Travel and Your Element: Where Does Your Energy Want to Go?

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I’m often asked:
Should your dominant element be considered when planning a trip?

The answer is a resounding yes.

There’s a compelling and ancient connection between travel and the Five Elements—Water, Wood, Fire, Earth, and Metal—rooted in Chinese philosophy, medicine, martial arts, and, of course, Feng Shui.

Each element holds its own personality, rhythm, and energetic blueprint. They’re connected to directions, seasons, climates, colors, and shapes. But more importantly, they influence our physical, emotional, and spiritual balance—including how and where we feel most alive in the world.

So… what travel adventure is right for you?

If Your Element Is Water

You’re introspective, imaginative, and deeply resourceful. You prefer to reflect before you act—and your strength lies in your steady, intuitive nature.

Best travel vibe: Solitude, oceanside walks, journaling near waves, meditative retreats.
You thrive in places where you can hear your own thoughts.

Best travel vibe: Adventure travel, hiking, trail runs, competitive sports, exploring somewhere new. You’d rather be running on the beach than lying on it. If Your Element Is Wood

Action compels you. You’re bold, driven, and fiercely independent. You perform under pressure and are always reaching for the next peak—literally and metaphorically.

Best travel vibe: Adventure travel, hiking, trail runs, competitive sports, exploring somewhere new.
You’d rather be running on the beach than lying on it.

If Your Element Is Fire

You’re the spark—the passionate, creative force that brings warmth and laughter everywhere you go. You love excitement, people, and making memories.

Best travel vibe: Group trips, festivals, vibrant cities, or anywhere with music and movement.
You’re the one organizing a game of volleyball at sunset.

Best travel vibe: Family trips, spa getaways, cooking retreats, or building sandcastles with loved ones. You restore others by simply being yourself.

If Your Element Is Earth


You’re grounded, nurturing, and a natural peacemaker. You seek connection, comfort, and meaningful moments over thrills.


Best travel vibe: Family trips, spa getaways, cooking retreats, or building sandcastles with loved ones.
You restore others by simply being yourself.

If Your Element Is Metal

You are elegant, disciplined, and drawn to refinement. You love beauty, structure, and value ritual and sacred tradition.

Best travel vibe: Boutique hotels, cultural tours, art-focused cities, or tranquil spiritual spaces.
You travel in luxury—not for show, but for meaning.

Remember:

We carry all the elements within us—but one often leads. Knowing your dominant element can help you align your travels with your energetic needs, leading to a more meaningful, restorative, and joy-filled experience.

Wherever you go, may your journey match your spirit.
Travel well. Travel aligned.

 

 

Are you wearing the best colors for you? Each of us has a power color based on the five elements and the day we were born. Sign up for my email list and provide me with the day, month, and year of your birth, and I will send you your birth element and power color!
Want more tips on creating a meaningful life? Subscribe to my podcast, Creating a Meaningful Life, and follow for more inspiration!

5 Things You Can Do During This Yin Season

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The crisp, white snow has smothered summer. It appears as if someone has laid a sparkling white sheet over what was once summer and put it to bed. I love winter. I love the hot chocolate with marshmallows melting into the whipped cream, snuggling up with a fire burning, blankets draped over me, and most of all a brilliant book.

In winter and as the world becomes cold, we go inside. Nature tends to freeze and die and there is a stillness like no other time of the year. It is in the deep stillness that gives us a moment to look into our depths, reconnect to our inner being, and embrace the darkness that surrounds us. 

This is the season that we celebrate holidays, eat and drink, and go to parties with our friends, but it is also the season where our inner world is most accessible because winter is represented by the water element, the most yin of all the five elements. This is a time of contemplation and reflection. 

Here are a few things I do during this yin season:

  1. Practice self-acceptance –  for me, this means spending five minutes a day looking in a mirror at myself and I don’t criticize what I see.
  2. Listen and recharge – Listen more to others and listen closely to what your heart might be saying. It is a time of receiving, not doing.
  3. Drink lots of water – in this yin season we lose a great deal of moisture out of our bodies so it is important to hydrate.
  4. Dream – we all have ideas and dreams and this season allows us to slow down and have these thoughts germinate as if we were planting a garden. Nurture these images and allow them to develop and grow naturally. Do this and see what sprouts in the spring.
  5. Serve – so many are in need during the winter. Perhaps gather coats for the homeless shelter or make a pot of soup for the older people in your neighborhood. Each season provides us all with unique chances to help those around us.

Are you wearing the best colors for you? Each of us has a power color based on the five elements and the day we were born. Sign up for my email list and provide me the day, month, and year of your birth and I will send you your birth element and power color!

How to Use the Water Element of Feng Shui to Bring More Abundance to Your Space

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How to Use the Water Element of Feng Shui to Bring More Abundance to Your Space

Can you tell what major element this room is missing? Right, water. Just as water is essential for life on earth, so is the element essential in your home or office decorating. Water is an ancient symbol of abundance, and it brings flow, freshness and deep emotion to any space.

The Water feng shui element, in all its gentleness and grace, is a very powerful element; in fact, water is one of the most powerful forces of nature. It is a different kind of power, the one that often takes you by surprise and encompasses all extremes — it can be a very powerful healer, as well as the ultimate destroyer. Water is the only element out of the five-feng shui elements (water, fire, wood, earth, and metal) that can exist in several states from liquid water to gaseous vapors to solid ice. This metamorphosis emphasizes the potent and often untapped mystery of the water element energy.

The water element is also the only element that is free in its presence and expression. It can fall from the skies as in rain, it can joyfully run, rest or play on the surface of the earth in rivers, lakes, and oceans, as well as penetrate the deepest chambers of the inner earth as in underground water. No wonder “feng shui” means “wind and water”! The wind is the expression of air, which we obviously cannot live without, and water is the ultimate queen of all elements — from plants to animals to humans.

A strong presence of the water element can help to elevate any room. Try decorating with the water element by using the colors blue and black. Or use shapes like waves and curves to bring in water. Also, mirrors, fountains, images of water and blue rugs will all add the essential water element to any space.

Just a couple of words of caution, water represents the flow of luck and wealth so if you put a water feature outside your front door, make sure it flows towards your home and not away from it. Never place images of water in your bedroom as water cools fire which will douse passion, and if placed over the bed, you will be sleeping “under water”.

What do the rooms in your house say about your abundance?

Have any Feng Shui questions? Feel free to contact me at michelle@michellecromer.com and sign up for your Power Color or visit me on Facebook at Michelle Cromer Feng Shui.

Michelle Cromer