Let me tell a story. It is a short story about feng shui, ghosts and gods.

Feng Shui has always been associated some way or other with the supernatural and strange wise beings. We have the legend of Fu Xi who gave us the River Map. We also have Huang Shi Gong who taught, among other things, the Green Satchels to Zhang Liang. Huang Shi Gong was also said to have used Feng Shui to bury Liu Bang’s parents (it wasn’t called Fengshui then but Kan Yu). Liu Bang went on to found the Han Dynasty.

Huang Shi Gong was a sorcerer, a magician, a man who knows the Dao. Some say he is divine, a god. Nonetheless, such is the mystical side of Feng Shui. It is a zone where no science can reach nor decipher. At least not yet.

Our story now begins. It is a story I heard.

Old Master Wang was getting on in age and had taken a reprieve from all the Feng Shui requests. Looking for auspicious sites requires the energy of youth. Though still fit for his age, steep slopes are becoming a challenge. Three steps one stop, five steps one rest – that’s how it is. But this morning’s phone call had a certain urgency about it.

Madam Li had somehow found him out and wanted him urgently. Tried as he could, she would not be dissuaded. Old Master Wang is a gentleman and it would be unchivalrous to turn a request down, especially one that seemed urgent. So he agreed. Madam Li would be over within the hour to fetch him. “There goes my lazy morning,” he thought to himself.

Madam was five minutes early. In the car, she told him exactly what had happened. Apparently her father had passed on three months ago. Shortly after the funeral, her father appeared in her dream and said that he was not buried right. His grave had bad fengshui. He was uneasy and asked that she looked for another site. “The site is at Moon Village,” he told her. Moon Village is a neigbouring village about eighty kilometers away.

She had brush it aside then as she had not much faith in Feng Shui, being educated in the new ways. But strangely, her brother had the same dream too. The dead man told him that it had to be urgently carried out. Right away, if not, the family will suffer.

Now, it is not normal Chinese practice to re-entomb the dead so shortly after. A good time would be three years so the brother thought nothing more of it. That was until he suddenly suffered a huge loss in his export-import business. There was some war or something in the Middle East and his shipment was somehow hijacked or lost without trace. This poor man suffered a huge loss. Insurance would not pay.

The dead father had reappeared to him just a few days ago. By chance Madam Li had heard that Old Master Wang was familiar with Moon Village. That was why she identified him, believing he would be the right man for the job. They needed a reliable FengShui master good with identifying Xue, the dragon’s lair.

Now Old Master Wang was scratching his head. He had scoured quite a fair bit of the hills and plains of the Moon Village. There were potential plots with possibilities of good feng shui but how on earth (or the otherworld) did the dead man know that there is a good plot in Moon Village. Madam Li had received quite specified instructions on location and features and they were headed there now.

Now, at his point the story got a little technical, talking about Feng Shui formations and what not. To cut a long story short (I promised a short story) Old Master Wang eventually found the site. Hopefully that would please the dead man, ghost whatever. At one point he did have to go down on all fours though. It was not the perfect site but okay okay.

The story gets stranger. The old ghost came back to Madam Li and said that was the site he meant. Excitedly, she called Old Master Wang and told him the good news. In the course of the conversation, she mentioned that her third brother, who lived in another town, knew of a local temple where the resident god is famous for giving Feng Shui advice. Old Master Wang was amused. “Why not ask your third brother to check with the ‘Three Yellow God’ there?” he suggested in jest.

Old Master Wang thought that was the end of the matter. On the day of the re-entombment, the third brother had this story to tell. He had indeed gone to the temple for a second opinion. Without asking for further details other than the locality, the ‘Three Yellow God’ gave the exact description (that’s what the third brother said) of the site. Fortunately, the god also mentioned that the site was a super fantastic one but it had good fengshui. Said it was a ‘green dragon lair’.

Strange isn’t it that gods and ghosts know feng shui too? But there is still one interesting part to our story. On digging up the first grave, the undertakers discovered that there were other bone fragments under the coffin. Ah, the poor man had been buried over another dead soul. Now, that is terribly inauspicious. No wonder the dead father was so agitated and wanted to be moved out immediately.

-the end, for now-

Lai blogs on http://www.fengshui-insights.com

Just what is Feng Shui? The short answer is that it’s an ancient Chinese art and science that was developed some 3000 years ago to help people balance the energies in the places they lived. It’s pronounced Fung Shway and it translates to “Wind Water.” In Chinese culture, the elements play an important part in everyday life, as in wind and water that bring good harvests, which in turn bring good health and prosperity.

Feng Shui is based on Taoist philosophy, which puts a great deal of stock in living in harmony with nature, and states that land is alive and brimming with energy, or chi (pronounced chee). This in turn means that your home is alive and full of chi as well and needs to be arranged in such a way that the chi can be maximized.

How can you use this Chinese art in your spring cleaning? You’ll need to do some rearranging, but first, you’ll need a bagua (pronounced bah-gwah) map. This map includes the eight building blocks of life, according to the Chinese Taoist philosophy: health, love/marriage, wealth, career, wisdom/knowledge, reputation/fame, children/creativity and helpful people, plus the center area of chi.

To make a bagua map, look at the structure of your home. The ideal shape is a square or rectangle, but despair not if your home is L-shaped or U-shaped. On a large piece of paper, draw a map of your home, noting where doors and windows are. If your home is L-shaped or U-shaped, use dotted lines to fill out the square or rectangle. Now divide the square into nine parts, which will correspond to each of the nine bagua areas.

The baguas are determined by the location of the front door of your house, which is considered the baseline of your bagua map. As you look in the front door of your home, the area to your right is “helpful people.” The area to your left is “wisdom/knowledge,” and in between those two is your “career” bagua. The center three baguas, left to right, are “family,” “chi” and “children/creativity.” The upper left corner is “wealth,” upper middle is “fame/reputation” and the upper right is “marriage.” In other words, it looks like this:

Wealth/fame/marriage

Family/chi/children

Wisdom/career/helpful people

———-front door————

Once you’ve drawn out your bagua map, you are read to place symbolic objects in the corresponding areas to maximize the chi in those areas. For instance, in your wealth area, you can place a bowl of coins, or perhaps hang framed foreign currency. Experts also recommend hanging a round clear crystal on a red cord, which represents wealth. Hang wedding photos and place keepsakes from your wedding in your marriage area, and place pictures of your children in the children area. You get the idea. The center chi area should remain as uncluttered as possible.

Carolyn Cooper is a gifted Energy Intuitive and teacher of cutting-edge vibrational healing. Through inspiration and years of experience, Carolyn has created Calyco Healing, a unique energy-healing training course in which anyone can learn how to heal themselves and others. These trainings attract an international audience. Cooper also publishes an e-newsletter called “Living in the Flow” and was a contributing author of the book 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Health. Visit her blog at http://www.calycohealing.com/blog.

The practical application of Feng Shui interior design in every room of your home can have an influence on helping with the creation of your wealth and abundance in terms of your prosperity. (By the way wealth and abundance is not just money it is wealth and abundance in every aspect of your life from friends, family and career).

However one room in particular can have a significant impact on your Feng Shui wealth. Surprisingly it is the bathroom and its Feng Shui interior design.

1. Location – The location of the bathroom in the house can have a major influence on your wealth and abundance. In terms of Feng Shui if you have a bathroom in the so called “wealth” corner of your home then you are likely to flush your money away unless you carry out some Feng Shui cures or remedies.

Just quickly the wealth corner of your home is the far left hand section of you home if you stand facing the front door. I have numerous clients over many years who have had financial problems until they applied these cures to their bathroom. The penny dropped for one client when I was explaining the concept and siad he now knew why he had gone bankrupt years before as he could clearly remember the layout of the home he was liviung in at the time.

The traditional cures to overcome that problem is to keep the door closed the toilet lid down, hang a small Feng Shui crystal in the window to draw in positive outside energy or chi and to hang a Feng Shui bagua mirror over the door. The concept is to seal in the flushing away energy and introduce positive chi with the crystal.

2. Feng Shui Interior Design – Decorate your bathroom so that it looks like a spa room in a luxurious hotel. Make it a place to go and relax, so that you can forget all the problems and hassles you are having in your day to day world. As I discuss at my books, use anything in the bathroom which makes you feel good. Trust your intuition. Always design in a way that lifts your spirits.

3. Clutter – in terms of Feng Shui wealth one of the best things you can do in any room is to remove anything which is cluttering up the energy of the space. You want energy to flow easily. So in the bathroom, don’t have all your half used cosmetic jars sitting on the vanity, remove the dirty laundry basket and make sure all the surfaces appear clean and are in good order. If things appear to be falling apart in any way this can affect how you feel about your wealth and abundance. The concept of clearing the clutter needs to be applied to all rooms to ensure a smooth flow of chi. It is not really about a short term messy appearance it is about things which have stayed in the same place for a long time, are covered in dust and which are stagnant.

Your Feng Shui Wealth can be significantly affected by your bathroom and these three tips give you some ideas of things to consider to make improvements to your wealth and abundance

George Birdsall wrote the best selling book Feng Shui – The Key Concepts in 1995 and has sold over 50,000 copies so far. He has recently released an eBook “Feng Shui Symbols – Ancient Secrets to finding Love and Wealth”- Ancient Secrets to finding Love and Wealth”. He writes a blog on planning your home improvement projects to save time and money at http://www.therenovationplan.com. He lives in Sydney Australia and loves organising anything in ways that Save Time and Money for himself and his clients. His business focuses around Project Management and Client Advisory Services to clients ranging from home owners to multinational corporations

Losing Sleep? Look to Feng Shui for sleep secrets. Feng Shui is beneficial for a lot of things, including how to get a good night’s rest each night. For the uninitiated, Feng Shui is an ancient Chinese principle that combines art and science to create a pleasing environment which is conducive to the positive flow of Chi, the energy of the universe. By regulating this Chi and keeping the flow positive, you can improve your time sleeping.

Sleeping Tip 1: Avoid sleeping with your head pointed towards the door to your bedroom. This is because when energy enters the room, if your head and body are in a direct line, it will bear the brunt of this wave of energy which can be subconsciously unnerving and can interrupt or even prevent sleep. Also avoid having your feet facing the door.

Sleeping Tip 2: Don’t position your bed right below a window. This can also be detrimental to your sleeping habits. The window presents a way for your positive Chi to escape. In addition, a window above your bed also invites bad Chi to enter your room. And since the bad Chi would be right above your head, you would experience most of the bad flow of Chi first before it disperses to the rest of your room.

Sleeping Tip 3: In terms of room decor, try and avoid water or any symbolism related to water in your bedroom. Yes, water is considered lucky and represents abundance in Feng Shui. But in your bedroom, it can actually have a detrimental effect on your sleep. Also avoid having pictures of water in your bedroom.

Sleeping Tip 4: Avoid sharp angled corners in your bed area. Architectural elements or pieces of furniture can have a harmful effect on your sleep. If any sharp angled corners or a sloping ceiling is pointed at the bed area, these are considered poison arrows in Feng Shui. Poison arrows produce bad Chi. By blocking the effects of these poison arrows, you can maintain a positive flow of Chi in the room and hopefully sleep better at night. Hanging silk plants or even pretty lighting can diffuse the effects of these sharp corners or angles.

Sleeping Tip 5: Get rid of photos and memorabilia of old flames. Any ties to past relationships can damage your current romantic life in your bedroom. This often leads to poor sleep. If you absolutely cannot part with certain memorabilia, move those items to another room.

Sleeping Tip 6: Clear the junk and declutter. Try cleansing your bedroom. Old, stale, and pent-up bad energy could be keeping you up at night. Decluttering and starting new is healing and purifying. You also might add aromatherapy techniques like adding scents. Lavender and vanilla are calming scents.

Any one technique many not bring about more sleep. But the combination of techniques should do the trick. For more sleep secrets including how to handle Feng Shui mirrors can be found at http://www.fengshuimirror.com.

A water fountain is a bomb of pleasure which when bursts out makes you elated. It rejuvenates your mind and soothes your soul. Beyond the work of art, interior wall fountains are gorgeous, soothing and bring much happiness. The purpose of this article is to make you feel just how lucky you are if you own a fabulous and fanciful fountain.

The fast moving factor of time never allows anyone to enjoy nature leisurely. Nature is the wonder which the blind can see and a deaf can hear. This is the truth that triumphs. One of such nature’s beauty are the waterfalls. But is it truly possible to spend hours and hours beside them to enjoy it’s calmness and the babbling brooks in our daily schedule? No……definitely not. So what can be done to bridge this gap?

Indoor fountains stand as the only way to fill this gap that ends your quest towards nature. They reduces the space between you and nature and make you feel to be in an eco-friendly atmosphere amidst of all sorts of urbanization. They are the perfect medicines that gives you loads and loads of relaxation. When coming to the topic of interior decoration it is the art of putting right things in the right place accomplished with an artistic touch. Indoor fountains are one of the renowned examples that adds glory to your home.

On superstitious grounds, water is considered to be one of the reflections of god. According to Feng Shui which is the art of interior design states that the right composition of colors and properties will ensure harmony in your living place. This Feng Shui too remarks that water is one of the basic things that fetches blessings to your sweet home. Some people who may argue with the decorative option will be surely convinced for this sentimental side.

There are also scientific reasons to boast about fountains since the water from the indoor fountains purifies the air and cleanses the surroundings. These are not blind beliefs because to be more specific the negative ions expelled from the water attracts and pick out the dirt and impure particles which is oppositely polarized thereby leaving the environment neat and tidy. They also enhance the moisture content in air which improves your skin tone and make wrinkles to vanish. The water fountain is a wonderful thing that stands itself as a symbol of beauty and a thing that increases your beauty as well.

Amber Liddell is resource for the website Serenityhealth.com, your one stop shop for any type of water fountains and water fountain information. You will find many outdoor fountains for your garden, wall fountains, tabletop fountains and even custom fountains. Visit Serenityhealth.com or call to talk to one of our water fountain experts.

Adding a window seat to a room can be a great way of creating additional seating space. These cozy little niches not only look great, but they also are a very comfortable and convenient place to curl up with a good book while still being able to enjoy the beauty of the outdoors. Although some people are lucky enough to have an older home with a dormer that already has a window seat built in, with just a little effort and some basic building materials and skill, it is easy to add one of these seats to almost any room in your home as weekend do-it-yourself project.

Choosing the Overall Design
There are many different ways to build a window seat that includes a hidden area. Although you can certainly find plenty of plans and patterns for building these types of units, you can also create a very functional window seat area using nothing more elaborate than standard kitchen stock cabinets, which can provide plenty of storage space. You could also use a prefabricated storage bench as the basis for your window seat, or build your own, either with a cabinet front or a hinged seat that lifts up to reveal storage space.

Building Your Own Window Seat
If you already have a recessed area by a window, such as what is provided by a dormer, you can build your own custom made window seat designed specifically to fit within the space you have. This can create a built-in look that will make it appear that the seat was designed as part of the overall house design. Unless you have the ability to create your own design plans, you will want to start with an overall plan for building a window storage seat, and then adjust the measurements to fit the space you have. This type of building project is generally fairly simple, requiring nothing more than the plans themselves, some lumber, and some basic hand and power tools.

Building a Window Seat from Kitchen Cabinets
Another great way to build a window seat with storage is to use standard stock kitchen cabinets. Not only are these cabinets easy to work with because they are already assembled and prefinished in most cases, but the hardware and everything else is already included. Another advantage of using kitchen cabinet units is that they can make it easy to create a window niche where one doesn’t even exist. To create this effect, use short kitchen cabinets to create the seating area of the storage bench, placing them on a short base directly on the floor in front of the window. Then, use full height kitchen cabinets such as pantry or open shelving units on either side of the window to create a built-in appearance. This can add a lot of storage space and style to a room, in addition to providing a window seating unit. You can use a purchased cushion such as those used for patio furniture, or sew your own custom cushion to add the finishing touch.

With signature design style, Jessica Ackerman, an online writer with WallDecorandHomeAccents.com, describes bold approaches to fish wall art and wall decor.

The primary entrance to your house is called the “mouth of chi” in feng shui. It is an extremely important area to focus on because so much of the energy that comes into your house comes through this primary entrance. A few small changes here can make a big difference in the rest of your house. Here are a few ways to make the most of what’s good about your front entrance and how to overcome any existing problems.

1) Use your front door

So many people come through the garage now that it is quite common that no one has even stepped over the real threshold to your house in the last few days. Make a point of changing that by walking out your front door to get the mail, or just to look around your front garden.

2) Make sure the lock works well and the door opens easily

Blocked entrances are very bad in feng shui, and the front door is the most important entrance. If your door leaks heat, get it sealed. If it sticks, either oil the hinges or get a locksmith to fix where it is stuck. Absolutely make sure that the door can swing open all the way inside, with no coat hangers or anything else behind it.

3) Widen the path

The wider the path to your door (and the wider your door, too) the more energy and, symbolically, the more money can come into your house. Ever notice how big, expensive houses tend to have double doors and wide paths? Make your house like that, even if it just means adding a row of paving stones on either side of the front path.

Having steps in front of your house can be good, bad, or not matter too much. Having steps going up to your house can slow chi down, whereas steps going down to your front door (like a basement apartment), can slow it down so much as to create stagnation. So long as there are just a few steps, and they seem in proportion to the rest of the entrance, they will not affect too much. But if someone has to climb lots of steep stairs to come to a little door, then you need to take some steps of your own to increase the flow of chi so it can overcome that barrier.

4) Consider the direction

The direction your front door faces is very important in feng shui. Most directions are positive, but doors facing North and particularly North-East are not auspicious. If your door faces either of these directions, you want to insulate the inside of your house from this energy. You can do that by having a winding path to the front door and adding bushy evergreen plants so the energy has to meander in. Painting your door with high-gloss paint will also reflect back some of the negative chi, as will using shiny metal fittings on the door. Other ways to block this energy include putting a reflecting globe or a convex near the front door.

Front doors facing East are excellent for building up a career or getting started in life. A South-East facing door helps with communication and steady progress. The South is a high-energy direction that may even need to be toned down with a dish of sea salt if you find yourself arguing with people. A South-West door gives more settled feel, but there is a risk of some not-so-good energy settling in, too. A Westward facing door will help with romance and contentment. A North-West facing door is good for authority and stability.

5) Consider the activity beyond your door

What’s going on just beyond your property line will also determine whether you want to block or increase the energetic openness of the front door. If your house is at the end of a street, or in the direct line of a traffic flow, you want to put up some blocks to slow the speeding chi down. But if you are on the inside curve of a quiet street, you want to bring the energy in and activate it, possibly with a water fountain or wind chimes.

Leslie Donohue is a professional decorator who specializes in how to use light. She just finished an extensive installation of outdoor ceiling lights around her home and is now moving on to the ceiling light fixtures in her home.

Kathryn Weber is the publisher of the Red Lotus Letter feng shui e-zine and the ebook APPLIED FENG SHUI, The Science of Determining and Applying Authentic Feng Shui to Your Space In 9 Easy Steps. For more information, logon to http://www.redlotusletter.com and receive this special report “16 Feng Shui Secrets for Greater Prosperity” FREE.

Kathryn Weber is the publisher of the Red Lotus Letter feng shui e-zine and is dedicated to helping her readers develop successful, prosperous, and supportive environments with feng shui. To subscribe, logon to http://www.redlotusletter.com and receive this special report Fr*ee “16 Feng Shui Secrets for Greater Prosperity.”

Kathryn Weber is the publisher of the Red Lotus Letter feng shui e-zine and the ebook APPLIED FENG SHUI, The Science of Determining and Applying Authentic Feng Shui to Your Space In 9 Easy Steps. For more information, logon to http://www.redlotusletter.com and receive this special report “16 Feng Shui Secrets for Greater Prosperity” FREE.