The signs of bad feng shui, and which to look at first

What the school calls bad feng shui

The Form School does not speak of curses. It reads a home as a vessel for chi, and a fault as any shape that lets chi rush, scatter or stagnate where people live: a straight channel from door to window, an edge aimed at a bed, a beam above a sleeper, a damp that never lifts.

Most findings are light, and a home with a few of them is an ordinary home. A handful are heavy, and two weigh above all the rest: the through-hall, and a beam across the bed.

At the door, where chi enters

The door is the mouth of the house: whatever chi the street brings, the home takes in here. Feng shui wants it to arrive slowly and settle, so it watches for anything that rushes chi in, sends it straight out or blocks its way.

• Standing in the doorway, can you see straight through to a balcony door or a large window?
• Does a staircase run straight down to the front door, or straight up from it?
• Is the first door you see from the entrance a bathroom’s?
• From the front door, do you look straight at the stove?
• Outside, does a road or a driveway run straight at the door?
• Does a large tree stand on the door’s center line?

In the bedroom, where you rest

A beam across the bed weighs heaviest of all bedroom findings.

• Lying in bed, is there an exposed beam above you?
• Is there a window behind your head, or nothing at all?
• Open the bedroom door and look straight in: does the bed lie on that line?
• Does a bathroom door look straight at the bed?
• Lying down, can you see yourself in a mirror?

In the living room, where the household sits

• Sitting on the main sofa, is there a window, a walkway or open floor behind you?
• Does a beam run above the sofa or the dining table?
• Wherever you sit or work for hours, does a beam hang overhead?

The stove and the bathroom, fire and water

• Does the stove face a bathroom door?
• Is the bathroom dark and damp, with mold in its corners and a floor that never dries?

What to set right first

A reading orders the work two ways at once: the heaviest findings first, and within them, what can change today before what needs a builder.

• Break the through-hall with a screen just inside the front door, and draw the far door’s curtains at night.
• Settle the bed: out from under any beam, off the door’s line, its head against a solid wall.
• Close the bathroom doors that look at the entrance, the bed or the stove, and hang a long curtain over each.
• Veil or move the mirror that shows the bed.
• Give the main sofa a wall at its back, or a console table where no wall can be had.
• Screen the stove from the front door with a curtain across the kitchen doorway or a slatted screen.

Read from one photograph

A reading weighs both sides: every finding says what it means for the people who live there, and what the room already does well is marked too, for the tradition counts a solid wall behind a bed, or a bright and open entry, as strengths to keep.

It begins from a single ordinary photograph, taken from the doorway. The sample reading shows one bedroom read in full: six findings against it, one in its favor, and thirteen fixes set in order.

Questions people ask