23rd July 2005
Dai Shu: Great Heat; Seconds out…; New facing direction; Of human bondage; Harry Potter and the…; Guardian diary…
Richard Ashworth
Feng Shui Diaries
Dai Shu: Great Heat
Solar fortnight beginning:
Thursday July 23rd 2005 02.21
Hour Day Month Year
water earth water wood
quai mow quai yute
chow shen may yuw
ox monkey sheep rooster
Dai Shu: Great Heat
After Slight Heat, we get Great Heat, though the actual process here on the ground appears to have been the other way round. The water-butt to watering-can to sunflower patrol has given way to slugwatch. And no I don’t squish or poison them – who knows what else slug pellets pollute? I put them gently over the fence into the long grass. All they can complain about there is an unvaried diet.
What else did you expect of a pacifist vegetarian? Napalm?
Seconds out of the Ring
Carol is of the American persuasion. She is an attractive, powerful, dignified woman; still frisky at 50. She and her son Dan are hiding out from her abusive ex-partner. She has been beaten up, poisoned, burned – you name it.. I have ensured that the entrances to her home are safe. There are ways of making a house hard to enter. And I have ensured that the back garden is prosperous.
To put the tin lid on it, the British powers-that-be have rejected her mile-long US cv as irrelevant, thus rendering her unqualified to practise her profession.
What all suddenly-single mothers have in common is money issues. The mutual dependence of the nuclear family pretty much ensures that. Carol has chosen the house well; it has mou kuk, the Guardian, at its heart. It is watched over by a stable male presence without the need for an actual man. Nonetheless she feels safest in the back with the house between her and company.
She calls late at night. Dan is out joyriding again. What can you do? I have six children of my own. I know that not all grow at the same rate. Children are God’s* way of keeping us anxious. And anxiety of course, is God’s way of letting us know we are not alone. She is very not alone.
I tell her that as there is nothing linear to be done, her best bet is to admit defeat and ask for help. Divine grace is always available if we will ask for it. Sometimes I think there is a qualification procedure but even that can be waived in certain circumstances. We are never given tests we can not pass.
Unsurprisingly I have been at home working on her feng shui all day. So she was on my mind already and we have an appointment the following day.
When I arrive Dan is asleep upstairs. We get a chance to do some heavy-duty soul work.
Her ba zi shows that this woman has been in three abusive relationships. Is that correct? Yes. More than her fair share. I ask her about the family she grew up with. Her mother would beat hell out of her as would her elder brother. By an inexorable route we start to unearth the decisions that have run her life and that we can – tao willing – change.
* Tao, Higher Mind Spirit, Goddess, Primum Mobile; pay your money, take your pick..
New Facing Direction
Veronica calls me. Last month she had cosmetic surgery. She is a talented actress with severe stage fright. Sixteen years worth. That is how long it is since she risked appearing in public. She is not sure how she looks. I reassure her she looks a million dollars.
When I first surveyed her flat she wasn’t sleeping. Her bedroom was a classic case of quietening a room down with earth. Then it was full of exotic glass pyramids and snaky murals. Now it is low, flat, sandy-coloured and quiet and she sleeps.
All this fussing is just delaying the day she must tread the boards again. As Legolas says in “Return of the King,” unable to resist the obvious any longer: “Aha, a diversion.”
She has every right to her fear but now is the time to come to life. Call your agent, tell him you’re back, get on with it. Her flat is full of fresh energy, courtesy of an immaculately placed water feature. I suggest there’s not much point paying me hundreds of pounds and wasting the chi walking the dog.
Sometimes feng shui will put the ball on the penalty spot but you may have to kick it.
Of Human Bondage
Olivia is a mother of two, born in West Africa. For a variety of reasons both children were farmed out to family when small. She tortures herself that they are not “bonded”. You can bond anytime you like, I suggest. Why not now?
Her house faces North over a fast roundabout which suggests dissipated energy as well as repetition. The sins of the fathers… that sort of thing. Her daughter’s ba zi shows a capricious child. But one with huge potential.
She doesn’t always tell me the truth, Olivia says. Olivia‘s ba zi suggests she may have been like that herself once. But you learned. So can she.
Here’s an idea: make a deal. You will always trust her and she promises to always tell the truth. Think it through. It’s a benign circle neither of you can get out of unbonded.
We revise the colours of her daughter’s room: one scheme to compensate for what is there already, an option that costs almost nothing, another if Olivia feels able to start from scratch. I compensate for the new, immaculate but incorrect living room with crystals.
She can’t stand to sit and watch tv with the kids. She has been withdrawing to her room. I point out to her that this is an opportunity to bond: a bit of quality time. Can’t they compromise on what they watch? She bravely agrees to stay in the living room in the evenings. I notice the photographs of the kids at a theme park. Like almost everyone I see she had actually worked it out just before I arrived.
Harry Potter and the Critical Pontiff.
So the Pope is against Harry Potter. Not much in His intray then. But what about the timing of these books hitting the market? Midsummer last time – surely a consciously chosen release at the moment of maximum yang. And doesn’t the way Harry Potter has stormed the world feel a little trancelike? I no more share the Pope’s position on this than on the need for unprotected sex in the Third World but I am interested.
Guardian Diary
Stitched up by a cynical Guardian sub with a quota of words to meet. He christens me “Mystic Mug.” My agent assures me that any publicity is good publicity. No one who is interested in feng shui reads the back pages of the Guardian on a Wednesday –if indeed anybody does – and I can now put “consulted by the Guardian Diary” on my resume.
Feedback is encouraged including that you never want to hear from me again if that happens to be the case.
Best wishes,
Richard Ashworth
Richardashworthfengshui@hotmail.com
If Poverty is to be History now is the time.
As ever, names have been changed to protect privacy.