Green By Design Episode 204: Feng Shui Guru Danijela Saponjic

Learn how to improve your life by improving your space with simple strategies of Feng Shui. Danijela shares how clutter, layout, and more affect our mental and spiritual wellbeing and everything we stand to gain by connecting with the soul of our home.

Danijela Saponjic, SpaceHealing & Feng Shui Master

Erica Reiner (00:06):

One, welcome to the green by design podcast. Thank you for joining us today. Today's guest is Danijela Saponjic and she is a feng shui and space healing master. So she's going to teach us a little bit about that today and her journey, but first, let me give you a quick background on her. Danijela is besides being a space healing and functional master. She's also a mother of four boys and she has basically been doing a lot of work touching thousands of lives through her books and trainings and private consultations over the past 20 years.

So she is a published author three times over and she is currently in Germany, born in Germany to a family from the Balkans and her connection to the spirit of nature runs deep. She created the space healing method to help people around the world, align their environment to the power of nature and healed old energy. So they no longer affect the current lives being lived in these places. So her clients open up a new space to call in their dreams, visions, and desires with joy and ease, which is so beautiful. So I'm so excited to have her she can teach us all about that. So thank you so much for being here. This is a really fun connection.

Danijela Saponjic (01:33):

Thank you so much for having me Erica and so excited and grateful to share my work today with you and your audience.

Erica Reiner (01:42):

Yes. now tell us a little bit about, you've been doing this for 20 years now. So tell us a little bit about how you got started in this in rewind us all the way back to your journey into the space.

Danijela Saponjic (01:55):

Oh yeah, definitely. So when it all started, I was 26 and I just graduated university and I was sure I'm going to have a normal career. So I'm going to be involved in marketing projects because this was my dream. Like that's what I lived for. And after I graduated, I already had one son. I was married and I had to experience that there was no company who wanted me. I don't know why it doesn't even matter, but it was really the lowest point of my life. And you realize that your dreams are not going to work out as you wish them. So I remember one day going through a magazine and they were talking about when you change something in your own environment you're going to like experience a change in your life. And honestly, I didn't believe maybe in 26 back then spirituality energy and all these things that were just like, not really a topic for me.

Danijela Saponjic (02:56):

So I first I thought, yeah, sure, lying. I don't believe a word they're writing there, but then things didn't get better. And I decided to give it a try. So we decluttered our apartment, my husband and me. And first of all, I was amazed to see how much clutter we had stored in our small apartment. And my apartment was really neat, but it was cluttered and I didn't realize it. So after this weekend decluttering session, things started to move into change in our lives. So we got opportunity within weeks to move into a bigger apartment. And even for my husband, opportunity started to open up and from, for me, not so much, but I understood that there is something else in this world more than we think we know. And I started to follow this energy to learn more about why decluttering changes our lives. So this brought me to think showy. And then I think within a year I started to learn that Chinese fishery masters and started my first business when I was 26.

Erica Reiner (04:08):

Wow. That's such a great story. I have so many thoughts. First of all, I'm just obsessed with decluttering. It's my favorite thing to do. I try and pick a space or whatever, you know, like comes naturally once in a while and I'll go through things and just be like, what can I donate or get rid of and just clear this out. So I tend, tends to be cyclical for me. Like I go kind of go through phases, but I always come back to it. So tell me about the relation. Tell me a little bit about like the connection or relationship between decluttering and funkshway because, well, first I'll give you a quick, quick anecdote that it used to be not so much more now, but I used to tell people, oh, I do eco-friendly interior design. And they, some people who didn't maybe quite grasp it, or wasn't sure about the vernacular would say, oh, like functional way.

Erica Reiner (05:07):

And I would say, no, I actually know nothing about feng shui other than what incorporates, you know, into the basics of design principles about placement of furniture and, you know like w the flow of walking around I can't think of the term, but just like the flow of moving around your space and just kind of like the prince, the very basic set crossover. But so people always assumed that about me. And I was like, you know, I actually know pretty much not that much about it. So I'm really excited to learn more and be able to help set the table straight. And then I guess I'm tagging on the question of what is the relationship between yeah. De-Cluttering and some of the principles and fengshui,

Danijela Saponjic (05:54):

So the basic principle fishery is the flow of life force energy. And this is when we declutter life force energy gets the space to move, and that's the reason why our lives start to change and move after we, declutter. That's the reason why the experience a sense of freedom and spaciousness after decluttering. So I dare to say that sometimes people really get me involved, like addicted to decluttering, because they've craved the feeling of freedom and spaciousness. Right? So this is really interesting. So you you, you grow sensitive to this energy of, oh, it feels so light here, and it's not only for the eye to have clarity because I'm think Sri, we also follow the principle. What you see is what you get. So if you see clutter, so you get more clutter, if you see clarity, you create clarity for your life or so you see opportunities coming. So honestly, when I do consultations, the first step for my clients is to declutter because it doesn't make sense, starting to create a space, place, the furniture look for the right colors for the space. If the life force energy or tea, how we call it, doesn't have the possibility to flow through the environment, but that's the connection.

Erica Reiner (07:24):

Okay. And what is that process like? Are you there with them helping them go through things? I, you know, like with Marie Kondo's book and movement that just exploded all over the world, or people asking you to do that, or what's your process like?

Danijela Saponjic (07:39):

So I love to keep it really simple. So for me, I want to teach people because de-cluttering is really a process, which you, it looks like it's a part of your life, but it's not the center of your life. So I love to teach my clients really simple principles, how they can start decluttering. For example, I tell them, just divide your home into chunks. Don't do this. I'm going to declutter my whole house this weekend. Well, it's like decluttering. It's very emotional. You need to make a lot of decisions and, you know, to bring those, to decide what things to let them go and where to bring them, like all the stuff you, because you don't want it to like put everything just into the trash. You want to give it somebody else or however, so it just takes time. Right? And so I tell them, just do baby steps.

Danijela Saponjic (08:37):

So maybe it's a draw or a cupboard or whatever, a closet, or maybe sometimes some someday then a room, but just chunk it down and set a timer an hour, two hours maximum three, because you don't want to be drained by the process. And then I also tell them, stop the cluttering. So wrap it up when you have the most fun. So usually my clients tell me, are you crazy? Why should I do that? So the thing is when you declutter for a long time and you feel drained after that, you will have more resistance going back to decluttering. But if you remember feeling light and happy and it was fun, then you're more likely to resume the cluttering faster. So this is a little trick I use. And then if you want to identify clutter, I want to give you three questions and those are everything. What you don't love, meat or use is clutter, super simple, super

Erica Reiner (09:47):

Simple love need use, and not. And I used to do a little bit of what we call organizing, which is, you know, the first step is decluttering, but I would, you know, come across people a lot of times where they would be like, but what if I'm going to use it, I need to save it to use it in the future. And in certain cultures who have experienced like generational loss or persecution or hardship, like even, you know, like leftover from the great depression here or whatever it is whatever might be there's a fear of scarcity. And like, I can't get rid of this because I might need it and XYZ. So I've heard one simple trick of like, if it's under 20 minutes and $20 to purchase it again, don't think about it. If you don't need it, love it, whatever, just get rid of it. But I'm curious to hear how you kind of overcome that obstacle. Yeah.

Danijela Saponjic (10:50):

It's a very good question. Thank you for asking and I never heard this trick, like it's 20 Lars, 20 minutes. Let it go. It's great. So that's from

Erica Reiner (11:01):

The minimalists. I can't take credit. The guys who have the podcast and the documentary. Yeah.

Danijela Saponjic (11:08):

I saw the documentary. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So what I usually recommend is, you know, it's just, it's a thought it's like, you just have the, it's not real, it's a thought, but still we have to honor it. So what I tell my clients is when you're decluttering than take one box medium size and use this box for items where you cannot make a decision on, not yet, you're just all these thoughts, put it in there, and you're done close the box and give yourself a half a year, six months. And if you didn't need anything out of this box, give it away, but don't open it, just it away. So this is like one possibility to really calm down. Because some people they really panic, like, oh my God, I have to. And I can't, and, and we don't want to go there. So this box is kind of a buffer for that. You put items where you can make a decision.

Erica Reiner (12:12):

That's a great tip. Okay. Well, thank you for that. Tell us a little bit more about the connection between nature and functional way and healing and space healing. Yeah.

Danijela Saponjic (12:26):

So things sweet is based on nature and interest principles. So when it was developed the masters, they have a look into the nature and have seen different principles. And then they brought them back to the people. So usually like you just have to think like feng shui was developed 5,000 years ago. So people were very, very connected to nature. And with times they went to the cities, disconnected to the nature, have different priorities and think tree is bringing this flow back to the people. So for example, one simple principle in nature is that nature fills up empty space. So if you want to invite something new into your life, you first need to create space for it on all different levels.

Erica Reiner (13:19):

I've always heard that you need to create space, but I never knew why that makes sense. Okay. Yeah. Come on.

Danijela Saponjic (13:26):

Yeah. Yeah. So this is one and the other one is also like in nature, everything, what doesn't grow dies. So it's just, it doesn't mean more and more and more, but it is constant development, constant growth and constant exchange of energies. So this is also in the T needs to flow. It cannot be stuck. It needs to flow so that everything can grow. And another principle the also have is the nature is is like functioning in cycles. So we have spring the south, the spring, summer autumn winter and then it goes, so nothing is a constant. So people very often say, oh, I want constant grow. And constantly, no, no, no, no nature doesn't grow constantly. It has ups and downs and times where we like withdraw. And then we go out. So instinctually is bringing this principle into our lives, through using the compass and the elements and everything. So this is a very strong connection to when you study things showy, you really see the connection to nature and instinctually. Everything is really simple and logical. When you see how to connect it to nature, nothing is like this because it has to be fishery says it has to be this, this and that, that it's based in the nature. And you can explain like really everything, Erica.

Erica Reiner (15:01):

That's beautiful. Okay. So once you guys are done decluttering, what else, what's the next process with your clients?

Danijela Saponjic (15:11):

So, as I mentioned we have this principle, what you see is what you get. So what I really want to make sure that people surround themselves in their space with things which are opening up their view, which are mirroring what they want to invite in their lives. So it doesn't have to be like vision boards all over the place, but it's, so it's just the feeling of the space. And then the next step where I take my clients is into the connection to their home. So in of course we have the placement of furniture and colors and everything, but everything can really only work. Then if you have a connection to your home and I call my company soul in space because I do believe that every house and every home has a soul. And when we connect to the soul and we start treating our space like an ally we are going to be amazed how much empowerment we're going to get from our space.

Danijela Saponjic (16:20):

So like, it's a manifestation space when you talk through a space that when, for example, when I'm leading my certifications, I used to lead them in person. So when I entered my office, I'm like, okay, my dear today we are welcoming 12 news people who are going to learn things. So I really tell my space what you're up to. Okay. I open up the energy, I tell them, oh, this client is coming in. Let's support her. Let's make her see all what needs to be seen. And so we set really the energy, we talk into the space. And so we open up the container for success, for example.

Erica Reiner (16:59):

Wow. I never even thought of that. That's beautiful. Well, what kind of, what kind of issues or what kind of struggles do people have that they come across and then feel like they need your help with, to clear out to as you put in your bio, you know, call in their best vision and dreams and all that.

Danijela Saponjic (17:29):

So, you know, usually people turn to feng shui when they have tried like everything else and it doesn't work, but like, okay, give this a try. And usually the feeling is, I know I should do better, but I have tried everything and I it's, it's not really working. And I'm wondering why, or when I go to a workshop or work with a coach, I feel so inspired. And then I go home and inspiration leads, or I'm so happy on vacation and filled with energy. And I come home and my home drains my energy. So when they make this connection between when I somewhere else, I feel strong, inspired, and healthy. But when I come home, I lose everything. That's spending turn to thing, show you because they sense the matter is the space. So the blockage is somewhere in this space and that's the thing. Shri is, is really perfect to solve this. Yeah.

Erica Reiner (18:37):

Well, I was just going to ask what, oh, so to walk us through the rest of the process, what does that look like for you?

Danijela Saponjic (18:45):

So when we, when, for example, when a client comes with any kind of problem, then I love to see their space meet online or in person. It depends where they are. And then the thing is that the space shows you why the people are experienced, what they're experiencing. For example, I always love to say if the tea is not flowing, I mean, the simplest thing, everybody of us has experienced, including me, is like, my life is not flowing. I feel fat. Okay. I declutter and my life gets into flow. So this is the very basic thing, but it's not always the clutter. Sometimes the energy is flowing through too fast to the space. So it's like having diarrhea, right? You eat and it gets just out of you and you feel drained and tired and whatever. So when you imagine a home, you open up the entrance door and the first thing you see is the backyard.

Danijela Saponjic (19:51):

That's like the life force energy flows just through. Ah, interesting. Okay. So this home then cannot hold well and abundance and energy because everything displayed through, think about, you know, the diarrhea thing, right? So what we want to do is redirect the CISO entering Sri. We see space in the same way, like, like our bodies. So we breathe in and the air is going through our lungs and then it's distributed to the whole body. And then we breathe out. So it's a perfect system and that's what we want to have in our home. So the chi comes in through the entrance door, that's the mouth. And then we want to have the chief of course, upper floors where the bedrooms are. We want to have it in the kitchen, living room, every verus, and then it can flow out through the windows because we in and breathe out.

Danijela Saponjic (20:48):

And the home also needs to breathe in and out. And the way how we can make sure that the chief flows everywhere is if you start seeing things chi, as a curious child, and the child loves to go to places or the spaces there it's bright and beautiful and color like beautiful colors. So, and if a space is cluttered or dark or the energy somehow off a child wouldn't go there. So chi doesn't either. So without making it too complicated, as I said, Fincher, is that really complicated? So when you go through your home and usually clients already know, so if I listen to it listening, like if somebody is listening to this, now it's like, oh, I know what she's talking about. This space there, this corner, I don't like going there. We know where those corners are. So that it's time now to think about how can I bring the curious, curious chi into the space? What does it need? Does it need light? Does it need decluttering? Does it maybe only need my attention and appreciation? Like thank you for being there. Sometimes we don't need all re not need or use or rooms if the house is very big. So we can still go to those rooms, which are empty and say, oh, I appreciate you because this room is also a part of your body.

Erica Reiner (22:23):

I have to do that in a corner

Speaker 1 (22:26):

Because I don't know what's wrong with it. There's

Erica Reiner (22:31):

A corner in our living room. We have a you know, certain kind of layout and the sofa is all taking up this whole back wall and it's a U shaped. So it has a chaise on the side and a chaise on this side. And we always gravitate to the chaise on this side and not on this side, it is against a window. So maybe it just feels a little bit more exposed. But I was so excited to like, get the second chaise so we could have like, both have like places to lay our legs out. And none of us are over there and I don't know what's wrong with it.

Danijela Saponjic (23:03):

Yeah. Now I have to talk to it. Okay. Yeah. Talk to it. Yes.

Erica Reiner (23:08):

There's light over there. There's pillows. It's just something. Okay. Fascinating. Well, that is really, really interesting. Let's my next two questions are we can take them one by one would be like, what are, and you might have, you might just be reiterating, but what are your top three, like best feng shui tips that can really apply to the most people. And then my question after that is going to be, what would you want interior designers to know about space healing and feng shui?

Danijela Saponjic (23:49):

Oh, very good. Okay. So the basic three tips is, well, we talked about it already a little, so it is the decluttering really, really, really, it just like, it's so powerful. The next thing is the chief flow. What I just said, like make sure that you have, I love to call them T attraction points. So these are the points where you bring the chi to every corner of your house. And the third one is, start talking to home. Okay.

Erica Reiner (24:21):

And let me re go back to the G attraction points. So what are a couple ways that we can retract it? Which you already mentioned, one is the talking. And then I think you mentioned, like, it could be something like light or color or something like that. Like what are some other things I'm missing there?

Danijela Saponjic (24:41):

Paintings. Okay. Pictures, also family pictures, which really like light, like always attracts chi. Yeah. So those are like really the interior design you would use anyways, but then you have maybe a brighter picture and a darker picture. And then you look at the walls and like, oh, this picture would be here more prominent. So let's put it there. And the other one would like be prominent here. So that's how you would like the create those chair traction points. And you could even enhance them if you put some like shine lights on those paintings. So they brighten up even more in sanctuary very often. Fountains are used also, but people need to love for water. Fishery means a wind and water, right? So if you love water log, having water in your home, putting up a thing, Sri fountain, but never put a fishery fountain in the south corner of your house because the south is connected to fire and the fountain is of course water. So you're creating a tension there. So this is like the one most important rule about fountains that if you like those fountains, a great chi attraction point, you can use those too.

Erica Reiner (26:00):

Okay. Wow. Okay. So we've got the de-cluttering, the chia attraction points and the speaking to your house as if it's a living organism.

Danijela Saponjic (26:13):

Yeah. Great. Yeah. And you will really feel how the house starts embracing you and giving you energy. And yeah, it's like when you talk to a friend and a friend that's really opening his, his, or her heart to you, and you really feel embraced and welcomed and cherished, this is the energy you can create in the house just by opening your heart and connecting from heart.

Erica Reiner (26:39):

Well, that's lovely. I'm going to have to start that. How long did it take you to, when you, I mean, you, you kind of mentioned that you started, you know, just like not really believing in, and then you kind of tried a little bit, how long did it take you to really like embrace all of these principles that are just outside of the norms were brought up with, in our, you know, kind of non energetic, closed, why it was like, you know, unless you're really have someone like that in your life, in your upbringing, like this is also, you know, foreign to people. How, how was your journey in coming to embrace some of these principles that seem a little bit more abstract or not confusing, but just outside of the box.

Danijela Saponjic (27:36):

So when I started to make connections to things which are already known to people this has really a world opened up for me. So four things show you, they're like, yeah, I think sure about some of the therapy tool, you put something in your corner and all these things. So, and I told them, have you ever experienced an acupuncture? Yeah. When I had this back pain that, yeah, you see things, showy is the same principle, like acupuncture, but for your space. And they're like, what I don't. And then you can explain like, acupuncture is about the chi in your body. And then the chi and your Marian's are, is like cluttered. The acupuncture needle opens up this block it and the chicken flow. So you feel more energized. We do the same thing in the space with the chair, traction points, and you don't even need to use Feng Shui remedies like bells and whatever. You just use interior design.

Erica Reiner (28:39):

Wonderful. Now I distracted you from the other question, which was the connection. Well, if you could, like, you know, cause I do like to like to target with this podcast, other interior designers, maybe people learning about green interior design. So for other designers, home pros or design, just enthusiastic, what can we take on board? Like what would you wish that every designer knew about space healing and feng shui that we might be ignoring? And it kind of bothers you when you walk into a hotel lobby or a a bar or someone's home that was designed. You're like, oh, they didn't blah, blah, blah.

Danijela Saponjic (29:23):

Thank you for this question. I love it. Yeah. So, you know, I experienced so beautiful homes and people are looking at me like, don't tell us we're crazy, but we don't feel good in this home. Not the design is off, but it's not aligned with the energy of the people and the space. And my like my idealistic wish would be that architecture architects and interior designer would know some basic principles about fishery when they place colors. You know, there are elements and how to place colors, what I just said. Like she attraction points just through their work, which they're already doing naturally very beautiful. But just place it a little bit differently. And I always say good thing. Chi is not seen it's felt. So my experience is also that people are connecting fishery to so many remedies and that the home needs to look a certain way when it's things shriek, but it doesn't, we can implement, you know, remember, thanks for is 5,000 years old, the fishery masters didn't have a shop to buy stuff.

Danijela Saponjic (30:43):

They work with nature. And what was there. So if you just like take the cheap principle and tear correction points and have this in mind when designing a home or placing pictures and furnitures, just have this, like how does the energy flow through our bodies and how I would, I love to have the energy flow in the space. This would be really a great, great step. And then you also mentioned the space ceiling. That's the method I have developed through like being curious and also getting to points of Feng Shui there. I couldn't help my clients because the fishery was perfect, but the energy was off. And the space healing is all about looking into energies, which are in the space from the past. So be it the past owners or be it in the earth because of like a mother earth knows everything.

Danijela Saponjic (31:45):

So if we built our house on our old well, but easiest, the easiest example is always cemeteries because they were all over the place. And then just times changed and cities were built and whatever. So very often we don't even know it that if we have this energy at our, in our whole home you cannot remedy with feng shui. And this is where the healing activation and the space, the space ceiling comes in so that we can really acupuncture the earth and release those energies so that nature's energy can come up again and hold the energy of the space.

Erica Reiner (32:24):

I love that. Well, this has been so enlightening. Thank you so much for sharing all of that with us. The last thing is for you to tell everyone, listening one place where they can find you learn more. Of

Danijela Saponjic (32:41):

Course. So the best place would be go to my backside. It's soulandspace.com and then you can see like everything. Perfect.

Erica Reiner (32:53):

Fabulous. Thank you so much for joining. And we will have to touch base soon.

Danijela Saponjic (33:02):

Thank you so much. It's been really exciting things.