7 Simple Steps to Turn Your Home Into a Healing Sanctuary + a Bonus Healthy Home Checklist

It’s no secret that we are spending more time than ever inside our homes… 

With uncertainty from the pandemic and more of us working virtually, now is a great time to make some simple changes that can create a healthier environment for you and your loved ones!

What are some of the benefits of creating a healthy home? 

Having a calm, ordered space that promotes healing improves our sleep, energy, and focus. In fact, it improves our entire well-being. Not only do we feel more levelheaded and have more clarity when our environment promotes healing, but we also feel more at peace and more grounded.

At The Living Proof Institute, we believe that healing begins in your home. 

Think about it: You might spend anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour in your doctor’s office to “get healthy,” but it’s what you do when you leave the doctor that matters most . . .  

And most of what you do happens in your home. That’s why your home should be set up to be a healing sanctuary! 

But if the thought of beginning your home transformation leaves you feeling more STRESSED than INSPIRED, begin with these simple steps.

 

7 Simple Steps to Turn Your Home into a Healing Sanctuary:

1. Start with One Room at a Time: The goal of this process is NOT to overwhelm yourself. Instead, meet yourself where you’re at. The best way to do that is to simply start with one room and move forward.

Actionable Success Strategies:

• When choosing your room, pick the one that you spend the most time in, the one that is MOST in need of care, or even the one that you think will be the EASIEST to complete. 
• Once you pick your room, search for inspiration! The internet (especially Pinterest) is a great place to start if you need some ideas on how you want your peaceful space to look.
• If doing a whole room seems overwhelming, start with just one space or corner.

 

2. Declutter that Room: Begin with ONE spot and then move onto the next. In the kitchen, that might be the pantry or the fridge, gradually making your way across the entire room. 

Actionable Success Strategies:

• Empty the entire space and focus on decluttering. Get rid of items that no longer serve you. In the kitchen, this would be food that is expired or processed, as well as old, damaged, or toxic cookware/storage pieces. Then restock the space one item at a time with healthy foods and key cookware/storage pieces.

• If you don’t have a large amount of time to devote to this, you can set a timer (for example, 10 minutes) and go through that space getting rid of whatever you DON’T NEED or USE.
• When decluttering, consider the Marie Kondo method. Pick up each item and ask: Does this bring me joy? If the answer is YES, keep it. If NO, consider getting rid of it. 
• When removing items from your home, you don’t have to throw everything in the garbage. You might be able to donate some items or give them to a friend. You can even post online (such as Facebook buy and sell groups) and make a little cash off the things you no longer need or use!

 

3. Optimize the Energy Flow: Practice the principles of Feng Shui, which is all about increasing the energy flow in your home. One of the simplest ways to do this is to space the furniture out 2-3 inches from the wall. 

Actionable Success Strategies:

• Again, you don’t need to overwhelm yourself. Start with ONE room or even ONE corner, then move forward at your convenience. 
• Use a Bagua Map, which is a Feng Shui principle that divides your home into quadrants. Each quadrant should have a specific purpose or energy. For example, our front door is our Career quadrant, and we enhance that energy by having an element of black (black floor tiles). For you, it could be as simple as adding a black floor mat. 
• To learn more about Feng Shui, listen to this podcast.

 

4. Start to Eliminate Toxic Products in That Room: As you go through this process, you might be surprised at how many toxic products you have in each room. The kitchen is a great place to start. Get rid of processed food that no longer serves you in your pantry and fridge. 

The same goes for toxic cleaning products. If you need to, get rid of those things slowly. Once an item is used up, replace it with a natural product until that entire room is toxin-free. 

Actionable Success Strategies:

• Avoid plastic. Stop buying plastic water bottles and food storage containers, and swap out your most-used pieces for glass or stainless steel. Remember, plastic that is chipped or cracked is probably leaking chemicals into your food!
• Invest in a great water filtration system. We use the Berkey water filter. Berkey water filters filter out organophosphates, pesticides, and fluoride. Today, chemicals are used in so many things (pesticides, cleaning products, personal care products, and even the drugs people are on) and it ALL ends up in your water.
• What kind of cookware are you using? Teflon pans create a lot of toxins. Swap out the key pieces that you use every day for stainless steel, cast iron, or ceramic pans. 

 

5. Replace Toxic Products with Natural Products: Are you currently using conventional cleaning and personal care products? If so, replace them with natural products or even make your own! 

Actionable Success Strategies:

• Go fragrance-free. One of the MOST toxic ingredients in cleaning and personal care products is fragrance. Even if that product isn’t coming in contact with your skin, you are inhaling it. If you enjoy fragrances around your home or as perfume, swap with diluted essential oils instead! I like Doterra oils. 
• When replacing conventional products, opt for natural or plant-based alternatives. I like Method, Greenworks, and US Thrive Market. The Detox Market is a great place to get natural personal care products. 
  • You can also make your own cleaning products using baking soda and vinegar. This is a cost-effective, simple, chemical-free solution to keep toxins out of your home! You can also dilute lemon essential oil and clean with it.
  • Not sure about the toxicity level of your cosmetics? EWG’s Skin Deep is a great website where you can enter any personal care product and get a toxicity rating. Pay special attention to the ratings of the ingredients used. Sometimes the product itself has an average rating (5-6), but certain ingredients in it have high toxicity (9-10).

 

6. Add Positive Elements to Your Room:  Now that you’ve decluttered and eliminated toxic products that are no longer serving you, focus on enhancing your room’s energy by adding positive elements. These include live plants, artwork, crystals, essential oils, and different colors based on the Bagua Map.

Actionable Success Strategies:

• Lighting is one of the best things to focus on when improving a room. For example, in the bedroom, I recommend lamps ONLY (no overhead lighting). Overhead lighting mimics the sun because it shines on you vertically, so even after the sun goes down, your brain thinks it’s daytime. This can disrupt sleep patterns. Also, focus on the TYPE of bulb and aim to decrease blue light by opting for yellow light over white. In the bedroom, we use red lightbulbs because they contain zero blue light. 
• Enhance your quadrant with the proper energy by adding appropriate artwork, crystals, and live plants according to your Bagua Map. Adding the right colors for each quadrant is one of the easiest changes to implement!
• House plants are a wonderful addition to most rooms because they help clean the air. They also decrease stress by lowering your cortisol levels. Peace lilies, money plants, and snake plants are some of the best plants for purifying the air. 
• When it comes to picking your crystals, shop local if you can. Although you can purchase them online, it’s best to see them before you buy them because you want to choose crystals that resonate with you. 

 

7. Add Some Healing Tools: For your final step, consider adding things to your home that really promote healing. You can do this room-by-room, or add these items later on when you’ve accomplished the other six steps for most of your house. 

And don’t forget, every home should have a healing space—a place where you can escape. Create a calm space in your home for reading or meditation. Fill it with your favorite art, crystals, meditation cushions, essential oils, and plants. This can be a WHOLE room or simply PART of a room (mine is in my office). 

Actionable Success Strategies:

• A portable infrared sauna is more cost-effective, energy-efficient, and time-saving than a traditional cedar one. Infrared saunas heat you from the inside, so you don’t get that overheated feeling. With any sauna, it’s important to start slow to build your tolerance. Start with 5 minutes, 1 or 2 times a week; then move up to 10 minutes, 2 times per week; then a half an hour, 2 times per week, etc.  (You can use coupon code livingproof if you live in the US or livingproofc if you live in Canada to get upto $100 off)
• Air purifiers help ensure that your family breathes the CLEANEST air by getting rid of excess dust, pollen, viruses, and bacteria within the home. I especially recommend them for the bedrooms and the living room. We use the Air Doctor.
• If you’ve never done so, you may want to test for mold in your home, especially if you’ve had leaks or excess moisture in the past. A lot of my clients have discovered mold in their homes that they didn’t know was there.
• A rebounder (also known as a mini-trampoline) or a dry brush are both great ways to move the lymph in your body. Our lymphatic system is where all our toxins go and the fluid in the lymphatic system helps remove waste and toxins from the bodily tissues. This is also why you want to make sure you MOVE throughout the day to avoid lymph fluid buildup.

 

Now that you know the 7 steps to turn your home into a healing sanctuary, you can make a plan that works with YOUR schedule and goals. 

Remember to start small and build upon these principles room-by-room. 

Improving your home is just one of the actionable ways you can improve your overall health and wellness . . .  

For additional tips, watch my full video on this topic here and get your BONUS Healthy Home Checklist here! 

If you loved this guide, I invite you to consider similarly transforming your WHOLE LIFE. 

What would it feel like to transform not just your home, but your whole MIND, BODY, and SOUL?

What benefits would you enjoy, not just for yourself, but for your entire family, if you were able to give back to them from a place of greater self-love, more energy, and a leaner, revitalized body?

As you envision that, I want to share with you a wonderful message I recently received from one of my clients.

 

 

These types of messages completely touch my heart.

At the Living Proof Institute, we address weight loss with a mind, body, spirit approach and that’s why we get messages like this daily from our clients.

 This type of approach leads to:

• Sustained results
• More self-care
• More self-love
• Greater awareness
• An uncovering of your emotional patterns
• Better food choices

Only 1 week into The Living Light Reset Program, this client experienced a physical and spiritual refreshment. “More than just food,” our comprehensive group program goes beyond just weight loss and our patients report experiencing so many amazing results!

Much like the home transformation is designed to meet you where you’re at, this simple-to-follow, 10-week program is designed for busy people who “have tried it all” and are ready to permanently lose excess weight, gain youthful energy, and have more clarity and confidence than ever before. 

Does this type of approach resonate with you? Are you ready to transform not just your home, but your entire life?

If so, I invite you to take action TODAY and book a complimentary 20-minute Wellness Discovery Call!

On the call we’ll dive into:

• Where you’re currently at with your health and the specific challenges you’re facing
• What you’ve tried in the past that hasn’t worked
• What your specific goals are and why they’re important to you

Then, we’ll create a specialized plan that fits your exact needs!

Author: Dipa Chauhan

Dipa Chauhan is a certified R Ph, CFMP, FLT Therapist, Functional and Lifestyle Medicine Provider. 

Dipa’s love for cooking and helping people led to the creation of the "Doctor's Orders: Your Essential Cookbook To A Plant Strong Anti-Inflammatory Diet". Here you can find over 250 healthy and easy recipes, weekly shopping lists and menus. Through this website Dipa has benefited thousands of people all around the world.

Dipa enjoys spending time with her family, especially her son Devin. Dipa also enjoys exercising, walking and other outdoor activities.