The front palace, foyer, or entrance, is an important area in the home that is often overlooked.

This is the very first area where new energy enters the home, flowing through the ENTIRE space we live in, carrying with it energy currents that are charged with frequencies that affect the home’s inhabitants.

Check out this post to read more about the front palace from a Feng Shui perspective, and how to find yours in your home.

Based on your Human Design Environment, consider how you want the energy to feel when it enters your home. Prepare your space so it imprints the surrounding energy flow with that charge. Let’s tend to your front palace!

Good flow

There are invisible lanes of energy in your home, and depending on where you arrange your furniture, it will affect that flow of energy and potentially create new flows of energy. Not all flows are auspicious. Sometimes we bang into things or feel fried. These are examples of the very information highways you can be sensitive to. Can you build your awareness on these invisible lanes in your home? If the energy at home does not flow, life will not flow. When it comes to your entrance, the very first energy that enters your space will be coloured with an imprint from your entrance’s energy. This will then permeate through your space. We can’t have this energy tripping up, or blocked. Get things out of the way in the entrance.

Sense of connection

What makes you feel connected to something greater than yourself? Is it photos of your family and friends? It is reminders of the stars, constellations and musings of the Greats? Is it scripture? Poetry? Something from your college? Consider what elements help you drop into your body, and surround yourself with that feeling the moment you step foot through the door.

Bring in music

In classic Feng Shui, maintaining fresh yang energy in the home throughout the day prevents the home’s chi from falling stagnant. Many people traditionally left their homes during the day to go to work, and the home would sit unoccupied for long stretches. The energy in the house can become too yin. Have you ever walked into a house that had the curtains closed for days, and you could feel the stale stagnancy? Sometimes this yang aliveness comes through a pet at home during the day, or even by playing music while you're gone. When you first walk in, you’ll be greeted by a sound system and this can be instantly regulating to your system. Maybe it’s music, maybe it’s the welcome home from a family member, maybe it’s an excited pet. Maybe it’s also perfectly quiet! Just build your awareness on the sound environment when you come home, and notice the first greeting to your ears. (Music on during the day can also soothe any anxious pets that are at home!)

Bring in grounding energy

Many Valleys home have furniture that is slightly more oriented to the floor, low, or heavy bottomed. Plants and good lighting are also amazing ways to invite grounding energy into the home. Other times, having something cultural or spiritual creates that sense of necessary grounding. Lighting incense, saying a prayer, or talking to a pet or loved one are rituals to connect with when stepping foot through the front door. Maybe you light a candle the moment you walk in. Maybe you blow it out when you leave or go to sleep. Is there a way you can get creative with your shoes and prioritize them in some way? This is very practical grounding energy. Maybe your favourite pair always stays out so they are easy to slip into, or maybe you display your shoes like art! Maybe you have slippers waiting for you as soon as you walk in.

Have a seat available

Whether it’s a chair, seat, bench or some other creation, have somewhere you can place your bum, say — in order to put on your shoes. Have a “sit down station” — anything that reminds you to stop, slow down sometimes, find your pace, and kick your feet up from time to time.

This is your stomping ground

What would make the space yours? What makes you want to kick of your shoes and put your feet up? Do you need slippers by the door as soon as you walk in? Do you need to command your house to lock the door, or ask Siri to start your playlist? Consider what elements you want to bring into your home so it is the first thing you’re greeted with when you step foot in the door. Play with your tech and sense of connection (or consider how it would feel to “unplug” in this space).

Intimately consider the art around you

Everything is art, but what is art to you? Consider the message woven into the art around you; the materials used SAY something, the words in the painting SAY something, the colour palette you select SAYS something, the type of things you hang on your walls, or collect in the corners of each space say something. What are all these messages coming at you implying? Considering the poison arrows in your life can be an expansive topic. Any time you’re in a space, can you zoom out your awareness toward the room and recognize any sharp corners pointed at you? How might we soften the corners of life, creating rounded, smooth edges and great unobstructed flow? By building your awareness of sharp objects coming at you in your space (and remedying them), you’ll also build your awareness on sharp sounds, people, and messages that don’t resonate with you.