Chapter 12 from Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-yen Lu's Book No. 69

When taking a feng-shui reading for a house, one first determines the orientation. Next, one must note whether or not there are any "outside" or "inside" adverse conditions.

The following outside conditions are to be avoided when they directly face one's door:

• Electric pole or large pillars
• Long and straight onrushing main road
• Deep pit or broken cliff very close to the house
• The curve of a road, river, or building that points at one's house
• Chimney, corner, 'knife-edge,' or other sharp and pointed objects projecting from the house across the street
• The front door of another house if it is larger than one's own front door
• Manure pit, vegetable patch, garbage incinerator or any filthy objects

All these are unfavorable outside conditions which should be avoided. While some of the above factors have an effect directly on the "earth chi," others are primarily psychological. If the adverse influence is due to earth chi, then we have to use remedies that can change the earth chi.

If the adverse influence is psychological, then we have to resort to "psychological remedies." For example, some people write words such as "bring me money" on an electric pole as a symbolic psychological relief. They go outdoors, see the pole and read the phrase "bring me money." Over time, the psychological block caused by the electric pole will be removed.

Some people feel psychologically better by hanging certain objects outside their front doors. These include "ba-guas," mirrors, talismans, flutes, and bells. "Ba-guas" are used to neutralize noxious sha-chi, mirrors are reflectors and enhancers, talismans destroy evil spirits, flutes (which in Chinese sounds the same as the word "whittle") to whittle down the inauspicious and ominous, and bells avert evil influences.

This mindset of self protection is understandable, so we need not berate people who, by hanging such objects, seek to receive some psychological comfort. In fact, these psychological relief methods do work to a certain degree and, if they can be employed in combination with rituals and the "intent to invoke divine protection," they form a kind of magical practice.

However, there are situations wherein psychological relief methods will not work. some examples are when the house is facing a large deep pit, an onrushing road, a manure pit, or when it is situated right outside the bow of a curve. In such cases, before the psychological relief methods could avert the negative influences from the earth chi, one's household would have already been stricken by natural or man-made disasters.

The following inside conditions are to be avoided when they occur directly inside the front door:

• Facing a staircase upon entering
• Face a "knife-edge" (which is the corner of a wall in line with the mid-point of the front door)
• Facing a beam which points at one
• A wall which is so close that one can hardly turn around.
• Any of the following visible upon entering the front door: a bed in a bedroom; a fire in the kitchen; the toilet in a bathroom; a fireplace
• The back door. When the house has its front door connected to the back door this way, it is known as "having its chest pierced"
• Such a narrow construction that the front and back of the house are too close. Such construction is known as "having a compressed chest"

There are reasons why such conditions are undesirable. For example, in the case where the front door leads directly to the back door, the chi slips away as soon as it enters the door. Here the chi cannot be stored. When a house is unable to store chi, the people living there will have financial problems.

When chi enters the door and is stopped by a staircase or a wall that is too close, or if the space between the front and back of the house is too narrow, the chi will become chaotic. Families living in houses with such designs will not get rich and will experience disharmony.

As soon as chi enters the door and faces a "knife-edge," or a directly pointing beam, bed, fire, or toilet, then people living in the house will become agitated, hot-tempered, accident-prone, inflicted by illnesses or strange diseases. Their children also will suffer these ailments.

I, Living Buddha Lian-sheng, feel that the front door is a major chi entrance, as well as the portal through which people come and go. As such, it has an extremely significant role in affecting the fortune of the whole house. One should pay special attention to the conditions inside as well as outside the front door, and should avoid all destructive features. Otherwise, even if the house is designed to be auspiciously oriented, the existence of adverse conditions will ensure that one's fortunes will come to nothing.

Ideally, treatment for a house with adverse conditions existing inside or outside the front door include alterations that will remove the offensive features. True geomancers are able to employ simple altering methods to rectify the situations. These achieve better results than resorting to the hanging of objects that provide mainly psychological relief.

The treatment for a house with adverse conditions outside the front door is to change the position of front door to an orientation that does not have the destructive conditions but that is still compatible with the birth magnetic orientation of the head of the household.

To treat the adverse conditions inside the front door, one can remodel or relocate the offensive feature.

Regarding the size of the front door, it should be entirely determined by the size of the house itself. Both a large house with a small door or a small house with a large door are inappropriate.

Fire, toilets, and filthy objects either outside or inside must absolutely be avoided, as they can adversely affect the health and harmony of the family living in the house.

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