Question: I have had difficulty attracting and keeping a suitable partner. Are there any feng shui elements I can try in my home to help?
george
Reading: Southwest corner feng shui
by email
Answer: You’re not the only person wondering this. Linda in Gardena asked about finding “better company” and Anonymous in Los Angeles asked if feng shui could be used to “attract a soulmate.”
The answer is yes, but.
Yes, there are ways feng shui can help attract that person you long to meet. But before you start using feng shui, you need to pay attention to who you are and what you have to offer.
Your personality, how you respond to other people, and your ability to take a genuine and generous interest in them will matter more than any mystical help you turn to.
Are you a good listener and empathetic friend? does he have a sense of humor with himself in addition to his ability to laugh at the world in general? Are you quite comfortable with who you are?
in short: are you good company and fun to be around?
If you’re okay on all of those counts and your grooming habits are fine (don’t forget to check your teeth for spinach after lunch!), then go ahead with feng shui.
Your bedroom is the place to start because it has the most powerful influence on your personal life and is vital for creating powerful feng shui relationship improvements.
Bring out your compass and find the southwestern area of the room. If your southwest corner houses an overflowing laundry hamper or chair where you dump clothes, books, old pizza cartons, or other debris, clean it up.
that could be part of your problem. turn this part of your room into a place of beauty and serenity.
In classical feng shui, the Southwest rules relationships of all kinds, from business and romantic partnerships to the bond between a mother and child. the number 2 (as in society) is also symbolic here.
yellow is the corresponding color, with that general Southwestern spectrum ranging from a rich cream to a deep sunset orange.
See also: 9 indoor plants good for feng shui this Lunar New Year – Culture
Keep it simple as you think of ways to incorporate this significant number and these colors into your southwest corner. you can add a vase with two yellow tulips.
As a higher maintenance, but deeply symbolic upgrade, consider a pair of canaries.
You may incorporate photographs, paintings, or other significant works of art. Numerous men and women have told me that they have had excellent results using romantic images in art. immediately comes to mind “the kiss” by gustave klimt.
Whatever you choose, make sure it’s something you love to look at and live with. wait a few weeks and see what happens.
I’ll talk about relationship improvements for the office in an upcoming column.
the sign of 4 is the word for death
q: We just bought a new house and will be moving in a couple of weeks. here’s the deal. the house address is 4153. a four, in numerology, is a number for both death and wealth.
isabella
by email
answer: interesting question. just after reading yours i got a second email from kristina asking about death and number 4 and numerology.
In much of feng shui, numbers have a meaning based on Cantonese language and customs. eg: You are right about the number 4. Many Chinese want to avoid houses with addresses containing that number because yes, the word for “death”, is the same as yes, the word for “number 4”.
The number 8, on the other hand, sounds like the word “prosperity” and is considered very auspicious. The eight is used on happy occasions, especially at weddings, where the large red 88 convey wishes of double prosperity to the bride and groom.
Aside from these language-related customs, numbers have meaning in the practice of classical compass school feng shui.
The lo shu “magic square” is a grid with nine numbers arranged like a three-in-a-row diagram, with 4, 9, and 2 at the top, 3, 5, and 7 in the middle, and 8, 1 and 6 at the bottom.
Any way you add these numbers (vertical, horizontal, or on a diagonal line), they add up to 15, the number of days it takes for a new moon to become a full moon.
These numbers can be used in combination with the ba-gua, the octagonal feng shui chart to delve into the secrets of feng shui.
See also: Aquariums in Feng Shui: Factors to Consider for Abundance
They are used to calculate auspicious dates and even the direction of luck, although the calculations are complicated and tedious. Fortunately, they are made for you every year and published in the annual Chinese almanac, the tong shu, which you can probably find in a good bookstore or your local library.
If you’d like more information on the magic square and its uses, check out Lillian Too’s book, “Applied Feng Shui”.
algebra surrenders its mysteries to the proper chi
p: I’m a high school math teacher. perhaps you have ideas about furniture placement in a classroom to promote better student outcomes.
bob
old mission
a: I don’t remember much about my math in high school, but I do remember how important focus and energy was to learning it.
In any room, both energy and focus are strongly affected by the arrangement of furniture. Ideally, the chi (energy) will flow through a front door, curving and winding around the room, and finally dissipating through windows.
If the desks in your classroom are in straight rows, your students will not benefit from this energy.
students may be slow, distracted, or unable to focus clearly on their teaching. group the desks in a semicircle. if discipline is not an issue, arrange desks so students face the door. this will make them feel more powerful because they have visual control of the room, a huge boost for students who are afraid of math and lack confidence in their ability to understand what you are explaining to them.
This arrangement will also help your ability to concentrate (because you’re not unconsciously worried about what might be going on just outside your line of sight).
It may mean you’re teaching with your back to the door, and I wouldn’t recommend putting yourself in a less powerful position if you have troublesome students, but if you can handle this arrangement, it’s worth a try.
make sure the classroom has plenty of light and bring bright colors into the room. if possible, hang up a mobile that is related to the math concepts you are teaching.
The light, the colors and the mobile will encourage the chi to circulate faster, which will stimulate those adolescent brains when facing mathematical problems.
Check back in a couple of months and let me know if the test scores have improved a bit.
kirsten lagatree is a writer from washington, d.c., whose books include “feng shui, how to organize your home to change your life” (villard 1996) and “feng shui at work, how to organize your workspace to get the most out of it.” maximum return and maximum profit” (villard 1998).
See also: 10 Feng Shui Tips That Bring Positive Energy in Home