… and it’s a little bit scary.
The way my main room is now set up is: There are two doors that get you into the room (both are open doorways). One is from the kitchen, and one is from the hallway that leads to my front door. As it stands now, my desk (which I put together myself – I ROCK) stands against the wall across from my bed, which is a great spot for it theoretically, except for the fact that when I sit at the desk, I can look to my left, out the doorway, and see all the way to the front door.
Now, I’m not a feng shui expert, and I don’t even know what I’m talking about here, but I do know this: I rarely feel like sitting at my desk. There’s something about the configuration of it, there’s something about being able to see the front door at all times which just … doesn’t … work. I want my desk to be a place where I can sit, and work. My apartment is small, but I have enough wiggle-room to know that the desk needs to be moved.
I know where it must be moved: to the wall where my Bookshelf # 6 now stands. If my desk is there, then there is no doorway leading outward, to the left or right hand side. My desk will be up against the wall, and my back will be to the rest of the room, and something about that configuration in my mind is very pleasing and right to me.
Call it feng shui, call it spatial relations, call it whatever you want to call it … I feel distinctly restless when I sit at my desk now. I do not think that you should always have a view of your own front door in the very place where you want to lose yourself in your work. No. It’s too tempting. The energy is wrong. The front door summons me in moments of writer’s block: “Come! It’s a beautiful day! Leave the apartment! Go!”
I get weird about change, though … and this will be a rather huge project. I must remove all the books from Bookshelf #6, pull it away from the wall to make room, and then empty my entire desk (of my computer, my plants, my office supplies) – and then move the massive desk to the other wall.
I need help.
My friend Jen is coming over to help me re-arrange everything. I feel strangely nervous but strangely excited. A new outlook, a new perspective, and hopefully a feng shui-approved workspace will now be set up.
I moved some of my books into storage, in anticipation of my move. And I’m finding it very hard to work in my apartment without them. It’s like a vital organ being in storage. I can’t consult the 12000 things I need to consult before getting down to business.
Oh boy, my territory! Oddly enough, a principle tenet of feng shui is that you’re supposed to see the door from your desk (or bed), so as to dissipate the feared sense of “Is someone staring at me and I don’t know it?” However, I agree with you that looking at an exit is like being summoned to play. With the desk facing the wall, it’s all about the things on the wall in front of you, and I am a firm believer in something that allows you to “take a trip” when you look at it, transport yourself into that environment and take a walk. For years I had an Ansel Adams poster of Yosemite which beckoned me to delightful walks down forresty, sun-dappled paths. For about five years I had a watercolor of a sun-drenched adobe village through which I often meandered. How I loved that village!
To get rid of the “I wonder if someone’s staring at the back of my neck” question, the feng shui fix is to place a small mirror where you can glimpse movement at the door while facing away from it, but not have it be your focal point.
Now I would get the heebie jeebies if I couldn’t see the door while sitting at my desk. It all comes from associating with the wrong sort of people in my youth. Most of my karate instructors were prison guards, and most of those who weren’t were cops, and ex-Marines at that. My favorite instructor (guard) used to say that his wife always bugged him about having to sit where he could see the door in a restaurant. She said that even if some guy came in and sprayed them with lead, there was nothing he could do about it. His response was that at least he could tell her what had happened while they were waiting for St. Peter to show up with the keys. His paranoia rubbed off on me at that young age, and now I can’t comfortably sit with my back to a door.
Bookshelf #6 is the one with the novels with Fabio on the covers – right?
Sheila, how do you react to windows?
I think if you actually have a HOUSE with many ROOMS – then having a desk with the view of the door (which leads out to the rest of the house) is fine and good. But when you only have one room (like I do) … and the desk faces the door going OUTSIDE … it just made me feel like I couldn’t work there.
My desk is now flush against an interior wall. And it feels much more like a valid work space.