Feng Shui History While feng shui has its origins in ancient China starting over five thousand years ago, it is actually based on thousands of years of careful and studied observation of human behavior and how the environment impact that behavior, both negatively and positively. Feng Shui practitioners were originally consulted to assist families in finding the ideal location to establish the family shrine and mausoleum.
The feng shui practitioners soon determined that placing the family shrine too high on a hill or mountain top would put the family shrine at risk of being exposed to the possibility of being buffeted about and damaged by high winds. The feng shui practitioners also determined that in the same manner, placing the family shrine too far low in a valley place the structure at risk of being destroyed and carried away by the country's seasonal flooding. Each of these two examples was a kind of extreme,' and that anything in its extreme could lead to dangerous circumstances. Here was the development of two of the most substantively principles of feng shui.
The first of these principles is that of the concept 'chi.' Chi deals with the flow of energy and whether that energy is flowing in a positive or negative manner. Obviously, the chi flow were the shrine to be placed on the mountain top would be such that it would be too fast resulting in damage. Were the shrine to be placed in the bottom of the valley, the chi flow would be both blocked and stagnant as well as too swift resulting in if there were to be flash flooding, the blocked and stuck nature of the shrine's position in the bottom of the valley, any chance to escape or protect the structure would be lost. Thus the word feng shui' in its literal translation from the Chinese language is wind and water,' a term that holds two of the more substantive aspects of feng shui, that being the ability to harness the ideal flow of chi and maintaining balance and avoiding harsh extremes as addressed via ying and yang analysis.
Feng Shui practitioners expanded their applications to observing the naturally occurring patterns in nature and apply these into the interiors of buildings and the surrounding landscape. Hallways were seen as rivers and furniture was viewed as rock outcroppings, and the goal was to create an interior living environment that was as natural-feeling and harmonious as was the natural world.
From the practice of intuiting and applying the naturally occurring forms of nature into residential and business environments evolved the practice of geomancy. In simple terms, geomancy refers to an ancient practice of divination in which the feng shui practitioner would take handfuls of soil, seeds, or other materials, and scattered them across the ground on the property in order to generate a configuration of dots that were then interpreted by the feng shui practitioner. Other ways of accomplishing this would be to make marking s in the dirt or sand of the property. As the practice evolved and became more advanced, feng shui practitioners, or geomants, came to utilize the compass, known as the ‘loupan' which contained tools relevant to determining astrology, auspicious and inauspicious areas of the building, as well as energetic patterns in the life of the building.
The goal of the feng shui practitioner was now to locate a site where the energies or ch'i of the land and sky were brought into perfect balance, and in terms of structures were already constructed, to provide the remedies and cures to make the building the ideal environment for those who live and work there. It was the harmony of these energies that would now ensure good fortune. Most feng shui practitioners work with either form school or compass school, in accordance to which school they feel more comfortable. One of the great things about Those Feng Shui Guys is that we apply both modalities in our consultations to provide that maximum amount of information and guidance for our clients.
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call Eric Cuestas-Thompson or Michael Bamba
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