How to Harness the Power of Feng Shui

From location-scouting to minor renovations, here's how you can attract good energy into your home

28 August 2018

Joey Yap is the founder of the Mastery Academy of Chinese Metaphysics - an education institution for Feng Shui, BaZi, Qi Men Dun Jia, Mian Xiang, Yi Jing, Date Selection and Face Reading. He is the best-selling author of over 170 book titles published in 7 different languages worldwide and engages with students in more than 37 countries. He has conducted professional consultations for a wide range of clientele from the UK, USA, Canada, France, Germany and all of South East Asia.

Designed Design Associates (DDA)

Let’s go through a few key points for building a home with good feng shui:

In feng shui, there’s no such thing as a house that’s unworkable. Every house can implement feng shui; some better than others, but don’t let what you can’t do stop you from doing what you can do.
What’s important in feng shui is to pay attention to your surroundings. If the qi that is entering your property from the environment is negative, then you can’t ‘cure’ it. All you can do is to prevent the qi from entering the house, leaving you in a neutral situation.

Let’s begin by looking at a list of the positive and negative environmental features around your home.

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Positive features
Having a home next to any of these is a major bonus:
1. Mountains or hills, even small ones. Having a house with its back towards the mountains would be the best, but even mountains on the side of the house is fine.

This Italian home shows a mirror to the mountains

User

2. Sentimental water sources like lakes, ponds, and calm rivers.
Having natural sentimental water – water that is gently meandering and flowing smoothly – sources near the home is always good. However, don’t confuse them with man-made water sources like drains and swimming pools, or rapidly-moving water like fast rivers and waterfalls.

See how a river passes through this home’s yard

Atelier Here

3. An open space, like a park or a field in front. This is known as a ‘Bright Hall’, which is able to collect qi in the area.

4. Location in a quiet and peaceful neighbourhood

Negative features
Don’t worry if you can’t find the positive features as an alternative to finding a home with positive feng shui is to ensure that the home is not located near a negative feature. Avoid getting a home that is located near any of these:
A highway or a road that has constant traffic.A train or monorail line. Note that if your unit is above the train track or the highway, the negative impact of these features is lessened.A drain that cuts right in front of the house as this completely blocks the qi flow into the house. It can be negated by covering part of the drain; however, this is not always feasible.A garbage dump or a construction site. It could be temporary, but while it’s present, the negative features are quite harsh.A tall sharp object, such as a pylon or water tower.A sharp edge pointing towards your house, such as the corner of a roof.A house that is facing an alleyway, a T-junction or other roads.

Notice how this apartment blends feng shui in its design

Versaform

What then?
Now that you know whether your home is in a positive or negative environment, what should you do next? If it’s in a positive environment, you’ll want to arrange your interior to benefit from the positive qi. On the other hand, if your house is located near a negative feature, you’ll need to take steps to prevent the negative qi from entering your home.

If you’re in a landed property, the key to this is your main door. If you’re in an apartment unit, you’ll need to pay attention to both the balcony and your main door.

In order for your house to collect, contain and spread the qi throughout the house, the area right in front of the main door and the balcony should be open and spacious so that the qi is allowed to flow into the house and spread. For an apartment unit, the qi also flows in through the balcony, therefore, the area in front of the balcony must be open and spacious.

However, what if the qi entering your house is negative? In that case, you want to block the qi from entering the house. You could put a screen right in front of the door so that the qi can’t flow into the house. Alternatively, you could reconfigure your layout so that a rarely-used room like a powder room or a storeroom has its door directly opposite the main door. This guides the negative qi to flow into that room and stay there. For apartments, you could just keep the balcony closed so the qi is unable to enter.

DB Studio

Feng shui is a vast subject that requires years to fully understand. The information here is just the tip of the iceberg but it shows that feng shui can be easy to implement.

Arete Culture

Read more:
7 Essential Vastu Tips for Your Bedroom
10 Ways to Make Your Home Vastu-Friendly

Tell us:
What other feng shui issues would you like to read about? Let us know in the Comments below.