Year of the Rat Resolutions

I myself am happy to be moving into another animal year. The pig year was okay but there’s something about the rat and its new beginnings that I’m anticipating with hope and excitement. The rat is the beginning of the Chinese twelve-year animal cycle so it's an especially New Year. Chinese New Year’s day is February 7 this year, so it means there’s still time to refine, or make, January 1st resolutions if you haven't done so already.

Traditionally, the Chinese clean their homes, pay all their bills, make amends with anyone they’ve harmed, buy a new outfit and celebrate for two weeks until the New Year culminates on February 21 when they celebrate the Lantern Festival. It’s the biggest holiday they have. Sadly, if you’ve watched the news, snow has hit some areas in China very hard making it difficult for migrant workers to get back to their families for this important celebration. I’ve been taking to heart what I can do to mark this passage, and here are a few things I’m going to do before February 7th:

1. I’m going to go to Patina to buy a decorative box and remove everything off my desk. Everything. Most of the time anyone coming into my office would say it's pretty organized. However, I have projects stacked into piles; I’ve got things I want to consider in the future in another pile; there are some decorative cards people have sent me which I’ve propped up; I’ve got a small area of trinkets. It’s all annoying me so it's going to be gone for these two weeks. I’ll just have to dig through the box to find what I want. This will be inconvenient, but will force the need to file better.
2. I’m going to take clothes I don’t wear but always think I will to the closet in the lower level and let them hang there. I want to get down to the actual pieces that matter and see where to go from there. This will be frightening since I already think I have nothing to wear.
3. I’m going to bless my house in some fashion on each of the 14 days. I may do some specific rituals; I may visualize I’m blessing the space; I may enlist my husband. This will be comforting.

What better example of implementing Feng Shui than by moving things along, making room for something new, honoring what you have. Elaine has a word for this----she calls it guerilla Feng Shui—it’s drastic, obvious, and in my face. But it’s a new year, a new time, and I’m ready.