Cats, Chinese New Year, Feng Shui and Super Bowl 2016
There’s much to celebrate today. It’s the Chinese Lunar New Year. In the U.S. we have Super Bowl mania. While grocery shopping yesterday, you’d think we were stocking up for a famine. Customers bought snacks by the truckload, treats for humans and pets (we’re down with the treats part) for eating, drinking and watching the Super Bowl. Football is not a big deal at our house but we make exceptions for the Kitten Bowl. And thrilled all 100 kittens appearing today were adopted!
January 1 may be our calendar new year but it’s never really feels like a fresh start until the lunar New Year which begins today. After an entire week of cleaning and preparing everything we feel ready for a burst of creative good fortune. The Lunar New Year is celebrated by all Asians, but is morphing into an All-American holiday regardless of race or heritage. Part of the reason is the growing interest in feng shui. When I began studying the ancient art of placement twenty years ago, it folded effortlessly in my lifestyle but few understood what I was talking about. Over the years it doesn’t seem so weird any more. Over the past couple years, I noticed a big jump in public awareness about both feng shui and the Lunar New Year. When HGTV airs how to feng shui your bedroom, it’s gone mainstream. Ditto NBC airing feng shui experts predictions for the New Year.
There are websites to quickly help newbies understand how to find the best direction calculators for sleeping, the lucky direction for your desk, auspicious times for planning anything and everything. And that advice applies to our cats. This is our post on feng shui and litter box placement. I wish I’d had all the tools and tips when I started! The Feng Shui For Dummies is a great primer.
At the grocery store while selecting mandarin oranges (lucky new year fruit) an Asian couple reached over to handle the fruit. They really looked like they knew what they were doing. We began chatting and they said they buying them for the new year. They were surprised I was doing the same and thrilled I knew feng shui. It felt like a cultural divide melted in an instant. The man gave me a vigourous thumb’s up and they both smiled like lost lost relatives. I may not follow their traditions to a T but when we break down the celebration to its core,
it’s all about living in harmony, honoring our planet and creating a safe, healthy and comfortable haven called home. Whatever you celebrate and or root for today and in the months ahead, I wish you all the best for the New Year!
21 Comments
meowmeowmans
Happy Chinese New Year to you, dear friends! We’ll need to look into that litter box feng shui!
Ellen Pilch
I usually have a Chinese New Year party, but this year just my hubby and I will get some Chinese takeout. I love Feng Shui and have several books on it- I clearly need to move some stuff around to attract some money 🙂
Seville at Nerissa's Life
I didn’t know ’bout the mandarin fruit being lucky for the new year. I just thought the peeps found ’em tasty. MO– — USES!
Purrs,
Seville
Annabelle
Woo hoo Happy New Year!
The Island Cats
Happy Chinese New Year! We’re watching the Kitten Bowl. What fun!
Layla Morgan Wilde
I wrote about litter box feng shui so long ago (2012) before your time 🙂
Brian Frum
Feng litter boxes? Who knew? I know about flinging litter though!
Layla Morgan Wilde
🙂 it’ll help with litter flingers.
caren gittleman
Happy Happy Chinese New Year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Layla Morgan Wilde
Happy NEW year to you do and hope your team wins!
The Swiss Cats
We’re discovering feng shui since a few months, thank you for the links. We’re so excited, we’re going to watch the Kitten Bowl for the first time ! Purrs
Layla Morgan Wilde
The Kitten Bowl is so fun, enjoy!
Skeeter and Izzy
Happy New Year!!!!
We have started investigating Feng Shui. We think that we need to be open to others and their beliefs. When it comes down to it most of these teach the same thing, Love, Peace, Harmony,Compassion, Kindness and Balance to be shared with all things living or not.
We have no use for football but adore the Kitten and Puppy Bowls. We are so glad that all were adopted!!!
Luvs
Skeeter and Izzy and the Feral Gang + Twig & Peanut & Romeo & the Angels >^..^^..^<~
Layla Morgan Wilde
Thank-you and enjoy the day. Wishing you much good luck this year!
Kathryn
I tutor English for Chinese students in China via an app. Yesterday, some college students showed me their neighborhoods from their iPhone. Yesterday, most of my students were all kids, whose parents gave them the tutoring app so they could prepare for Chinese New Year. Since China is 13 hours ahead of New York/Boston time, I can only tutor in my early morning/evening, which is their late evening/morning.
A few days, I had typed something into Google translate for my landlord from Hong Kong, who speaks very little English — about the water… Google translated ‘water’ into feng shui — flow. He had turned off the water at night one day, and I said we needed water 24 hours.
I will pay attention to cat feng shui.
Thank you for a marvelous post.
I thought that was really beautiful.
Today, I will watch the kitten bowl. If John is going somewhere else to watch the SB. Maybe he isn’t, though, since Bill and Tom aren’t in it.
I am so happy for the feng shui of the kitten bowl that they were all adopted.
Layla Morgan Wilde
That’s cool about seeing your students in China. Ha, about translation. Enjoy and purrs to all.
easy rider
my mom thinks it is HER ear, because she is a monkey (not only because of the year she was born said my dad). we also have a big bowl with tangerines and mandarin oranges for luck, welth and health… I hope it works, we sure will need it :o)
Layla Morgan Wilde
So glad to hear about your mom being monkey since it should be a much better year for her.
Sammy
I can remember my Mom talking to me about and being fascinated with feng shui about 20 years ago or so. She passed away in 2001 but I still have her hand written notes about how I should have my living room and bedroom arranged!!
Pam
Layla Morgan Wilde
Wow, she was ahead of the curve!
Summer
I didn’t know there was litter box feng shui! My human should look into that – including for when we travel together.