW.

Over the last year, it seems that every client that has come to see me for energy healing has received, either spontaneously or related to why they came, what I call a “heart upgrade” during the session. What is happening is that our hearts are needing to adjust or calibrate to the new energies and higher frequencies that are coming to our Planet. We must adjust in order to maintain resonance with the Planet. This inherently involves releasing density or lower frequencies from our heart chakra.

Why is this happening now?

We are moving from a head-based consciousness to a heart-based consciousness. If you’ve heard buzz words, such as the 2012 shift or shift of consciousness, this is it.

If you’ve noticed that your spelling isn’t what it used to be, then you are experiencing this shift. If you’ve noticed that you can read others more than ever, then you are flowing with this shift. If you have or are transitioning from a head-based job or career to a heart-based job or career, then you are aligning with this shift.

It is a total and complete change in how we have operated in the past.

And it is happening very quickly. Have you noticed that you can’t accomplish things like you once could? But with other things, it’s like magic? Instant manifestation.

The sooner we each shift from head to heart, the easier life will be. Not only easier, but more joyful than we could ever imagine.

In an article I wrote a while back – Doing Less, Being More – I spoke to this same issue. It is a shift from the masculine to the feminine, from doing to being, from head to heart. However you want to think about it. But now I speak about it with more urgency. This shift is happening so quickly that it is affecting people’s physical and mental wellbeing.

Here are some suggestions on easing this transition:

• Have awareness. Just by reading this post, you are bringing awareness to your heart.
• Feel. Our heart is our feeling center. We must start to feel. To feel emotions. In fact, this will be the only way to accomplish or manifest anything in the physical world. Even businesses and businesspeople will have to feel in order to navigate in the material world.
• Be in your body. In order to feel, you must be present in your body. Throughout the day, check in and just feel your body from the inside out. Activities, such as yoga, tai chi, even golf, or any activity where you have to be present with your body form, help immensely.
• Feel your heart. Bring your awareness to your heart. Feel it from the inside out. Breathe into it. Or just physically touch your heart.
• Stop judging others. Judgment arises out of the ego’s need for separating ourself from others. This couldn’t be further from the heart.
• Forgive. This is the density around the heart that I referenced above. Forgive everyone, especially including yourself. Don’t forgive intellectually, but with your heart. If you don’t shed some tears in doing this, then you haven’t forgiven.
• Be love. Spend 5 minutes a day just being love. Let it radiate out of you as you sit in your chair. You don’t have to actively send out love, just be love. This is your essence. This is really you.
• Love Mother Earth. Our Planet is our home. Be here with respect as you would if you were staying with a friend over the weekend.

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Tisha Morris is a certified life coach, feng shui consultant, energy healer, yoga instructor, and author of 27 Things to Feng Shui Your Home (Turner Publishing).  For more information, visit www.mindbodyom.com.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be spiritual. There was a time when I really liked thinking of myself as ‘being spiritual.’ But as ‘being spiritual’ has become more mainstream (which I am happy to say) the more I think it’s odd to refer to myself as spiritual. To me that’s like saying, I’m a human being. It’s obvious, isn’t it?

Ultimately we are all spiritual beings having a physical experience. Some of us gravitate toward the spiritual part and others more to the physical. Ideally, we should have a balance of both. As a culture, we have been too much in the physical. Even with regards to religions, very little is discussed as to our being spiritual beings. Several years ago when I started to tap into and realize my spiritual side, so to speak, the pendulum swung in that direction as I too had been too much in the physical world for most of my life. Now I think I am able to strike a balance between both worlds.

“Being spiritual” has become a new identity in our culture. And identities are all about the ego – not our true spiritual nature. Some of the most unbalanced people I meet are the most “spiritual” – at least in identity. Instead I think of myself as a balanced person (or at least what I strive to be).

Balance is really at the heart of everything in our life. And no longer do I think of the work I do as “spiritual” work. As a healer, I’m helping people and spaces to be balanced. In feng shui, it’s all about balancing the energies in a space. And the same is true in energy healing with the body and in life coaching within your everyday life. It’s all about balance. It’s not coincidental that “holistic” means to make whole. Inherent in being whole is to be balanced. Of course, working with energy, per se, could be considered “spiritual”. Or is it science?

I do believe that in being balanced physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, you will inherently radiate your true nature of love. Which is the ultimate goal.

What do you think it means to be spiritual?

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Tisha Morris is a certified life coach, feng shui consultant, energy healer, yoga instructor, and author of 27 Things to Feng Shui Your Home (Turner Publishing).  For more information, visit www.tishamorris.com.

One modality that originated in Chinese Medicine is Feng Shui. We may think of feng shui as more of a way to apply furniture and objects aesthetically, but it can actually be extremely useful in prevention and healing of illnesses.

Our home is a mirror of ourself. It holds a certain vibration. And in some cases, it may be a low vibration that is keeping you stuck, preventing you from getting well, or even causing you to get sick.

Feng Shui is ultimately about harmonizing our living spaces with the Earth’s energy. As we have become further removed from nature and the natural rhythms of the earth’s energy, so have our living spaces. Feng Shui helps improve the energy flow in your home. As the energy in your home harmonizes and improves, so does the energy within your body.

Before you ever move into your home, there is an energy environment taking place as a result of the land it sits on, the direction it faces, the slope of the land, and the natural elements around it. Some houses simply have better energy than other homes just by the way they sit on the lot.

That being said, the most powerful determinant of the energy within our homes is ourselves. We are powerful energizers that can change the energy in the space by where we place furniture, what we stuff in our closet, and simply by what emotions we emit into the space. Over time, mental and emotional patterns form in our home as a result of our energy. And in the case of an illness, such as Cancer, it is of utmost importance that those patterns get broken up and dispersed in order for healing to take place.

With a specific type of Cancer, such as asbestos cancer or Mesothelioma, environment is especially important. Mesothelioma is a type of cancer that is a direct result of environment, specifically exposure to asbestos. There are other types of Cancer that have been linked with spaces containing high radiation or other environmental toxins. Because the body is already weakened and sensitized to environment, it is extremely important that those with such diseases have proper energy flow in their home, hospital, or place of healing.

For those battling any type of Cancer or illness, your home, hospital room, or temporary home needs to feel like a sanctuary. It is the space in which you feel most comforted, safe, and at peace. A Feng Shui consultant can assist with making your space feel like a sanctuary, which will assist in your healing journey.

In such cases, a Feng Shui consultant would look at the land, test for geopathic stress, consider the floor plan and furniture arrangement, determine where the Health section of the house is, identify clutter zones, clear stagnant energy, and look for any other blocks of energy that may be present.

Similar to the way our body gives clues as to our mind, our home gives us clues, or, in some cases, red flags as to our mind and body. As you make positive changes to your home, you will make positive changes to your mind and body.

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Tisha Morris is a certified life coach, feng shui consultant, energy healer, yoga instructor, and author of 27 Things to Feng Shui Your Home (Turner Publishing).  For more information, visit www.mindbodyom.com.

According to the Army Corps of Engineer, a flood of this magnitude statistically happens 1 in 1000 years in Nashville.

I am saddened to say that Nashville (and the surrounding counties) has received its share of the natural disasters that seem so widespread these days. This one has struck near and dear to my heart as I see the town I grew up in and currently live in submerged in water.

And I’ve never felt more proud to live here than I do now.

Like any city during a disaster, the people of Nashville have opened their hearts to their neighbors, friends, and strangers. And but for the scores of volunteers, so many more lives would have perished. Once again, the Volunteer State has lived up to its name.

Nashville has always been a city for healing. Situated in a bowl of limestone rock, Nashville is very grounding which provides a great bed, so to speak, for healing. It’s no coincidence that Nashville is a hub for major hospital corporations. Underneath, it also has a very strong and vibrant alternative health and lightworker community that many are not aware of.

Being a sister city of Athens, Greece, Nashville has many parallels, such as the only exact replica of the Parthenon, along with many other architectural similarities throughout the city. It is theorized by many that Nashville will be (or is) a major player in our new world or post-2012 era. This brings me back to the flood.

All natural disasters are a result and for the purpose of bringing our Planet into balance. And all natural disasters cleanse and renew the areas in which they strike. It seems not coincidental that this flood has taken place while the most disastrous oil spill in history is taking place. Earth must maintain a balance if we are to maintain residency here.

A smaller example is that of East Nashville that was hit in 1998 by a tornado. This once-thriving area in the early 1900′s had since been overtaken with crime and poverty. Beautiful Victorian-built homes had fallen prey to decay and neglect. After the tornado came through leaving destruction in its path, the neighborhood spurred by insurance money rebuilt itself to better than ever. It is now considered one of the best neighborhoods to live in in Nashville.

While none of this makes it any easier to see the current devastation of homes, lives, and businesses in shambles, I do know that Nashville will rise from this disaster and be better than ever. It will heal and be healed. And it will be that beacon of light that will help bring our precious planet back into balance.

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Please spread the word, in case folks don’t grasp the severity of what’s going on. Temporary shelters are at capacity, missing people are unaccounted for, many homes are under water, we’re in a water conservation emergency, much of Nashville’s economic base is threatened by flood damage, etc.

Text ‘REDCROSS’ to 90999 to donate $10 to disaster relief.

EN’VISION’ YOUR LIFE!

Join us for the ultimate Destiny Vision Board Workshop

featuring

~Astrology by Rachel Lang~

~Aromatherapy by Meg McFayden~

Thursday, March 4th 5:00p-8:30p

@ Art & Invention in east Nashville

According to Chinese wisdom, one’s Destiny is determined by three types of Luck:

Earth Luck (Feng Shui)

Human Luck (Intention)

Heaven Luck (Astrology)

We have combined all three of these and even added a dose of inspiration in the form of an aromatherapy essential oil blend specifically matched to each person.

This is the ultimate Workshop to En’vision’ Your Life!

You will leave with a vision board, an astrology reading, and an essential oil blend!

Everything you need to clarify, inspire, and manifest your dreams.

REGISTRATION:

$48 by March 1st; $58 after March 1st

All Supplies Provided.

To pay by credit card, link here and scroll down to the Buy Now tab.

To pay by check, email tisha@mindbodyom.com for address.

SOLD OUT!!

(For notifications on future workshops, join my Newsletter on the right sidebar.  Thanks!!)

One of my favorite books I recommend to clients is You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay. I absolutely love this book. If there was such a thing as a recipe for making permanent changes on either or all of the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual levels, then this book would be it.

When I recommend this book, however, I can tell some people question whether they need to do something as extreme as “heal”, particularly those without a physical illness or disease. If I could read their mind, they would be saying, “Healing is for sick people. And I’m not sick.” But the word “heal” is synonymous with the word “change.” To heal is to change. And most everyone wants to change their life in some way or another. And, healers are essentially transformers, or instruments of change.

If you don’t have a physical illness, then why do you need to heal or change? Simple. So that you won’t get a physical illness or disease. All physical ailments start out on the emotional or mental levels way before they ever reach the physical body. The physical body is the outward manifestation of our mind. Thus, the body is the last resort, or the red flag, that lets us know that major changes are needed. So, ideally, we make the necessary changes, or heal, before the physical body ever gets involved. Oh, and did I mention another reason we want to heal… so that we can live the best and most fulfilling life we can.

What about genetic diseases? You might ask how someone is supposed to change something that they didn’t even create in the first place. When a genetic disease is passed down, what is passed down is the mental or emotional belief system that creates the disease, not the physical disease itself. It is scientifically proven that DNA can be changed with our mind. And when DNA is changed, genetic diseases are changed.

Why do you have to change to heal? We live in an ever expanding and evolving Universe. I am not saying this as a prophetic spiritual statement, but as a scientific fact. The common phrase “evolve or die” succinctly sums it up. You have also probably heard the phrase, “the only guarantee in life is change.” We are here on Earth to grow and evolve. It is impossible to improve your life, including health, without making some change. In extreme cases, the “change” may be surgery, which may as a result prompt one to make a change, i.e. pattern, belief. (For example, after having a minor, same-day surgery a few years ago, the experience was so undesirable for me that it awakened me to take preventative care steps to hopefully avoid ever having to be in a hospital again!)

If surgery is still not enough to prompt a change, then the problem will rearise somewhere else in the body—in some form at some point. We are living in a world where we are bombarded by messages of quick fixes and have grown to believe that we can change our life without making changes!

What prevents us from change? Fear. More specifically, we get caught up in old patterns (or ruts) because they are “safe” and “known”. Fear is of the unknown, even if the unknown could be heaven on earth. These patterns could be the result of inherited family patterns, unserving belief systems, and/or karma. When something finally becomes too painful to continue, either physically or emotionally, then one will finally make a change (or make a more dramatic transition from Earth). But why put yourself through the years of painful misery? Instead, make a conscious change, or, in other words, choose to heal.

Love – for ourself or others—is at the core of all change. And when we make a change that is in our highest and best interest it always comes from the heart. Think about major changes that you have made in your life that have been beneficial for your growth, evolution, and happiness. They all involved loving yourself or someone else. Perhaps, it was taking the risk to move across the country to be with someone you love, or breaking up with someone that you knew was not in your highest and best interest. Maybe it was loving yourself enough to take a risk with a job or school that was more in alignment with your life purpose. Or perhaps it was changing a belief system in order to tap into your unconditionally loving someone.

Heal = Change

Change = Love

Love = Heal

Love always comes from the heart.
Open your heart and you will heal or, vice versa, heal by opening your heart!

photo credit

 

If you’ve found yourself voraciously cleaning stuff out of your home lately, you’re not alone. Over the last few months, I have heard this repeatedly from friends and clients. There is an insatiable urge to clear things out of closets, basements, drawers, and in some cases, entire rooms. For many people, this urge is so pronounced and unlike anything ever experienced before. For those of you who are historically packrats, this feeling is very new and perhaps even confusing.

So what is going on? Afterall, it’s not even Spring!

Basically, we (in conjunction with Planet Earth) are going through a major purging. Looking at it in terms of the economic climate, we have all realized that we not only can live with less, but feel better with less. All of the stuff that we accumulated over the last couple of decades just doesn’t feel good anymore. Stuff feels like a big weight. Instead, space makes us feel good. We can breathe again (notice how your breath changes after you clear something out). This is all part of a return of living close and in harmony with the Earth, not in opposition like we as a collective have been doing. In fact, you may have noticed that when you are now drawn to purchase something, it is artisan-made, natural fibers, and/or organic products.

From a spiritual perspective, we have been and will continue to be (perhaps until 2012) on an accelerated course of evolution with this Summer (’09) being in full force. As we evolve, we become less and less dense as different vibrations cannot co-exist. Matter is the highest form of density. Whereas, energy before it manifests into a physical form is a lighter density, but still some level of density. For example, a kidney stone would be emotional energy like anger that has manifested into a physical form. As we evolve, we purge this density (which could be the subject of numerous blog articles) on the physical, emotional, and mental levels. And, our home, which is an extension and reflection of ourself, needs to as well.

As you clean stuff out of your home, you are assisting in an important and necessary part of your spiritual growth, which is paramount to your physical and emotional well-being. You may even notice some resistance well up along the way. Be conscious and notice what the resistance is.

As you clean out your basement, you are cleaning out your subconscious mind. In other words, you are bringing things from the subconscious to the conscious mind in order to effectively deal with it and, if necessary, get rid of it. Prior to that, things were stuffed down there to avoid dealing with it or even having to see it.

What about closets? This is where we stuff things we don’t want others to see, perhaps including ourselves. As we clean out our closet, we are all “coming out of the closet” in some aspect. In your own unique way, it is allowing you to live more authentically. This again is a letting go or purging of anything dense, such as lies, fronts, and fakes. Even with regards to your clothing closet, perhaps there are clothes that no longer seem to fit who you are anymore.

We are all evolving to our highest vibration and most authentic selves, which is love. So, when you get the urge to purge your home, go with it.