I first met Leila when I stumbled in to a donation New Year’s Day yoga class at Triyoga Camden and within 0.01 seconds, my mind was blown. She is the real deal – a yogini, bodyworker, practical mystic, creative soul and gifted healer. I knew very soon that I wanted to learn more from her and in 2016 completed my 200 hour yoga teacher training with Leila and fellow wise women, Bridget Luff and Heather Umlah.
The course was so much more than learning how to teach yoga but instead a safe and dynamic space to facilitate our own homecoming – exploring the relationship to ourselves and others, upholding the pillars of nourishment and figuring out our own magic for world. There is so much more I will say about my experience of the course but for now I have asked Leila to divulge her secrets of the ‘beauty way’ to create a sacred space.
Leila: The word ‘sacred’ connotes a sense of elevation from everyday life, of preserving or reserving time, energy, and presence in a special way. There’s also the awareness that there is something higher or more refined at stake – something that needs protection or attention, lest it be sullied or undone. Sacred is the opposite of mundane, which suggests that it is not boring or dull.
I think it’s fair to say that I have dedicated my life to celebrating the sacred and making it more apparent, accessible, and enjoyable in my work, in my love, and in my home.
Sacredness moves in the hush of beauty and reverence. Connecting to sacredness helps you to get a bigger perspective and remember what’s really important to you. It’s about honouring the best in life and opening up our capacity to let go of what is not important. The more you connect to sacredness, the more beauty you see around you, and the easier it is to keep a loving perspective throughout life’s challenges. Sacredness is all about love, and making your home more sacred is an act of bringing more love into your whole life.
I have always used the word ‘altar’, for some reason that’s the word that feels right for me – but some people use the Sanskrit word ‘puja’, others use the word shrine. Interestingly, the word ‘altar’, has its roots in the Latin ‘altus’ – meaning High. If those kinds of words don’t feel right to you, you could simply call it a ‘sacred centre’.
It wasn’t until I was an adult that I made my first altar that was related to spiritual practice. I was living at the Omega Institute, and was so inspired by an incredible florist who created arrangements of flowers and found objects, which he would leave in the most unexpected places all over campus. Whenever I stumbled upon one of his pieces tucked between a pair of rocks on the path up to my room, and I would be instantly reminded to pay attention, to cherish, and to wake up to beauty.
I couldn’t afford to take his class on flower arranging, so I took matters into my own hands. On my daily three hour walk around the lake, I gathered twigs and weeds and wildflowers. I collected vases from the local charity shop. I studied and emulated his work, crafting weird and wonderful forms for my own delight. In my tiny cabin room, I constructed my first formal altar – a wildflower explosion at the foot of my bed, an altar dedicated to my love of the natural world, to my process of healing, to beauty – and most of all to my own creative process. This altar was a symbolic articulation of my highest aspirations, even though I didn’t know it at the time.
Since those early days of my practice, I have lived in homes where I made an altar and ones where I did not. The difference in the kind of things that happened in my life with and without altars is pretty much day to night. In my last few flats, I specifically sought a space where the altar could be the focal point of the room. I want my attention to be organised towards the sacred. I have learned how easy and how subtle it is for my attention to move towards something else.
Below are a few steps to bringing more sacredness into your home…
1. Connect with intention
The first step in creating sacred space is remembering why you want to bring more sacredness into your home. Whatever sparked your inspiration has a particular feeling to it. Get in touch with that feeling, even journal about it. Do you love the feeling of peace and clarity that you associate with sacredness? Simplicity? Spaciousness? Or is it more like richness, abundance, power, vibrant energy? How does this connect with what you feel you need more of in your life? My years of practice and space setting have helped me to bring the ‘sacred vibe’ into so much of my life in a way that has made a concrete impact at many levels.
Make your space setting personal from the start. It will have much more weight that way.
2. Gather objects for your sacred space
Flowers and things from nature gathered on walks, artwork that feels inspirational and uplifting, photographs of beloved ancestors or teachers – all these are the sorts of things that charge a sacred space with energy. Simply keeping fresh flowers in a vase in the space is wonderful – but keep the flowers fresh, dried flowers are not the best.
Crystals are also a great choice to bring a feeling of sacredness (sustainably sourced is a must). The beautiful colours and the way these rocks reflect light can focus energy. Simply put, the molecular organisation of a crystal has a particular kind of harmony. And different crystals and minerals, with their different structures, have different properties that can reflect your intentions.
Amethyst is a great stone for raising a more spiritual and intuitive energy. A sparkling Citrine geode has a more abundant, material kind of an energy. There are great books on the subject. The most important thing is to put the crystal in your hands and make sure you have a good feeling when you hold it. Soak your new crystal overnight in a bowl of sea salt water to purify it before you put it in your space. Take any crystals out for a full moon bath. It might sound a bit out there, but the truth is that the earth and water responds to the moon. Harness that energy and bring it into your sacred space every month, you’ll start to feel the difference in no time.
Statues of deities or symbols of power and potency are also appropriate. Feel into it and choose well.
Have a look at your intention journalling, and see if any words stand out: ‘Joy’, ‘Ease’, ‘Love’. Write these words down on a pretty piece of card and set this card in your scared space to read whenever you spend time there.
3. Build an altar
Simply de-cluttering and blessing your home brings a feeling of clarity, but creating a ‘sacredness epicentre’ is the most potent way to keep that sacred vibe going.
Choose a place in your home, perhaps a corner, and find a surface, a small table or an empty box you can put a textile on. Clear all other possessions out of that area. Make sure there is no artwork above that space, though having this on your windowsill or in front of a window can be beautiful.
Try to avoid a place where there are any electrical wires or cables, just a space that you can have completely clear.
4. Purify the whole space
There are several ways to cleanse a space. You can purify the space through sound, using a bell, or by the act of ‘smudging’, which is purification using smoke. For smudging, purchase a dried sage bundle or a stick of the wood Palo Santo (be sure you find a sustainable source for these items). *She’s Lost Control sells locally grown sage bundles. I highly recommend using local items, it’s more powerful ritually and it honours the Earth.
Start at your sacredness epicentre and offer the smoke or the ringing bell all around the perimeter of your whole home, and around the perimeter of each room. Make sure you travel in a clockwise direction. If you have had some ‘bad vibes’ in the house for any reason, you may wish to do one counter-clockwise sweep and then do a clockwise one – the clockwise direction brings more energy, the counter-clockwise is said to ‘banish’ any vibes you don’t want. If you want to clear out old energy and set a new tone, consider a good old clear out of belongings and do a good broom sweep of your whole home before you do your smudging.
For a water purification, you can also bless your own water (cup your hands over it and send an intention of blessings), or perhaps use water taken from a spring that is meaningful to you (that you or a loved one has collected personally.) Put the water in a pretty bowl, and do the same perimeter walk around your home and each room, sprinkling the water with your fingers. Sea salt can also be used – this is a grounding form of purification – but don’t just hoover the salt up afterwards – leave it for some time and clean it by hand when you do, putting the purifying salt into nature or a garden instead of the bin or down the drain.
Make sure you remember your intention at the start and throughout your purification.
Afterwards, pay attention to the way your home feels different. So much of sacredness is about placing our own loving attention into our home and making it very personal.
Purification done on a regular basis can bring a more healing, peaceful and energised feel to your space.
5. Spend quiet time in your scared space
What we do most frequently has the most power in our lives. This goes for how we move our bodies and what kind of energy lives in our home. A daily meditation practice, or even an intentional quiet period of 5 minutes, is a stellar way to bring more sacredness into your home – it’s easy to overlook but what we actually do in our home creates the feel of the place and what we take out with us.
Switch off all technology when you do this, and sit in front of your sacred space. Breathe deep, perhaps light some incense or do a quick smudge of yourself or the space – even ring the bell.
Feel into the vibe you have created – and most of all, enjoy it. Soaking in what you love is the whole point of having a sacredness-aware home!
