A screenshot of Brad Pitt's Voom Portrait by Robert Wilson played on a massive plasma TV screen.

Back in China thousands of years ago,  feng shui developed as a means to better survival and well-being.  Sadly they did not have plasma screen TV’s back then, so the official feng shui word on the television and electronics has only arrived in the last relative handful of years.  So, how can you blend your TV into your environment in a healthy, feng shui way???  

A piece of Johnny Depp's Voom Portrait displayed on a plasma screen tv.

I don’t own a TV. Perhaps that speaks volumes in terms of answering this question.  It all goes back to 2007, when I managed an art gallery in Los Angeles that featured Robert Wilson’s Voom Portraits.  About 15,000 sq feet of space was carefully designed to hold about fifty plasma screens that “played” video portraits all day. From the minute the screens turned on in the morning my nerves started to fry, and by the end of the day, I’d be driving home with an insane, aural migraine, sort of twitching from the waves I had been soaking in all day.  So… my massive meltdown really made me think: what do TV’s and electronics do to your feng shui at home???

Televisions cast a ton of EMF “rays” into your home. Even if  televisions are not turned ON, they are pumping out EMF’s. Same with all of your electronics, constantly discharging electromagnetic waves.  In addition, TV’s add the feng shui elemental nature of metal and fire in excess to your environment;  they captivate, they fix attention and  they even hypnotize.  There are a list of other reasons why TV’s are not the best feng shui: subliminal messages are pumped into your environment as the programming plays, there is intense violence on display, they lend the suggestion of an escape from present time to your home even when they are off (the TV acts as “the great escape), they pull your focus in a room to the screen rather than something symbolically or structurally meaningful, they generate disjointed through patterns, they disrupt a gathering space and break down meaningful connections within the space…and on and on….

The catch: I LOVE TV! I am betting you may love TV as well.

The safest ways to have a TV in your home:

• avoid placing one in the bedroom at all costs
• keep it unplugged when you are not watching it
• try to keep lots of plants in the room where you TV is located
• & do not leave it on when you are not actually at least partially watching it (it is not a white noise machine!)

Also: I will say the same little rules apply to computers and other large electronics, though large desktops are difficult to unplug/replug.

One little tip: If you are really sensitive to electricity or have babies or young children at home, you might want to try a home EMF blocker.   I will not pretend that I know how it works, but I can say that I noticed a difference within hours after I have plugged it into outlets in every home I have lived in, and thats significant.  If its a placebo effect, I can say it was a worthwhile placebo!

Ok, now I can go finish watching Top Chef… xoxo Dana