Sacred Design Tips: Lighting

Lighting can make or break our bedroom experience. Proper lighting is especially important in creating an environment of relaxation and comfort. The ideal lighting casts a warm glow and envelops all in a soft, golden light. Dimmer switches that allow a range from soft to bright are always good. Side lighting is practical and convenient. Putting small soft-light lamps on either side of the bed can create an intimate atmosphere perfect for nighttime chatting or reading, and for late night trips to the bathroom. Family reading may call for additional task lighting, for which floor lamps are ideal. The key is having just enough light so that reading won’t strain the eyes, but not so much light that our inner circadian rhythms are thrown off or we feel like we’re in K-Mart. Whether we notice it or not, we humans are extremely sensitive to light and our body responds to the brightening or softening of the light around us. Gradually turning down our bedroom lights with a dimmer switch as bedtime approaches signals our body that it is time to rest.

Just before going to sleep, you may choose to turn off all of your bedroom lights, and rely solely on candlelight, the softest and most therapeutic light one can bring into a bedroom.

Sacred Design Tips: Textiles

As with furniture, so with textiles and bed accessories. We ought to pay as much attention to what we wrap around our bodies as to what we put into them. Most of us unwittingly wrap or cover ourselves in materials that have been heavily treated with toxic pesticides. Traditionally, cotton sheets are the norm for bedding. They are more body-friendly, comfortable and of better quality than synthetic fabrics. But shockingly, in the United States, one fourth of all pesticides used are applied to one crop – cotton. Roughly a third of a pound of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides are used to grow enough cotton for a t-shirt. (sustainablecotton.org) And cotton grown in third world countries isn’t much better. Scary, isn’t it?
So support healthy, eco-friendly cotton and reduce the health risks for your family by purchasing organic cotton sheets and clothing. A number of organic cotton sheet sets with thread counts of over 300 are available for under $100. And 1000 thread count organic sets are available for the luxury shopper as well. Finding them is as easy as heading to Bed Bath and Beyond, or going online. Either way, it’s worth the trip and the extra expense.

Cheap carpeting and bed accessory fabrics are harsh on the body. They disturb the subconscious and creates disharmony, making you feel less than completely relaxed. Part of this effect is the quality itself. Another part of it is the message you give to yourself when you buy inferior bedroom items. You’re basically saying, “You’re not worth the extra expense.” So always invest in quality when it comes to bedroom carpets, blankets, sheets, pillows and pillowcases. You don’t have to buy absolutely top of the line. But buy quality. Your comfort and well-being are worth a little extra expense. The difference between cheap items and quality items monetarily is affordable, and its noticeable.

By choosing textiles imbued with spirit and purpose, materials that are soft and touchable, and surrounding ourselves with plush pillows and bedding, we are creating our own version of a cradle. This safe, soft space is vital to making the family bedroom a place for gathering. In order to encourage our children to share our bedroom with us, why not try making the bed a bit more accessible? If your small child is walking, a small step stool conveys the message that their presence in bed is important. Plenty of pillows and family friendly bedding ensure that children will always feel welcome.

Sacred Design Tips for the bedroom

First it’s important to know the purpose of each room for you and your family. What does each room mean to you? What experiences will you be having there? What activities will be occurring there? What do you want your family, your guests to feel there?

In designing any room, select every item with your eye and your gut. Let each item have a specific reason or purpose, and evoke memories, moods or feelings that nourish you. Every item should be an anchor for something. Items that have no meaning for you, that don’t have a pleasing effect on you, don’t belong there.

What feelings and impressions do you want to greet you when you enter your bedroom? What objects, images, colors, motifs might give you the feelings described above, the feelings you long for? Before making any final decisions, do research and investigate options. Go to furniture stores, antique stores, art stores. Surf the web and see what’s available. Trust your intuition. Rely on serendipity and synchronicity. Get advice from people whose knowledge, taste and opinions you trust. Use the resources available to you. But trust your gut for all final decisions. Never go against it because it never lies.
The following tips will help you create an ideal environment for your bedroom or any other room. Let’s take a look at the bedroom from the center outward, starting with the bed, and considering other essential elements in turn.

The Bed

Our bed can express our personality, our artistic and aesthetic nature, and our true self in its most basic and elemental form. It can suffuse our body, mind and spirit with a calmness that is biophysical and sacred. Many of us have had profound spiritual experiences in our beds, in dreams, in reveries, in love.
In choosing our bed, it is important to place our attention and intention on every element of which it is composed, from the wood that your headboard is carved from, to the mattress you will lie on, to the sheets and blankets that will enfold you, and cover, drape and give shape to your bed. The only rules for creating your bedroom, and choosing your bed, is to listen to and respect your feelings, needs, desires and tastes, do the necessary research and investigation to find out and learn what you don’t that can make the difference, and then set your conscious intentions according to the vision that emerges in you out of all this.

My family’s bed is the center of our room, and in many ways the center of our family life. It is large, made from two large beautiful teak doors removed in the renovation of a Hindu temple. Thousands of worshippers over generations walked in and out of the temple through these doors that are now the footboard and headboard of our bed. So this bed has great meaning for both of us. What kind of bed would have the most meaning for you. My guess is that you will know it when you see it.
Furniture

Furniture is affordable and easy to buy in any of a number of furniture outlets and retailers like Pottery Barn, West Elm, and Ikea. Most of it is mass-produced in less than ideal environments by low-paid assembly line workers in batches of thousands in large overseas factories that have no independent oversight in terms of quality control, health and safety conditions for workers, and more. Much of it is typically made from low-grade materials treated with toxic chemicals. The furniture may be visually pleasing and even well-constructed. But I believe the environment and conditions under which it made leaves an energetic imprint on the furniture itself. Not to mention that the toxic chemicals often used in making such furniture leak into the surrounding atmosphere of our home. (Toxic home-environments is a growing health concern.) For all these reasons, and especially for your bedroom in which you spend more time than in any other room in the house), I recommend buying high quality furniture made by craftsmen without the use of toxic chemicals. For your sake and the sake of your family, every item and bit of energy in each bedroom should be positive, peaceful, healthy and pure.

Altar Your Space to release November 1st

Make your home your sanctuary! Jagatjoti Singh Khalsa, designer and founder of Tara Home, shows how simple furnishings like a hand-carved wooden chair, a stone statue of Ganesh, colorful silk pillows or graceful translucent curtans can transform a basic room onto an oasis of beauty, harmony and grace.

The full-color richly illustrated book uses bold examples of transformed homes to show how to infuse your home with awareness and fullness.

By joining spirit and purpose, your home will become a sacred place where form and function blend into a unique, life-affirming haven. With 150 full-color photographs by Jagatjoti and Mike Goedecke, Altar Your Space illuminates how small changes and a new perspective can create a more radiant life.

The book will be available soon in bookstores as well as at Tara Home in Venice, Calif. Or place your order directly from Mandala Publishing now.

"Wherever there is a touch of color, a note of a song, grace in a form, this is our call to love." - Rabindranath Tagore

Book Release Party

Sign up now to be on the exclusive guest list for the launch party. The party will be Hosted by Joely Fisher, friend and client of Tara Home and Jagatjoti’s and will be between 7-11:00 pm on November 7th 2007.

Organic Wine and herbal martini’s and Hors D'oeuvres will be served and some of LA’s great DJ’s will be spinning. Jagatjoti will be here to sign copies of your book.


Sign up to be a guest at info@tara-home.com