Bold Rug...now what?

My friend Diana has a beautiful floral rug in her bedroom as a jumping off point.  She wants to incorporate color and potentially pattern but the question is, how do I do it without it looking too busy?  Can I still incorporate color and pattern in the bedding if I already have a patterned rug on the floor.

Yes, I say!  Yes, you can.  It is all about a happy medium.  I struggle with this whenever I look at rugs but truthfully in my opinion you need to view your rug as a neutral base.  That's not to say you don't want to coordinate and pay attention to the fact that your rug needs to mesh with the rest of the things in your room but just that you don't need to worry so much about incorporating things to be totally matchy matchy.  Now that I've totally confused everyone, I think it is easier to demonstrate with pictures.  These rooms have a lot going on but yet feel totally cohesive in my opinion.

All images from here.