How Feng Shui Affects You and Your Home | Interview with Feng Shui Expert Kathryn Weber

In today’s episode, I have the pleasure of interviewing Kathryn Weber who is the publisher of the online feng shui newsletter, The Red Lotus Letter. Kathryn Weber is trained in classical Chinese feng shui and has over 23 years of feng shui application, practice, and professional consultation. Her newspaper column, Living Space, was syndicated nationally by the Chicago Tribune, and she had three feng shui jewelry lines on Home Shopping Network. She has been quoted in Reader's Digest, the LA Times, and Realtor.com. Katie's emphasis is always based on the practical and real-world application of feng shui that blends easily with today's homes and lifestyles.

You can find Katie on Instagram @fengshuikatie or visit her at redlotusletter.com. Be sure to grab her free report.

If you’re in the process of selling your home or preparing your house to sell, this season of the Behind the Renovation podcast is perfect for you.  Over the next few weeks, I am interviewing industry professionals and related businesses for the Home Selling Success series to help you understand what home selling and buying look like in 2021 and how you can prepare yourself for the good, the bad and that elusive virtue called patience. 

Transcript

Alice: Welcome to the podcast, Katie, thank you so much for joining me. 

Katie: I'm so happy to be here. Alice. It's great to join you. And I'm excited that you're, you've got a podcast. How awesome is that?

Alice: We're back and I'm doing this home selling series. So of course, part of the home selling success includes fengshui and I know you and I had spoken than 11 years if you can believe it about the subject. So let's, let's discuss it again. And for those who don't know what functionary is, can you just explain a little bit what punctuate is.

Katie: I'll give you a couple of, there's a couple of variations of what punctuate is. Now. People say it means wind and water. Well, that really doesn't mean anything to most people. It's like, okay, when did water and I don't have either wind or water in my house, but it's basically the idea and the concept that the way your home is arranged and is aligned in the environment will have a direct effect on your health, your wealth and your happiness, your relationships. And it's another idea that's a little bit more esoteric for, for those who like the more esoteric kind of ideas is the idea that there is a fleet free-flowing energy that moves throughout our homes throughout our spaces called G. And that, that the smooth flowing energy of Chichi is, is what creates an opportunity that creates good health. And that creates an environment where we can flourish in our lives. And it's also another variation is it's the Chinese art of placement. I kind of liked the idea of the CI idea and the idea that the way we live in the homes we have in the range and the way they're there oriented and so forth has an effect and a bearing on, on how we feel and how successful and productive and effective we are.

Alice: Which makes sense. Because a lot of times we all have probably experienced this on one level or another, where you walk into a space and either you feel really good or you automatically feel like, Ooh, something's weird about this. You don't quite know what that is, but 

Katie: Yeah, yeah, you can't put your F sometimes you can put your finger directly on it. And, so for instance, we'll, we'll take, since this is part of home sales series, let's like, for example, the home, that someone is interested in purchasing. So a potential buyer comes to the door, they ring the bell, they open it and it smells like a cat or an ashtray. And that's, you know, immediately it gives you a feeling and you go, no, that's not for me. We can, we have, things in our environment, in the homes that we interact with, and they can either make us angry and frustrate us or they can delight us. So for instance, a good example is I recently renovated my kitchen, just every down to the studs, everything removed walls. And what have you de redoing everything still waiting on the dishwasher because everybody else oh boy, you know, I think as far as renovations go, it went really well. 

Katie: I'm very decisive. I know what I want and that kind of thing. So I don't, I don't really have trouble, deciding, especially in those spur of the moment calls, sometimes that contractors have that you've got to know, but it was actually really smooth. And when I walk into the kitchen and now it's, it's bright and things are where I want them to be. I am delighted and I feel good and it makes me happy going into the kitchen. Whereas before I had this one, this one cabinet that had been used a lot and it's it creaks every time and it was the hinge. And, and it made me mad every morning. I would go into my, go into cabinet to get out a coffee cup. And it was like, it was grading online nerves. It was just the nails on the chalkboard experience. 

Katie: And, and some mornings I would think, well, I'm just in a crummy mood. Why did I didn't wake up in a crummy mood Am I in such a crummy mood And then I go back and I think about that darn cabinet with that, that squeak and that screeching sound, it just drove me bananas and your house can do that to you too. And in ways that are, these are very, easy to understand examples, but sometimes there are ways that your house bothers you, that gets sort of sublimated. And we kind of get where we, our eyes don't see things anymore. Like when we walk into the garage and then we have to step over the lumber and we see the paint cans that are over there and the big mess that we have that we said, we're going to straighten that out and all that stuff we're going to take to the donation. And over while we don't really notice it anymore, but it's still there and still annoying us. And that's, that's how your house can really affect you in ways that may not be as obvious. 

Alice: Totally understood. And these are in some, I feel like some of these things are common sense, but yet we all know common sense is not so common. And so some of these things, as you said, it seem very obvious. And when you're talking about energy, there's energy blockage, right So a lot of this clutter and things like that is blocking the energy. So removing the clutter obviously allows energy to then flow. 

Katie: Let's talk about the external function. There is an external fengshui  that all homes have. And there is the idea that, and it's not the idea is that it's an absolute concept that all function way in our homes begins from the outside in, it comes from, you know, our health becomes, it comes from the outside and goes inward. Where, how do we do that by the air We breathe by the water. We drink by the good food we have. It starts externally and goes inward. It's the same thing with our home. And if our homes are cited well, and they have a good foundation in terms of the way that they're arranged in the environment, you know, you're not oriented, looking at a parking lot, or you're not, you don't have a cliff that's falling away at the rear of your house. And, and they're all those external factors make a big, big difference at you. 

Katie: Even things like, for instance, I saw a house today online, that, someone was talking about him in my Facebook group about how they had all these trees and this house was like literally surrounded by trees. I mean, like, almost like the trees were like trying to smother it. It was, they were too close. They were too many. And this is there's. There am brings up the other idea in functional about balance and how important balances.  We know that in that when we go to a home that we, you know, the N the house in your neighborhood that everybody drives by, there might be three, there might be four that you drive by and you just look and you drive by and you exhale go. That's so pretty that, oh, look at that. Look, they put new paints and it just, it, every time you go, oh, that's just so great. 

Katie: You know, it just, so it just relaxes you when you drive past it. That's what we're looking for is, and, and it's, and when you say common sense, but yet, if it were common sense, it's obvious you can, it's, it's obvious when you see it. But the getting to, when you see it is that's the bridge, that functional gaps, that's the gap. That is the fengshui bridge of, of, of how we get from just a myth house and one that you go, oh, that's beautiful that you love pulling up to, or you love driving paths. It just makes your heart leap. It's a visual delight. And that is one of those things where you were talking about common sense. Many times people tell me I would go to their home to do a functionary consultation. And they go, well, that's just common sense. I said, so eight that the church common, you didn't see it. And it's like, wow. Yes. And sometimes people have to be shown the thing they weren't seeing that they, but that was understood that even though it was understood, yes, turning my desk around. So I have a nice solid wall behind me is common sense. But most people don't do it. Why Because they give priority and preference to the wires on their computer. Instead of getting a cord covered. 

Alice: A little bit guilty here, because the wires don't go across the room, which is not a very large room, but this way, everything is kind of towards one section versus, you know,  I've tried rearranging this so many different ways, and perhaps I need to have a functionary consultation on that. 

Katie: I'm ready to push you back to that wall behind you. 

Alice: Then there's a closet over here and then the windows on this side, and I've had it in front of the window, but then, then my back is to the door. So we can talk about that. So I know having, having your back to the door because they can come up behind you. 

Katie: Yeah. It's not that, it's not that it's the idea. Not that someones can come up behind you, but that you have a clear sight, a clear vision of what's ahead. That's what's most important about it. It's not that, you know, people talk about the whole neighbors over the stove thing, which you should never do. Yeah. Practical perspective. Like all red doors are off. Yeah. All red doors are good. Fengshui no, they're not anyhow. But, the idea is that, it's, you know, people say about the I'll finish the concept or the idea of the the stove with the mirror behind it. It doubles your food, your food, and all that. No, it doesn't. It just doubles the fire. And it's not an element that created double, what's. What's important though. I want to talk is obvious that you were talking about, you talked about the obvious, and it seems obvious, like what we're talking about here with the desk arrangement and with, with curb appeal, it's so obvious, you know, it's, they have nice plants, but the thing is those plants and the landscaping that they have that surrounding their home is imbalanced. 

Katie: There's shadow, there's not too much. There's not too much sunshine. There's not too much shade. Right. We've seen the houses that are all covered with trees and they have no grass growing because it's all covered in shade and they have dirt on it where the grass is supposed to be. And then we see other houses that have not shaved one, and they look dry and fried to a crisp. And then you drive by the house that you go, and they have a balance, right. Of light and shade, tall trees, medium shrubs, flowers, a nice patch of little grass, or what have you, you know, that kind of thing. So those things we can see are obvious, but yet we don't always see them in our own home. You know, the sharpest knife can't have its own handle. 

Alice: I actually had a client who did her landscaping. And then actually she was a vendor partner of mine. And she, she sent me photos cause she was freaking out. She spent all this money and her landscaping, she just didn't love it. And she didn't know why. And there were two things that I saw, one it's a very large, deep yard and everything was flat. So when you're talking about the balance, I said, you need some elevation because everything it's so deep that, and everything's at the same level, there's no visual interest there. You know So you need things that are a little bit taller and then things that are a little bit shorter, you know so that you can, your, I can visually dance through your yard, whereas everything right now, it's just so flat and boring, to say the least. So I totally understand that about ballet. 

Alice: Let's talk about the bedroom, for instance. funny, you should say about the mirror over the stove, but I remember some clients of mine who had mirrored wardrobe doors. I know that's kind of a taboo with funky way and these particular clients, they flipped their doors. When I went to go see their property. And at first, I was looking at the doors, like what's wrong with these And then I realized it's because they were inside out because they didn't want the reflection on their bed. Can you explain what the, what the no-no is regarding the reflection of the bed?

Katie: Sure. Yes. The idea is that your bedroom is always supposed to be a restful and peaceful place and mirrors are active and they also doubled the number of people in the room. So let's go, let's just start with talking about being peaceful and serene. We need rest enrollments in our bedroom. Most of the time, and mostly rests more than anything else, right We need sleep. Not that we don't eat romance, but think about rest. Russ does lead to romance because more people have sex on vacations and they do in their day to day world because they're rested and they're in a, in a place where they don't have to worry about, you know, feeding the cat, the laundry things for mowing the lawn or picking up the mail, that kind of thing. And so they get to rest. They in on vacation, you, you you're able to rest though. 

Katie: You feel more romantic. So that's why hotels get all the actions. But, but it's important how we look at our bedroom is in terms of the activity that goes on there. And it's important that it's rest. And when we have mirrors in there, we see movement, we see people, it doubles the people in the room, and that is not good for a relationship. And it's also not good to have this, activity or be able to see this motion and movement in the night. even if, even if you're, even if you're in bed and you're, you're asleep, it's, it's, it's still there. And so it's always better, to take those mirrors off or cover them. I love to peel and stick wallpaper. It gives you a way to cover it up. And then you don't have to do like curtains and get them out of the way. 

Katie: Peel and stick wallpaper is a terrific thing. It's on, it's off. You re you move out of your rental, it's over and done. And this allows you to be able to rest more, fully, more people have insomnia with those mirrors. Then, then w if they would just take them out of their bedroom, it also creates an interruption in the relationship and people won't understand why don't, I feel rested. And, I have a sister who also has a bedroom exactly like that, except the way her bedroom is arranged is the mirrors are directly in front of her. They, instead of being on the side, like many people love it. They are directly in front of her. I've told her, oh, and it's a rental. And I said, peel and stick. Did you hear that fuel is tissues I'm not going to stay here? I know. I'm like, if you put the peel and stick up, you'll find the new place you've been looking to buy a house. You're going to find a place. If you, if you commit and finally do something about it, you'll find the place. If you don't do anything about it, you're be stuck there forever. That's how it works. Right. But yeah, that's, that's so important to, to make sure that the bedroom doesn't have mirrors in it because it just. 

Alice: And then also, even if you're a single person having two nightstands on either side of the bed, correct. Versus one

Katie: You know, when we think about our bedroom and when we think about what's restful to us, what's restful to us is, is pairs life impairs because we are an assembly of peers. Are we not We have two arms, two eyes, two ears. You know, we are an assembly of Paris. And for us to see two things together is balanced. It looks harmonious. And if you have a bed that just has one nightstand, and I know that there's a decorative thing about, you know, not having matchy-matchy nightstands. I would say, if there's any place you want to do, it is in the bedroom and it is having matchy-matchy, it, it makes us more, it's more visually restful. And again, this is key. And that's what we want to do is have whether you're single or whether, or whether you're married is to have two matching nightstands and lamps and have equity and parody and, and balance and visual balance, because it's restful to us.

Alice: So what are your thoughts on having a bed frame Because I know there's been conversations about that versus just having a mattress let's say, on the ground or a mattress just on those metal bed frames that come with them from the mattress store. So rather than having an actual bed, what are your thoughts on that, unless you're camping.

Katie: Camping. Yeah, absolutely. And even then, I don't know that I sit on the ground there often. I always get this low of beds, but, yeah, no, it's so, you know,  that frame is perfectly fine. Here's what I find is missing many times. And this is, especially for people who are going to either buy a house or sell a house, especially for those, we're trying to sell a house. When you see a bed that doesn't have a headboard on it, it feels incomplete. It's it is an incomplete bed. So I'd like to see somebody that is raised up off the ground, that they don't have to get up off of the floor and to get out of number one, number two, it has a, a proper headboard, a headboard gives us support. And it's interesting. I gave a talk to a conference, a women's conference. It was a single woman's conference about dating. And I asked the women in the, in the conference and they're about 300 there that time. And I asked them, how many women here don't have a headboard, at least 50, if not 60% 

Alice: Really that's so interesting. 

Katie: Yes. And I said, if you want to support in your life, you need support at night, you need support in bed and so important just like your desk. We want a bed. That's going to, we're going to have a solid wall behind us. We have a nice headboard. That's supportive and comfortable. I'm not a fan of beds with the rails and all that, that can create headaches and that kind of thing. But whether it's your desk or your bed, you always want to have a nice, solid wall behind you, and you can see the door or insurance, clearly. And that's always going to be the best arrangement. Now, for people who are buying a house, they might not recognize it, but they will go, you'll go into a house. And, and you'll see, you'll, you're looking at houses and Tim and I moved to this house, two years ago. 

Katie: And, and, and we looked at so many houses, oh my gosh, well, there's just so many houses. And, and whenever I saw ahead have a bed without headboard, I just was like X. And you might not recognize that you feel like I don't like this house, but when you see a bed, especially in a master bedroom, that's a big selling. No, no. So if you want to sell your house, make sure you've got a proper headboard, even an inexpensive one. I think I bought, an inexpensive one for a guest room that I had because I had had an antique one. And I thought I'm gonna, I'm going to kind of stage the house when we were selling our last house. And, and I put it an expensive one up there, just so I would have one, cause I think the antique one was, it just was distracting. 

Katie: And I thought it would look more updated and you know, the house sold like that. But so to both buyers and sellers, that headboard is really important. And for everybody, there are so many ways that I think that fengshui can help, sellers find, you know, just the right combination of what will move their house quickly. I think it makes all the difference in the world. Especially if you do certain things like activating the lucky corner, which is always the corner that is diagonal to the door, across the room, and diagonal. And what that does is it visually creates it. It visually creates more space and it visually draws you into the room. It pulls you into the room instead of you standing at the room and you survey it and you go, eh, but if you've got something interesting in the corner, a tall lamp, a plant, something, and in the corner, it makes all the difference in the world. That's called the lucky corner. And you'll know it any time you walk into a room, there's usually one side of the room and it's opposite, whether it's to the left or the right, but it's that corner that draws your eye. And that's the lucky corner. And if that's activated with, like I said, with a nice lamp or something like that, and then it feels, it brings the viewer into the room. 

Alice: So we talked a little bit about curb appeal. Now I've had some experience where, the numbers of the addresses, the way they added up and I don't really fully understand it, but the way they added up, it could be good. Like it could be bad luck. Can you speak to that at all?

Katie: Numbers have really been coming up lately. It's interesting because I often say, training conferences, I used to hold that I was no longer functionally as east or west or south. I think of it in terms of numbers, but with regard to, to numbers and functional, I want, I want to talk about one in particular that you may have encountered, but, and, but I'll just say in general, really anything that ends in zeros is usually seen as more positive. There's not really any bad number out there. So I wouldn't worry too much about the number of the address. That's more numerology versus functional way, but if you have, so for instance, if you, if you are 8,000 Walnut avenue, something like that, then that is, considered a more positive address because it has more zeros behind it. So that I can say that. 

Katie: The other thing I want to address is the concept of the number four now, number four is this is a very common misconception in funks way. That is just here in the west. Now in the EAs and in Mandarin four is a homophone for death. So, so this is why Chinese families will not want to go to a home that is, you know, 4 64 Walnut or, you know, that kind of thing, because it's got 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, especially. Yeah, we're 44 0 4. Yeah. Any, anything if there Mandarin-speaking, it says to them, they hear death. And, but for us as, as if for English speaking or European, languages, it at four doesn't sound like death. And so that is a misconception here in the west. Now in, like I said, in China, you're not going to see, you know, the 14th floor in an office building, or, you know, sometimes maybe not the fourth floor, but yeah, well, I never paid attention to that. 

Katie: It's really, it's really, it's about whether you speak to the man or not, but that's really the big thing when it comes to addresses, you know, you know, I love to talk about curb appeal a little bit, because this is, this is where the magic happens at your home. And, and anybody can tell you how important especially realtors. It's those first impressions, that first chance when somebody drives up that you can make that beautiful impression it's that, you know, that little Robin's egg blue box with the white set, right. The ribbon we'll know, oh yeah, it looks dark. We don't even have to say the name, you know, yet to see it. And this is the same thing with our house. You want to make it, have that Juul box appearance that looks enticing. That is delightful in some, in some ways we need to have landscaping. 

Katie: That is, that is well balanced that you don't have just all trees on one side and no trees on the other, maybe have a tree. And if anything, you always want to have a little bit higher, trees on the left side of the house. As you're looking out the IM I can't say enough about landscaping. This. I like to talk about things in Fengshui that a lot of you don't hear a lot about, we hear a lot about clutter and we can talk about clutter, but, some of the things we don't hear about are things like cleaning the importance of beauty and, and landscaping, because like I was saying, all energy starts from the outside and goes in. So if you have, if you're surrounded by, you know, a junkyard, well, you're, nobody's expecting a palace inside, inside the front door, but if you have a lovely yard and it's, well-maintained, you have a pretty pathway, I call that. 

Katie: I call that your, your, your money path, that comes to your front door with maybe you have some flowers and, and the front door is a beautiful shade. So that's, that's a little bit different it's you don't want your front door really needs to stand out. That's the place that says welcome cheap, welcome buyers. And it is an opportunity to set the stage of expectation once you set to step inside the door. So I can't say enough about the curb, curb appeal, and the importance of investing in landscaping and investing in a good quality landscaping plan. You might want to do the work yourself, maybe it's safe. So, you know, if you've got a budget you've got to work with, but I hardly endorse getting a designer to help you create a cohesive and attractive looking landscape for your home, especially at the front, if you're trying to sell. Yeah. And especially the front, just for your own enjoyment. 

Alice: Absolutely. Every single day, when you come home, you want to be able to like, oh, this is my house. I'm so excited to be home versus that's so ugly. I don't even want to stare at it. 

Katie: Yes. It lifts the chief of the house. How's and it lifts your energy too, because one with our house, we're not separate from our house. Our, our body holds our spirit in our households, our body, it's just another layer going outward. And so that's, it's very important that what we see surrounding our house, I put as much design emphasis on my, on my landscape, in my home, as I do in my home. 

Alice: Well, and more so exactly what you're saying over this past year since everybody was home and we were sheltering in place, we are one with our home. We couldn't have been more one with our home. 

Katie: No, I know. I know. And doesn't it. And if COVID has shown us nothing else, it's shown us how important home is, how important places to us and that our homes aren't just a box. It's, it's a place of protection of safety and where we are our, our, our free itself. And it's, it's, it's really elevated how we look at our homes now. And I think that's a good thing. I, you know, there's the lining of this whole pandemic is, I mean, and look at what it's done for the economy, in terms of people putting all their money and effort and time, revamping. Yeah. I was going 

Alice: To say home improvement is an all-time high right now, which is great. 

Alice: Now, when you're talking about your curb appeal and then incorporating a color on your front door. Are there specific colors that have better luck have better have a specific meaning? Is there one that's better than another, in any particular case, or does it depend? 

Katie: Or does it would say that the best colors, the one that looks the best on your door and you know what that is So for instance if you have a red brick colonial home with white trim, nothing looks more beautiful than a shiny black door. And with that browse for hardware on it, you know what I'm saying It's just beautiful. If you have, if you have a, a white clabbered house, that's maybe a craftsman type bungalow, oh, I think a vibrant door looks fabulous, maybe turquoise or orange. You know, you can select colors by the direction that your house faces. In fact, and I have on my website, a color calculator that will, you can, you can use and to pick the exact color for your, your door direction. There is a fallacy about, there are myths out there that, red doors are great functional way and, and they are to some degree, but they can also be problematic for certain door directions. So just to say, blanket red is always a good door, color, or black is always a good color. I wouldn't say is, is accurate. We really want to use the colors that are going to make our house look good. And that I believe are suited well for, , the direction that your house faces. And there's usually a wide range that you can choose from. 

Alice: Okay. And then to figure out which direction our house spaces do, can we just stand in front of the art in front of our door with a compass and it'll, that pretty much tells us?

Katie: Yes. In fact, I was gonna say, I even have in my, my desk, this is what I recommend, that people use, not their smartphones, because your smartphone can sometimes give you very different readings. And I just use a simple little compass, like, like this camping compass, and you just hold it at, at the body, you know, mid-body level and you open your front door and you look out as you are the house. So from the front door, this is as your, like the house. And you're looking out toward the street and then you just take the measurement and that tells you the direction. So for instance, it's north 20 degrees, or, you know, south 182, whatever that is. And, and then you can select by, by the direction, colors that are suitable or, or best suited. And then you can choose, like, from that, from that the direction that your house faces, those colors, what will look best with your kind of house Now, there is one color that is, I call it the Fengshui beige and that's purple. Now I know not everybody wants a Barney. 

Alice: I was like, I don't know if I'm big on this purple door action, but.

Katie: No. I'm not either, but I actually have one that's plum. It's a rich plum and I have an ivory kind of colored brick and house, and it just stands out and it's not garish, but it's a, it's a rich and rich plum color that has a beautiful depth. But I think like Abra, Jean, that deep eggplant that's magnificent. anyhow, so those are, but that's, I think you've gives you a kind of some options to choose from, from the direction and in, within that, there are usually several different colors in that row, in the direction. 

Alice: I do love a color door though. And if you want your house to be memorable, a pretty colored front door is going to make everybody remember you versus typical white or you're black or you're brown or whatever. So let's talk about when you first enter into your home and I want to kind of address it from two ways. There are people who actually go through their front door, which I don't know if that's very often that people actually go through their front door, and then there's the garage entry. Right. Which is everybody goes through there, they enter through their garage because they parked their car and get out of the car and go through the garage. It seems to be, is there one versus the other that's better or is it taboo to do one or the other or, does it matter?

Katie: You know, I'm big on practicality, Alice. I, you know, It's like, you know, we park in the garage, we go in through the, through the back door, that's perfectly normal and perfectly acceptable, but the front door is always going to be your front door. The one that the architect intended is the mouth of cheese. That is the point at which all energy enters your home, whether you do or not is irrelevant. It's whether it's the energy that's coming through that door, you know So when you have guests who come to your house, they're going to ring the bell and they're going to be at your front door, the FedEx man, what you know, those are, that's an important area. When you decorated the holidays, you don't decorate your backdoor. You decorate your outdoor because it's the front of your house. It's the face of your house and it's the mouth of, of cheese. So this is one point at where all the, all the energy enters, you know, maybe you go, I go in and out of my front door to check my mailbox, that kind of thing. I go look at my plants, cut roses, or what have you. And, so I use both my front door and my back door in different ways, but it's always the front door is the priority, never the back door. 

Alice: Well, and just so people know the entry into your space is so very important because if anybody remembers a couple of years, not even a couple of years, been a while now, I'm in Vegas. Was it MGM that had the, was it the lion entry And that was the MGM lion. There was not one Chinese person that was willing to go through that entry. 

Katie: Interesting. A lot of people don't know is that Las Vegas will make more in the month of Chinese new year from all of the Asian, gamblers, Chicago they'll make more in, in the month of Chinese new year, then they'll make the rest of the year. And in the casinos, they have that much pull. And, and also gamblers, whether they're Asian or not are superstitious very soon and going into a mouth of a lion, you're going to get eaten even, the smallest school child can understand that symbology. Yes. So, you know, I actually have photographs of it before and then after, and the thing that they did a beautiful job with replacing that lion with a lion that looks stately yet relaxed, didn't look fierce. It looked, like, and it wasn't, it wasn't lying down. 

Katie: It was, it was up, it was standing up, but it's back in, was down like it was in repose. So I thought they did a really nice job, with that. But yes, your, your, your, your entrance really is so key. And I really liked the idea to have that visual balance. like we talked about with the bedrooms, especially if you're trying to sell your house. And that means having some type of a door guardian, and that can be like two potted plants, on either side of the door, because it says, look at the door when you have something on either side, it says, look at this, this is important. It also has an element of protection, the protective quality. When you see something flanking there, it's like, you know, the Swiss guards outside the Vatican in Vatican City, you see the Swiss guards standing there at the doors. And when you see that, you're you, the symbolism that goes around the world to everyone understands that, that concept of, of a door guardian on either side. And it says, this is important. And it also points toward the door. So I think really important for that, that curb appeal and also the way your house looks when you enter the house that four years. So what do you open up to, this is, this is another area where you have an opportunity to make a great impression. 

Alice: I wanted to ask you about that. Cause I did a little bit of research and I know this has been an ongoing conversation that I've had with a lot of, we have a lot of Asians, we have a large Asian population here where I live and the staircase in the center of the house as you, or the first thing that you see directly when you walk into the door, if you have stairs that go up, that tends to be bad luck. 

Katie: Well, it is an Asian thought for sure. And it's also in a Fengshui, thought the idea is as the energy just runs straight out the door. And so for that reason, many Asian families, when they see, a stair staircase that is directly opposite the front door, we'll just pass on that house and, and understandable. But what if you have enough room, it's not often as the case where you have a staircase, that's just right at the door, but sometimes it happens. I know because I lived in one of those houses. When we moved from Texas to North Carolina, they, this is a very common east coast type of arrangement where you have a staircase that may be, just three, four feet from the door. And one of the ways that you can kind of offset that is with a round rug, but yeah, staircases, you, you want to make sure that there's something to draw your eye away and put around drug between the staircase and the door, if possible. 

Katie: Cause that does, there is a tendency to have a cheat that runs out. The other thing you can do is to line the stairway with something that is, it draws your eyes up. So maybe you have a set of three prints, you know, have you seen those scenes that they break up into threes Maybe they have trees or something like that. You could stair-step that energy flows where the eye goes. And, and if you see this, if all you see is a stair landing, your eye goes out the door like where the store steer is pointing. But if you see it, go up to your eyes, go up, your inner, the energy goes up with it. So that's, that's another key thing. the other, I want to bring this back to mirrors too, because one of the things that's a, it's a big fallacy is to put a mirror opposite the door. 

Katie: this, if you have a mirror opposite the door, you're pushing money out. You're pushing, oh, we don't want to add, you know, all the energy. Yeah. It's you never want to open a door and see the mirror ever. And it's even if it, even if it's like a, you can see through to the house. If, if, if sometimes there's like a fireplace, that's another thing you don't want to see is a fireplace. You never want to have your eyes, go, go away from the house you, cause she needs to kind of flow that whenever she is moving fast. so if your vision moves fast, then she is moving fast. So for instance, if a big no-no is a door that is aligned with another door or a window, so sometimes you open a door and these houses, fishbowl houses all the way back, all the way through them. 

Katie: And if that's where your eye goes, that's where your money goes right out the window. And this is many people. What they'll do is they'll put curtains on the window. And I said, no, you need to block the view at the door in some manner. So for instance, I had a house in Austin, which pains me now, this house, if we sold it today, we would have made a fat half-million profit it's killing me, killing me, but, oh, well what do we do It's a beautiful home. And it had this arch foyer and an arch. And then this giant plate, glass windows, all across the back your eyes, as soon as you open, you had this sweeping view of everything in the house and, and your eyes went out the back, well, what did our money It just started flying through the house. And so what, so what we did was I put some doors that like, they were these two doors I could close. 

Katie: And so the energy would come in and, and then you could open the door and go in and you have the whole, you have the whole house to see because we lived in the house. We could see everything, not the FedEx man. Doesn't need to see all the pretty views I needed to see them in my living room. I didn't want like I said, the ups driver to see everything in the house. I, you know, I felt like it's also a privacy thing. So we want to slow down energy. If it moves too quickly, then that means our money could go out the door. And so we want to put, we want to try to block the view from near the door and block the view eye level. Some people will talk about hanging crystals and that kind of thing you can, but I would rather see somebody have like a, if they have a beautiful entrance, maybe they have a round table with a pretty floral arrangement so that your eye stops at the floral arrangement. 

Alice: Exactly what we're doing at a plan's house, where they, you go through the front door and yes, you can see through the back cause they're sliders in the back that go to the backyard and we've ordered a nice round at your table, but because we're in 2021 during a pandemic, getting things in a timely fashion is, you know, that's a whole nother subject. So the plan is to have a table there and that's, what's going to stop the energy. Cause there's this nice big, expansive hallway, but it's too big and expansive. And then again, you're, you're being able to see, it's nice when you walk in, you're like, oh, look, what's beyond you. But like you're saying, there's nothing stopping the energy. And it's a little too chaotic. 

Katie: We want energy to move like, you know, sort of like a trickling brook, you know, not a giant river, you know, that that's, you know, white rapids and that's for vacation, you know, that's for fun, you know, whitewater rafting, but not for your energy in your house. You know, you bring up a good point about COVID, you know, there's a lot of fatigue, out there. COVID fatigue, pandemic fatigue, working from home, adjusting to that. and you had, you know, when we were talking originally, you had asked that you know, people want to feel kind of law in their home and what could they do And I just want to say one of them, one of the quickest, easiest things that you can do is flowers, you know, add fresh flowers. I make sure that when I go to the grocery store each week, that flowers are always in, in my shopping basket. 

Katie: I make sure I'm going to reach for just a moment on my desk. I have a little that says these beautiful roses from my garden. I can't say enough. I planted so many, roses in our yard this past year. We did landscaping, but flowers are one way that can perk, perk up the energy. The other thing is to find all flaws, look for flaws. And that means there's maybe, maybe you were trying to kick your shoes off when you walked in the door and you accidentally threw a shoe and it scuffed your paint and they, every time you walk in the door, you see that stuff on the wall every time. But do you paint it Do you clean it No. Look for those things, chips in the woodwork, maybe you got paint chips, touch it up, retouch up, scuffs on the wall, fix and squeaky hinges. 

Katie: That kind of thing. Just fix all the flaws, little, those little tiny details. Those things have an amazing impact on our energy day by day. There it's that drip, drip, drip of little things that we, because our eye goes to the imperfection first, always. And if we remove that imperfection, then our Iris on things of beauty, like flowers and in, in our house, the other thing that people can do, if they're really suffering from just burnout over the phone, I'm getting a lot of emails about that. I, I would suggest that everyone just take all their pictures off the wall and hang them in completely different places. We get where we no longer see our homes anymore. And that means we don't see ourselves that, that we become this, this blurred vision, this gray mass, you know, that's how life feels and it's, and, and when you change the artwork on the wall and put it into new places, you see new things and you see it in new ways. And I, I can't say, how important that is for, just getting a new, a new perspective can really change your outlook. 

Alice: Yeah, no, I agree. That's why a lot of times, you're not able to see your home for what it is, and having a neutral third party, come in and say, Hey, listen, we need to change this, this and this. because they don't see your house every day. You're kind of on autopilot, right It's like, you're getting in your car and you're driving. And I do this all the time. I get in the car and I start driving in a direction that I'm used to going. And I'm like, where am I going this is not even where I'm going to get here. 

Katie: Did aliens take me? How did I get here? You're just so, yeah. 

Alice: Then doing, checking off those to-do lists makes me feel so good. As for me, I love it. Like, and I'm not saying that I'm great at doing it all the time, but there are those pending things like, oh, I gotta get this done. I gotta get this done. And then when you finally actually take the time to do it, like yesterday, I just did my ring doorbell. It had been offline for a while because I had changed the password, the wifi password, I was too lazy to, if the tool, you know, unscrew it, take it out and do the thing. And then I did it and I was like, Ooh, look at that. 

Katie: Hey, there you go. Yeah. Things like that. I like that ice cream that comes in a plastic container with a screw-on lid. 

Katie: I wasn't going to name brands, but, that's the one and I'll to caramel calls my name, but, you know, get some porcelain, some paint in there, go to the dollar store and get a little set of inexpensive brushes, port, get a couple of those, you know, it gives you an excuse to eat ice cream, you know, so go eat some ice cream, several, several, pints of it and get your paint and get your, your trim paint, and a couple of, a tray. Maybe, maybe get some WD 40 and, and just go from room to room and just look at, you know, I have a, I have a bathroom door and, after this call, I am going to go because it's got a squeak and it's been bugging me. And, it's just recently popped up and I'm going to go get it after this because, it just reminded me of that, but go and go room by room and look for little scuffs and chips and things like that, squeaks and, and, and fix it right then. And there, it feels so gratifying. 

Alice: I agree. So now I'm not sure what the market is like where you currently live, which is in Texas or where we're in Texas are you?

Katie: I'm on the Gulf coast. I'm halfway between Houston and, Brownsville. 

Alice: Okay. So it's a hot market across the country. I'm assuming that it's probably pretty hot where you are also, it's insane. Actually, everybody is in the same boat, but if for some reason, somebody was trying to sell their home and in this hot market, they were having some challenges, getting it sold and price point, not being one of those factors, because if you're, you know, too aggressively priced, that's a whole nother conversation, but let's just say that they're having a hard time selling their property, even in this hot market. What are some things that they should probably look at as possible issues that they're having And then I want to also say that with everything that we're bringing up as concerns or functional issues, there's a remedy for every little thing that comes up? Right So there, and usually we've spoken about that. Like, you know, changing the energy, bringing in some tables, bringing in an area, rug, diverting your attention to elsewhere. So with respect to a property that may be having some challenges being sold, what are some things that they might want to look at as potential remedies 

Katie: Yeah. So what's important is that any buyer potential buyer can see the house and too often they see stuff. And this is the hat collection. The live love, laugh, you know, signs or something like that. It's like things all over. And it's an, and what happens is that's distracting. I think what we want to do is sort of neutralizing our environment. And I always feel like if you're ready to go, then start, start going. And my advice is usually there's too much stuff. And here's what has to happen in order for a house to sell. It has to have a, what makes a house sell is a fire. Fire creates earth is real estate, right And fire create fire creates earth. And fire is sales. Fires is fire is money and success and it's moving and it's active and it, and how do we kill a fire 

Katie: We smother it. And the fire is also related to the eyes and the heart. And if you want to kill a fire, you just smother it with a blanket. Something like that, the way we kill a fire or sale is we ha we smother it with stuff. We have packed closets. We have too many knick-knacks everywhere. There's not, we need to see our eyes need to be able to move clearly and cleanly along all the surfaces and along the walls. And to see the house, some stuff is nice. Obviously, we need to look like it's lived in, but I recommend that most people take the time and trouble to pack up 25 or 30% of their stuff. If you're ready to get going, then start going, and this will help the sale get going time and time. Again, the thing that I see that hinders people most of the time is that the FA sales are being smothered by too much stuff. 

Katie: The other thing is flaws. what might be an endearing crack to you in the, in the, in the wall, you know, is not endearing too, to a potential barrier. And so, you know, and the cabinet that squeaks and people open cabinets and, you know, have some order in, in making sure that there's ordering your closets, that, you know, I went to a house and, it looked really nice. And then I opened the garage door. I mean, rammed to the rafters and it's like, oh, okay. And out of balance, yes. Right. That's fun. Twice balanced. The best thing you can do when you want to sell your house is rent a storage room because we have to have more air and we have to have more movement of the eye in the, in the house. And then the ability to see the house. The other thing that we want to look for are leaks, and this could be, maybe you have a dripping faucet. 

Katie: Maybe you have a hose bib outside. That's that's dripping. we want to make sure that there's no water leakage anywhere. So tighten up everything. If you've got a toilet that starts running, because it's got a leak the, in the tank, fix that. So fix those flaws, make some space so people can actually see the house. And the other thing is, make it pretty, you know, and this is where people like you and stagers come in that make houses look beautiful. Put the time in the, in the effort, into the whole environment and especially, you know, things like the kitchen, you know, I, you know, you know, I, I will, I saw some, no mine cabinets from the, you know, I think the early eighties, I was going to say granite tops, but they had granite tops. That doesn't seem right. Does it, they replaced the one thing with lamb.

Alice: And placing the other. Yeah. So it was a quick fix, but let's fix this one problem. And I have a hard time with that when people say, oh, let's just change the countertop. But then your, your cabinet, your vanity cavity, your kitchen cabinets are junk. Let's w it has to go together. As you said, it has to be balanced. 

Katie: Correct. And there's what I call the clean, dirty paradigm. And that is, it looks clean, but it's really dirty when you get really close and you look, everything looks neat, but when you get really close, there's an inch thick layer of dust and grime. That's a big turnoff, I can't say enough about the need for clean. Yes. We need to have, our house deep cleaned. I recommend getting the CA the, the rug shampooed, you know Yeah. And only steamed, you know, you don't want any detergents used on it cause that just attracts more dirt. Anyhow. I'm, I'm a big proponent of Stanley steamer at any rate. I think that cleaning is a big concept. You know, that I think gets swept up with a rug, deep cleaning. You smell it. You can feel it. And you don't look somewhere and you look behind the door and there are dust bunnies, the size of Dallas, you know, it's not good.

Alice: Not, not cute. I know you couldn't pay me a better compliment than to say that my house is clean because I take pride in that. Like, you can tell me that I'm I look good. I smell good. But if you tell me my house is good, I'm happy. 

Katie: Feel we, there's no better way to explain how what, what that feeling is than when you've had your home freshly. It's been freshly cleaned either by you or someone else. And you walk through it, you've just put away the mop or the dust cloth, or, and you've put away everything and you look around you go, 

Alice: Yeah, you just breathe a sigh of relief. It's like, it's so satisfying. 

Katie: There we, we have a need for that. And, and, and dust and grime are bad. It's the accumulation of dust and grime and its negative energy and it needs to be removed. And so get your house higher. they have, services like, you know, different, cleaning services that do move. They do move-in services will they'll come and clean your house before you move in. They'll also do it when you're getting ready to sell. So call someone and say, I need a good thorough cleaning. And, and you know, if it's too much time and trouble for you, you, you can hire them. 

Alice: It absolutely can. And you probably should, because I've always said not everyone's a good housekeeper and that's okay. That's why there are people who do this on a professional level that can come in and do it better, faster, and it's worth every penny. Okay. Yes. You have to squash this for me because one of my biggest pet peeves is when people leave, not the toilet seat up the whole lid up. So when you go into a bathroom, I keep my toilet seat covered at all times, unless I'm using it. Okay. But when I did using it, I close it, flush it, move along. I cannot stand when I see MLS photos with the lid up. So it's a combination of faults, right Whether it's the homeowner, the realtor, or the photographer, somebody didn't do their job to make sure that that little detail, nobody wants to look into a hole. Okay. So am I crazy or is that how it best way to the nth degree. 

Katie: I always, I, you know, when it comes to, when it comes to, toilets, rather than up and down, I say they're either open or closed and it's better than they're closed and closed at the, at the toilet and closed at the door and just keep, just keep, just keep them closed. A lot of people worry, oh, I've got a phone, I've got a bathroom in this corner of that corner. It's hurting my career, my money, my relationship, or whatever. Well, I wouldn't want to do without indoor plumbing. And, and sometimes, sometimes bathrooms can actually solve some, some problems. And, and that's not something we hear much about with Fengshui, but it's true. There are some times that there are energies from year to year, month to month that, toilets can do some, some great Fengshui work. So, they're great to have, but it's just how they're treated. Just, you know, close the door. Don't put big lots of plants in there, that kind of thing. that's really, you don't want to, you just don't want to make an, a shrine, a decorative shrine in, in your bathroom. It's just, it's, it does its function and that's what it needs to do. And just keep the door, the toilet closed. 

Alice: Thank you. Thank you very much. I appreciate you saying that. Okay. I can talk to you forever because there are so many different aspects of Fengshui that we can get into. Where's the best place for people to find you and find out all the knowledge you have about different aspects and functionally applies to not just home selling and homes in general, but you know, financial reasons or romance business for all kinds of stuff. So what is one crazy thing that's happened to you over this past year 

Katie: You know, it didn't really happen to me. It happened to my husband, actually, of all things. he has, he's been in the pharmaceutical development field for a long time. And, he got an offer last year, right. As the pandemic was coming out and it was to work for them, one of the main manufacturers of the COVID vaccines. And so we have been up to here with, with COVID and clearly, but I was like, how, how interesting is that It's like, right as it was all kind of coming out, it happened. I think it was, he was in talks with them, like right in April. And then at the end of May, he was working for this company that makes them a dharna shot and one other one. and I can't re I, I always the two confused whether it's Pfizer or Lilly or J and J J and J anyhow, but, but yeah, manufacturing, the, and so I've been hearing about glass vials, you know, when you think about all the glass it's going to take to make a billion glass vials or 2 billion, right. It's like better save those pickle jars. 

Alice: Oh my goodness. Yeah. You know, it's, there's some industry that has been impacted very positively during this whole pandemic and there are others that obviously negatively, but as Leslie glass has never seen so much, has never had this much attention in their whole entire lives. And all of a sudden, you know, they're everywhere. Where can people find you online?

Katie: They can find me at redlotusletter.com. So red, like the color Lotus, like the flower and letter, like what you put in the mail, where you see.com. And, but I also have an offer for anyone who is looking to sell their house. Maybe you have some, some listeners, and I, it's a, it's a free report and they can go to Bitly, which is B I T dot L Y forward-slash sell house FS it's bitly/sellhousefs.

Alice: We'll include that in the show notes so that people can grab free reports because I'm sure there's plenty of information in there that will help them.

Katie: It's been so much fun. Thank you for having me.