Feng shui ("phong shway") is a Chinese philosophy about the relationship between people and their environment.   It attempts to explain how everything is connected and affects the individual, for better or worse.   Everything has some type of energy level, either at the molecular level or reflective of some other type of matter.   Either by itself or in combination with other matter in the our environment, it is believed that this energy can affect us.   Feng shui practitioners attempt to redirect energies created by an individual, the home or workplace, their local environment and even the planets, in order to provide a beneficial living space.   The practice of feng shui can be applied to the individual and family, or even communities at large.

At the core of feng shui is the belief that everything in our environment plays a part in making us who we are.   Being conscious of this, we can arrange our surroundings in ways to focus these energies to our benefit.   With concern about industrial pollution, deforestation, and other matters affecting the earth's balance, it is no wonder that people have taken a new interest in feng shui.   Feng Shui (literally "wind water") is part of an ancient Chinese philosophy of nature.   Feng shui is often classified as a form of geomancy, divination by geographic features; however, feng shui goes further to understand the relationship between nature and ourselves.   Feng shui is related to the very sensible notion that living with nature, rather than against, benefits both humans and our environment.

However, the western world tends to corrupt such notions.   Feng shui has become a buzzword of interior design.   Whereas earlier, interior designers would create living areas based on "room flow", they can now pronounce "good feng shui" or "bad feng shui".   Feng shui practitioners would say you have to break up straight lines in a home to circulate good Chi.   Why not just say, "Don't put the entrance door directly at the base of the stairs, since it will cause a draft to the second story"?   Because it doesn't have the same authority.

Nor does it have the same price tag, either.   People disdain paying others to tell them common sense approaches to living.   Some would rather pay experts, who help them justify the way they already live.   Some so-called masters of feng shui are paid big dollars to take readings and provide advice to trendy, urban dwellers.   Buy a few mirrors, add some color, a wind chime or two, and it's all better.   The basic premise that it's unnatural to live in a penthouse condo on top of some steel and glass hi-rise is ignored.   It is these "experts" that corrupt the truths that can be found in feng shui and cloud it with superstition and charms.

The eight-sided bagua is a basic tool of the feng shui practitioner.   It is used in the feng shui survey of a home or site.   It is also believed that the bagua with a mirror in the center can ward off bad influences in the environment.   This is done by using one of the 64 possible combinations to counteract outside influences.   The lines forming these trigrams are either whole (male) or broken (female).   Each trigram consists of three male or female lines.   In various combinations, a trigram represents heaven, earth, water, fire, dampness, wind, thunder or mountains.

K'an   rain drops    broken-solid-broken

Ken     mountain    solid-broken-broken

Chen     thunder    broken-broken-solid

Sun     wind    solid-solid-broken

Li     lightning    solid-broken-solid

K'un     earth    broken-broken-broken

Tui    marsh    broken-solid-solid

Ch'ien    heaven     solid-solid-solid

I don't know if there are any mystical powers in the bagua.   However, I would think that the symbols would make the feng shui practitioner mindful of environmental elements, at least at a subconscious level.   Better judgements to adjust the site in tune with the local environment might be the result.