Your bedroom should be your sanctuary; it’s the place you go to relax after a long and hard day of work or taking care of children. Whether you are resting, sleeping or reading in your bedroom, it should be a place you can completely relax and feel at ease.
It’s the easiest thing in the world to create clutter in our bedroom, which can result in restlessness. You can’t sleep well when you are not comfortable in your own bedroom, and this can also lead to a restless day. You’ll be too tired or too irritable throughout the day without a proper night’s sleep.
In order to make your bedroom comfortable, you’ll know exactly what NOT to keep in your room, so that you can be your more relaxed self in the morning.
- Television
Most people love to watch TV in their bed, or before bedtime, but having a television in your bedroom is one of the biggest mistakes you can make. Watching television immediately before bedtime results in a restless sleep period in men and women, both young and old. The blue light emitted from television makes us alert and restless, which is acceptable during the day but harmful at night.
Scientists recommend avoiding any kind of screens at least two to three hours before bedtime, which makes watching television absolutely out of the question before bedtime. Therefore, it is important that your bedroom doesn’t even have a television so that you are not tempted to turn in on before going to sleep; not only that, you need to end watching television a few hours before you are ready to go to bed.
- All Gadgets
Not just your television, but all other kinds of gadgets and electronic devices should also be banned from your bedroom. This includes laptops, smartphones, tablets, and even eBook readers and Kindles. All of these gadgets emit blue light just like television and can hamper your sleep.
Using your smartphones and tablets before bed is one of the unhealthiest habits anyone can develop, as they will prevent you from having a relaxing sleep at night. You should keep all your electronic gadgets out of the bedroom; at least, they should be kept away from your bed. Your charging station should ideally be far away from the bed so that you are not tempted to glance at your phone or tablet before sleeping.
Besides, having your phone away from the bed also means that you have to leave the bed to turn off the alarm in the morning, and not have the chance to roll over and go back to sleep.
- Pets
A lot of pet owners love to sleep with their cats and dogs at night, but this is not exactly a healthy practice. As much as you love your pets, they have a very different sleep-cycle than humans, which means they can often wake up at odd hours. Just like babies, they might wake up in the middle of the night and want to play with you, which is going to ruin your sleep. Besides, shaggy and hairy pets carry fleas which can hide into your bedding and cause asthma attacks or allergies at night.
You can cuddle your pets and shower affection on them as much as you want during the day, but they should be firmly left outside your bedroom at night.
- Family Photos
You might love to look at photos of your beloved family members first thing in the morning, but the rules of Feng Shui prohibits keeping such photographs close to your bed. According to Feng Shui, Family photographs belong to living rooms, the study of libraries, dining rooms or even in the foyer, but not in the bedroom.
Why is this? Because looking at the photos of your family members can trigger any memories or obligations that will cause you to be anxious, such as having to get up early the next morning to get your children ready for school, or the dinner party you should host for your family the next week. You might think that looking at your loved ones and family members before sleep will make you feel relaxed and loved but in truth, they will only remind you of all the obligations and responsibilities you have.
- Work files and Papers
If your work is mostly done with papers and files instead of on your laptop, they should also be kept away from your bed. In fact, all your professional devices and gadgets, paperwork and files, should be completed a few hours before you go to bed to sleep. It is very important that you establish a boundary between your work and home, especially your work and bedroom. None of your work thoughts and worries should accompany you when you are getting ready to sleep.
If you have to bring your work, complete them before you head off to bed. Use your dining table, coffee table or desk to finish your paperwork, instead of taking them to bed with you.
- Open Shelves and Empty Chairs
This is something you can see in every bedroom: empty chairs and open shelves will gather clutter. Even if the rest of your house is neat and tidy, it is usually the bedroom that stays cluttered most of the time. If there is an empty chair in your bedroom, you can be sure everyone is going to dump their dirty laundry on them; in the same way, open shelves also mean that they are going to be filled with junks and tidbits from every part of the house.
The solution is simple – avoid keeping chairs you don’t sit on in your bedroom, and cover up all the open shelves. Even if there’s clutter inside your closets and cabinets, keeping them covered will keep the clutter away from your eyes. Keep your dirty laundry away from the chairs and into covered laundry bins, and there won’t be any clutter in front of you. All the storage units in your bedroom should have doors and covers, as well as have plenty of drawers instead of open shelves so that you won’t be bothered with the clutter.
- A cluttered Side Table
Just like a cluttered closet, chairs or open shelves, too much stuff on your side table can be both an eyesore and a source of pressure on your nerves. There should be absolutely nothing on your bedside table except the basics: a lamp, an alarm clock, a glass of water and perhaps a book you are reading. Everything else should be hidden away from view, preferably inside drawers. This is why it is always better if you get a side table with drawers underneath.
- Food and Drinks
It is completely unhygienic to eat or drink anything on the bed or in your bedroom, for the obvious reasons. Although it seems very sweet if someone brings you your breakfast in bed, eating there will only lead to breadcrumbs, spills, and stains on your bedsheet. Your bed sheets, blankets, and pillows should be incredibly clean when you go to sleep in the night, which is impossible to avoid if you have the habit of eating and drinking in your bed.
Having your breakfast in bed should only be allowed on the days that you are planning to change your bedsheets and not something to do regularly.
- Too Many Colors
In most professionally designed bedrooms, you’ll only see a combination of two or three colors, and nothing more than that. In your choice of paint, furniture color, bed sheets or closet doors, there shouldn’t be more than a few colors, and nothing that’s too bright.
A bedroom where you can see a rainbow of bright colors can stimulate your brain when you are trying to sleep, and prevent you from dozing off. Besides having only a few colors present in your bedroom, they should ideally be subtle and neutrals colors.
- Dirty, Uncomfortable Bedsheets
Dirty bedsheets belong in the laundry, not on your bed. It’s the same with an uncomfortable mattress; they belong somewhere else, not in your bedroom. In short, your bed should be as comfortable as your bed sheets should be clean and freshly laundered.
Even when you live alone and you are fairly tidy, everyone should change their bedsheets at least once a week, twice to be fair. At the same time, if your mattress has become lumpy and has started to sag, you need to change it as soon as possible. A new mattress doesn’t really come cheap, but think of it as an investment for your comfort.
- Shoes
Shoes don’t belong in the bedroom; they belong outside, in the foyer. Shoes become dirty once you’ve worn them outside, so they should stay well away from your bed and bedroom. Shoe cabinets and shoe racks are usually placed in the foyer or in your living room so that you don’t have to bring your dirty shoes inside the house.
If you don’t have a foyer or additional space in your living room for a shoe cabinet, and if you take excessive care of them, you can keep your shoes inside the closet. You can actually find special hangers for shoes and bags in the market that you can hang inside your closets. This way, your shoes wouldn’t be scattered around the bedroom and you won’t trip on them by accident.
- Too Many Books and Magazines
While a lot of people love reading a few pages before going to sleep, it is not a great idea to keep too many books or magazines in your bedroom, i.e. on your nightstand. There are a few reasons behind this: a) books gather dust; b) too many books and magazines mean a clutter on your bedside table and c) to read at night, you need artificial light.
A little reading in your bed before sleeping is a good habit, and some books help you to relax after a tiring day at work. However, you can get too engrossed in your book which can keep you up for hours at night, which is something to avoid at all costs.
It is very important that you keep your bedroom clean and tidy at all times, free from clutter and mess so that it becomes a place you can properly relax and sleep. Too many belongings and unnecessary objects can clutter up your bed and bedroom, and hamper your sleep – which is not something anyone wants.