2024 is the Year of the Reader. While Soft Wood element years are particularly supportive of writing, Hard Wood element years are especially supportive of reading. This element highly values growth through education and personal development. Lifelong learners, Hard Wood elements will educate themselves through ongoing classes, curriculum and reading books about areas of interest to them.

In 2023, Soft Wood elements were in the news again, this time for other aspects of this element’s personal energy. Their Machiavellian tendencies to intentionally create drama they know will receive negative attention. Their juvenile response to adding insult to injury. Their billion dollar success. Their completion number. Their forever young experience of life. And their schoolgirl crush approach to romance.

We’re nearly out of the woods! If your year felt like getting lost in a dark forest or walking through a scary woods, never fear and be of good cheer. The Hard Wood element year is almost here.

Now that you’ve finished your Christmas shopping and checked everyone off your list, it’s time to make a cup of tea or peppermint hot chocolate, put on a favorite Christmas movie, album or playlist and start wrapping!

Even those who don’t decorate for the four seasons or the various holidays throughout the year, will often put up at least a few Christmas lights and decorations in December. And if you know your personal feng shui element, you can decorate with the elements and colors, festive scenes and holiday themes that resonate the most with YOU! To learn how to decorate for your personal element, read on!

In The End of Hustle Culture, I talked about the rise of the self-help gurus. The social media influencers who created content to become a public figure and monetize their life. The spiritual teachers, masters and guides who positioned themselves as the monk on the mountain that people looked to for guidance on their own journey for a one-time payment of . The self-made millionaires who decided to teach other people what worked for them, based on the false premise that everyone else is like them…or should be.

If you’re making your list for the gift giving season, consider taking the personal element of your friends and family into consideration. Whether you’re planning to buy presents to put under the tree, spend money on an experience or subscription, create something handmade or provide an act of service, knowing your loved one’s personal element will help you give them a gift that will make them feel seen, known and well-loved. Even if gifts are not your or their primary love language, you’ll be able to select a thoughtful gift that can be be given with intention and received with appreciation.

The Honor System is an 8-week self-study course that guides you through eight of the elements of honoring your unique personal energy. Once you know your personal feng shui element, it’s important to begin learning how to honor your unique needs and values. This do-it-yourself course provides weekly guides, journaling prompts and assignments that are customized for your personal element! It’s a guided self-study course you can use to determine how to honor your unique personal energy.

As we come to the end of the Mountain Earth 20-year cycle and shift into a new Fire element era, tribalism will be replaced with collectivism. And just as there are both positive and negative presentations of tribalism in society, there are both unifying and conforming expressions of collectivism. Unfortunately, the persistently self-righteous othering that results from most prevalent type of tribalism we’re seeing today, leads to chasms of division that tend to initiate the great equalizer of the state owning everything and everyone owning nothing…and of course, being happy.

In feng shui, there are various ways we can activate and enhance wealth. And none of them have anything to do with enhancing the far left “wealth corner”. That’s an over simplified Westernized school of feng shui that uses a fixed bagua.

In fact, there’s not just one, but many areas in our homes and on our properties that we can activate and enhance to create and build wealth. Some wealth activations are general for the house. Some wealth enhancements are more specific for the year. And some wealth rituals can be customized for your personal feng shui element!

Soft Wood is associated with the Life Center of Wealth & Prosperity. And it’s represented in nature by the “persistent wind”. So, Soft Wood element years can bring not just the winds of change, but also the winds of prosperity.

Wealth is not just having more than enough the money to live well. It’s being debt free and having savings. It’s owning assets like homes, land, rental properties and other real estate investments. It’s having gold, silver and other precious metals in your possession in the form of coins or jewelry.

August is the mid-point of the year. This is when the annual energy peaks before slowly beginning to diminish and create space for the arrival of new energy at the end of the year. And this peak is a gift bestowed on us that we can choose to receive with open eyes and arms, hearts and minds.

If you can’t get to a forest, bring the forest to you. Enjoy the scent of the pine in the comfort of your home. Diffuse doTERRA’s coniferous essential oils or proprietary blends with their woodsy scent and grounding effect. Essential oils that come from evergreens are some of oils I like to work with the most, especially in my daily rituals and energy healing practice. My favorite blend to diffuse is Midnight Forest.

Soft Wood is represented in nature by the evergreens that stand at the top of the world in massive forests of centenarian trees in the Arctic Circle. The towering Redwoods and Sequoias of the Pacific Northwest. The coniferous trees of the boreal forest in the northern hemisphere. And the tropical evergreens of equatorial rainforests in the southern hemisphere.

As a classical Feng Shui consultant and The 8 Elements Master, I offer two guides that will help you Feng Shui Yourself! The first is an Annual DIY Feng Shui Guide with step-by-step and gua-by-gua feng shui remedies and enhancements for the year. The second is an Annual Personal Energy Guide for your personal feng shui element, with valuable information about the annual element’s effect on your personal energy and the energy visiting your element’s house and best directions.