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With the break, I'm absolutely bursting with ideas for my column and I was having a hard time pinning down a topic. So I thought, I'd go with a different concept and offer you some bite-sized snippets of the Feng Shui and Chinese Metaphysical areas I've been researching, exploring and working on in the last few months while I've been away from writing my column. So treat this week's column like a Feng Shui smogasboard, a taster of things to come.
It's all about a good date
While on my break, I've been working hard on a book on Date Selection amongst other things. While working on the book, I remembered my own run-in with starting off a venture on the wrong date (yes, believe it or not, we are so busy taking care of our clients needs that we sometimes forget to select a good date for our own activities!). In hindsight of course, it provides for a great example of how date selection matters and what a difference a good date can make.
It was 2006 and I was preparing for my usual recce of the locations for my China Excursion course. The recce included going to Tibet, which I had planned to include in the 2007 Mastery Academy China Excursion. The trip needless to say was an absolute disaster. My team members all had serious altitude sickness of varying forms, and one team member got so sick that he had to be taken to a hospital for water in the lungs, before being immediately flown out of Tibet to Chengdu. Naturally, this year, as I took my students to Tibet for the annual Mastery Academy China Excursion, we took every precaution under the sun to make sure everything would be fine, including selecting a good date! Not only did no one get sick, but the entire group of students had a great time. So, why was one trip so disastrous and the other so smooth sailing? It's all in the dates.
For my 2006 recce trip to Tibet, we departed on what is regarded in the 12 Day Officer system of date selection as a Balanced Day (Ping Re). This is generally regarded as an acceptable date to commence long-distance travel. However, when the Dong Gong Method, another method of date selection, is considered, then the date that my team and I left for Tibet was actually a bad date because that was a day where a Fire Star was present and travels to the North would be affected by Black Sha Qi. Now, since we flew to Beijing and then onto Chengdu before heading to Lhasa, we were heading North the whole time. However, as I had gone from Hong Kong, I was somewhat less affected than my traveling companions who had traveled from KL. The exact date we landed in Tibet was a Stable Day (Ding Re) according to the 12 Day Officer method but according to the Dong Gong Method, it was an inauspicious day, being afflicted by the Bing Fu illness star, which was exactly what happened!
By contrast, this year, the Mastery Academy team and the students landed in China for the China Excursion on a Stable Day according to the 12 Day Officer system. Furthermore, based on the Dong Gong system, this day had the Heaven and Monthly Virtue Noble stars, the Yellow Spiral, Purple Sandalwood, Heavenly Emperor, Earthly Emperor and Golden Storage Stars. Not only was no one ill, but everyone had a good time and even the weather was fine!
The power of a good date!
China's great men and their tombs
This year, one of the sites I had selected for my students to audit in China was the tomb of Deng Xiao Peng's mother. Now you might be wondering - why aren't we looking at Deng's own tomb? Well, in Feng Shui, if we want to know why a particular person has achieved great things in their life, we don't look at their tomb - we look at the tomb of their ancestors. This is because Yin House Feng Shui affects descendants so if we want to know how someone is going to turn out, the answer is to check their parents or grandparent's tomb.
And certainly, this explains the differing fortunes and destinies of two of China's greatest leaders: Mao Zedong and Deng Xiao Peng. Mao will always be immortalised in China as a great leader and first 'modern day Emperor', whilst Deng, despite being one of the important leaders of the Communist Party of China, never held any official position as head of state.
Mao's Yin House Feng Shui originates from his grandfather's tomb whilst Deng's is drawn from his mother's tomb. This is already a strong revealing indicator of the different paths the two men will take. In Feng Shui, it is said "Male is Yang, Female is Yin, Father is bones, mother is flesh". Now, what does this mean?
"Mother is Flesh" refers to the use of Yin Qi, and talents and skills that are gained through experience, observation and through study. "Father is bones" refers to what is already in you at the point of birth. Latent talent or abilities and innate character. So Mao's leadership skills and charisma were in-born, whilst Deng had to learn the hard way, how to rise to the top.
Between the two tombs, Mao's grandfather's tomb, atop a magnificent hill with a North Guardian (Bei Chen Xing) locking in the Water Mouth of the area, is definitely superior to Deng's mother's tomb, which is a good but basic Five Petal Lotus Formation. Mao's grandfather's tomb has some of typical features of Emperor-creating formations, whilst Deng's mother's tomb derives its Qi from the Five Petal Lotus Formation itself. Deng's power is not just true power, but takes a long time to secure, just like the lotus takes a long time to emerge from the muddy waters. The bloom of the lotus also does not last, just as Deng's power did not hold sway for long.
Both Deng and Mao's children did not succeed them to positions of great power and influence. This is because both the burial sites do not have multiple layers of incoming dragons but a single meridian spot. This indicates power to only the immediate descendant, but not lasting power that carries through the generations and can create a dynasty. This is contrast to the tombs of the ancestors of the founders of the Ming and Qing dynasties, where there are extensive incoming Dragons and supporting mountains behind the main spot, indicating lasting power - 12 generations long to be exact.
What makes a person go berserk?
Some of my students were sms-ing me while I was in China, asking me about the BaZi of the young man who went on a rampage in Virginia Tech University in the US. Based on public domain information, I got his birthday and this is the BaZi chart of Cho Seung Hui, the Korean gunman (time not known)
Xin Metal born in Ox (Chou) and Ox is part of the season of Winter. In BaZi, we have a phrase "water and metal too much emotions" and this chart epitomizes that. This young man was emotionally unstable. As he was born in Korea and emigrated to the US, this move further affects his chart negatively since the direction of West is associated with the element of Metal. It would definitely have been better for his mental state probably to remain in Korea, in the East, which is Wood.
Based on the calculation of his luck pillar, he would still be in the Gui Hai luck pillar. This means that his Year Pillar is in a fu yin formation with his luck pillar. A fu yin refers to a sad crying event. His year pillar is not only in a fu yin formation, but there is also a self-punishment between his year pillar, his luck pillar and the annual pillar of 2007. Hence, this person is deeply emotionally affected and unstable this year.
The fu yin also explains his suicide - that is often explained in ancient BaZi literatures like San Ming Tung Hui that a fu yin can bring about sad, self destructive issues or even death. The Year pillar represents a person's external outlook and also, the feeling of gratitude. When this is affected, the person feels suppressed and disturbed. As the star affected is the Hurting Officer (Shang Guan) star, rebellious, angry and desiring to prove the people around him wrong about their perceptions of him.
Of course, there's more to this chart, but in keeping with the taster theme, I'm going to keep it short and sweet. In my next article, I'll be delving into a little more BaZi, specifically that of the famously eccentric Hong Kong billionaires, Nina Wang. In forthcoming articles, I will also be exploring places with interesting Feng Shui in and around Malaysia. So if there is a place or a location(a restaurant, an office, your favourite chicken rice shop) that you're curious about, Feng Shui-wise, do write in and let me know about it!
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