MANY PEOPLE ASK ME, “What is Feng Shui really?” I recently heard Feng Shui practitioner James Jay put it very concisely: “Feng Shui is a support system for our lives. It’s an ancient Chinese art and science that allows us to create harmony and balance within any environment. When we create that harmony and balance, it lends support to our lives. When our lives have support through our environment it’s much easier to achieve the things we want in life such as well being, abundance, love and happiness.”

Whether you realize it or not, your home environment is constantly either supporting or sapping your life energy. Making a few simple changes within your home can have an immediate and powerful effect on your personal energy levels, as well as the physical and material aspects of your life. I call it empowerment through environment!

To correctly tap into this support system you need one of Feng Shui’s most powerful tools.

Feng Shui tool for environmental enhancement — the Bagua

One of the most provocative, powerful and important tools in Feng Shui is the Bagua (Ba-gua) Map, represented as a grid of nine sectors. The Bagua comes from the Chinese Book of Changes, “The I Ching,” and literally means “eight trigrams.”

These trigrams form the basic building blocks, or treasures, that hold the most significance in our lives: Career, Knowledge/Self-cultivation, Family/Health, Wealth/Prosperity, Fame, Love/Marriage, Children/Creativity, and Helpful People/Travel. Each of these building blocks is represented in the Bagua map, and is formed around a ninth sector which is the overall center, or grounding element, of your life.

Using the Bagua

This grid, illustrating the nine sectors of your life is intended to be superimposed over the floor plan of your home. The home’s main entrance is always located at the bottom of the grid, (in the Knowledge, Career or Helpful People sector). Once you have identified where your entrance falls in relation to the map, you can identify where the remaining areas of your environment fall. Now your home can begin to tell the story and shed some light on issues you may be facing in your life.

If your life is working perfectly then you’re probably already intuitively practicing Feng Shui, and you have balance and positive energy flowing through your home.

However, if any of the sectors or building block areas are not supporting you, or perhaps are causing you stress, then personal enhancements using the Bagua Map are the way to go.

The key is to activate and keep the Ch’i (vital energy) flowing through your home.

What is your home telling you?

Is your garage cluttered? (If it’s connected to the house, then your garage is part of the Bagua as well.) Is your bedroom piled up with clothes that need cleaning and a bed that is not made? Is your guest room used for storage or unfinished projects?

Think about where these rooms are in relation to the Bagua Map. Is the story unfolding? When looking at homes through Feng Shui eyes, you can usually identify trouble spots fairly quickly.

Over the three years of writing this column I have addressed each of the Bagua areas in detail. For new or veteran readers, this is a valuable review.

Positive personal enhancement suggestions for Bagua areas

Career Area — Front Center — Enhance this area if you are looking to make any changes in your career. Enhance with:

• Colors: black or very dark colors

• Shapes: asymmetrical shapes

• Items: items in glass or crystal, mirrors, career images and symbols

• Art depicting water scenes, art depicting flowing water such as rivers, waterfalls, oceans.

Knowledge and Self-cultivation Area — Left Front Corner — Enhance this area if you are a student, in counseling, or want to develop a more peaceful mind or lifestyle. Enhance with:

• Colors: colors of blues, greens, or black

• Shapes: stripes or columns

• Items: items in wood, healthy plants with rounded soft leaves, images and symbols of knowledge such as books, representation of deities or inspiring people

• Art depicting forests, nature scenes, mountains, peaceful places.

Friends/Family/Health Area — Left Center — Enhance this area if your health needs a boost or if you’re recovering from surgery. Also enhance it if you would like your social life or your relations with your family to improve. Enhance with:

• Colors: colors of blues, greens,

• Shapes: stripes or columns

• Items: healthy floral arrangements, items in wood, photos of family, friends or representing perfect health

• Art depicting vibrant flowers.

Wealth Area — Back Left Corner — Enhance this area if you need to generate more cash flow in your life, or if you want to be more aware of the flow of abundance in your life in general. Enhance with:

• Colors: purple, blue or red

• Shapes: cones, triangles

• Items: items that “call the Chi” such as flags, wind chimes, whirligigs, flowing water features (fountains, waterfalls or aquariums), opulent items in the purple color spectrum, healthy round leaf plants

• Art depicting wealth or items you wish to purchase.

Fame Area — Back Center — Enhance this area if you would like more recognition at home or at work. Enhance with:

• Colors: reds

• Shapes: cones, triangles

• Items: diplomas, awards and acknowledgements, up lighting, inspirational sayings

• Art depicting animals, people fire and the sun, personal images and symbols of fame.

Love and Marriage Area — Right Back Corner — Enhance this area if you want to attract or improve a love relationship. Enhance with:

• Colors: reds, pinks, white

• Shapes: cones, triangles

• Items: pairs of items (candles, love birds, vases)

• Art or photos depicting your significant other or romance, colors of reds, pinks and white.

Children and Creativity Area — Right Center — Enhance this area if you are trying to get pregnant, want to improve your relationship with children, or would like to explore your inner child and creativity. Enhance with:

• Colors: white and pastels

• Shapes: curves, circles

• Items: creative images and symbols, whimsical items, toys, stuffed animals, arts and crafts supplies, photos of children, items in metal

• Whimsical art or art made by children.

Helpful People and Travel Area — Right Front Corner — Enhance this area if you want more mentors, clients, customers or other helpful people in your life, or if you would like to travel. Enhance with:

• Colors: white, black or gray

• Shapes: curves, circles

• Items: creative images and symbols, whimsical items, toys, stuffed animals, art and craft supplies, photos of children, items in metal, natural rocks, stone

• Art pertaining to spiritual guides, mentors, helpful people or desired travel locations, pictures of mountains.

Center Area — The center of the Bagua is considered neutral, a place of grounding of all the other areas — a place of balance and peace. This area is associated with the element of earth and is related to the color yellow, as well as earth tones. It is also symbolized by items in the shape of squares and rectangles and items made of ceramics.

Missing areas
When overlaying the Bagua onto your home plan, you may find that certain portions of the grid are located outside the actual structure of your home. Such “missing” areas need to be strengthened. In a future column, or with an in-home consultation, you can learn to “anchor” these areas through structural as well as symbolic enhancements.

Feng Shui at work

A client was unhappy with her home office; she felt she did not connect with it and was having trouble getting her work completed. During our consultation, by overlaying the Bagua we determined the home office was in her Helpful People area, but her desk had its back to the door and the room had too much wood. (This area is enhanced by the Metal Element: See http://www.fengshuibymaria.com/newspaper—columns.html — Sept. 2011.)

She bought a small, kidney-shaped desk and placed it facing the door and placed one of her husband’s beautiful photographs of a mountain behind her for stability. She hung another beautiful rock picture in front, continuing to bring in the metal element for that area. She also hung pictures of spiritual guides for her to connect with. A beautiful round rug helped complete the look. Now the energy can flow freely and her home office supports her work. Her productivity has increased significantly and now she can sit comfortably enjoying her view and her comfortable new office.

A client just told me how helpful the Bagua is. She said it makes shopping and decorating so easy because, as she said, “There are no random acts of decorating.” If she needs to purchase an item she consults the Bagua, checks colors and shapes, and adds or removes items accordingly. She loves the way her house feels; it is totally supporting her and her life.

Questions, questions, questions

I encourage you to email me with questions, to which I will respond in this column or by email.

One reader wrote: “Our little boy’s room is in the Wealth corner of our house. He’s not that neat. Yikes! What can I do to keep him from draining our prosperity?”

Dear Reader,

If your child is old enough, have him choose colors of blues, reds or purples for his room. Create an organized storage system for toys and clothes. You can hang a picture of a tree with rounded leaves to indicate prosperity growth, or even paint a mural of a beautiful tree. The same can be done with an aquarium — a real one, or a picture or a mural. Art and items that represent wealth could be a large piggy bank with coins, pictures of planes, boats, cars, vacation locations. Have fun with it!

Affirmations

Remember that in Feng Shui, intent plays a significant role in enhancing any area of your home or business. That’s why all enhancements need to be made with intentionality; written or stated affirmations, expressed as if they are already happening, are very important. For example, “I have an abundance of wealth and prosperity flowing into my life.”

Feng Shui on a shoestring

Feng Shui enhancements do not have to cost a great deal. By using the Bagua you can actually use items already in your home that are placed in the wrong area and relocate them. We call this shopping in your own home.

For questions or home consultations email me at mtmccull@aol.com and put “Feng Shui” on the subject line, or visit my website at www.fengshuibymaria.com, where you can read past columns, or Facebook “Feng Shui by Maria” where I post pictures as examples to enhancements.

And check out my blog — just go to the website and click on “Blog” and you can view many pictures and I will respond to your questions quickly. I look forward to hearing from you.

Until then … Blessings!

Benicia resident Maria McCullough is the owner and founder of Feng Shui by Maria (www.fengshuibymaria.com). She is a speaker and educator with more than 15 years’ experience specializing in residential, landscape and business consultations.