Q&A Sunday: How to Become a Helpful Person

Anjie Cho June 7, 2020

How can I become a more helpful person?

There’s an area of the bagua that has to do specifically with helpful people and benefactors, and it’s one that doesn’t get talked about as much. It’s called qian, and it’s related to the metal element. Metal governs our mouth, our voice, and our communication. There are a lot of ways you can interpret this, but something that stands out for me right now is that sometimes the best way to communicate is to do less talking and more listening.

Something that I have been thinking about recently is this quote from my root guru, Chögyam Trungpa: “The answer is the question.” Sometimes we need to take a break from talking and instead take the time to listen and receive what those around us are saying.

The benefactors area is about both giving and receiving help. The way to attract helpful people to you is to become a helpful person. And because it’s related to the metal element, it’s about learning to communicate, both in how we speak and how we listen.

This area of the bagua is also related to assistance from the heavens. If you feel like you need assistance, look at what is going on in the helpful people area of your home. Is it cluttered? Are there a lot of things there? How can you bring more clarity to this area? Since this is a metal area, you can add metal items to this area, like a metal singing bowl. The sound and vibration of metal instruments can cut through a lot of the confusion and can be a way to communicate to the world that you are available to help or that you need help.

At its core, feng shui is not really about moving furniture around in your home to attract a partner or more wealth into your life. Those are residual benefits that come from practicing feng shui, but it’s really about starting to recognize that you are not separate from your environment. On a superficial level, you affect your environment and your environment affects you. Once you understand this, you can see that you are not separate from your environment. Then, you also start to understand that you are not separate from the people around you. This concept of interdependence is at the core of feng shui, as well as many other philosophies.

Another nuance of the helpful people area is that it is directly across from the abundance area, which means they are intimately connected and work in tandem with each other. When you start to become a helpful person, you receive more. When you have more and you’re feeling abundant, you can share more and become a more helpful person. I hope that all of you can find a way to become a helpful person, take action, and offer some of your abundance and prosperity to those that need help. Since we’re all connected, we all will benefit.

by Anjie Cho

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Which Element Nourishes You?

Anjie Cho June 3, 2020

Since a lot of us are spending more time at home right now, it’s a good time to consider whether your home environment feels supportive, and what you can do to shift that if it doesn't. One simple way to do this is to make sure your home includes the elements that are most nourishing for you. The five element theory comes from Taoism, and is the foundation of a lot of modalities including Traditional Chinese Medicine and feng shui.

There are a few different ways to figure out which of the elements (earth, water, fire, metal, or wood) nourish you the most. You can look up your numerology, or you can tap into your intuition and notice which element you’re naturally drawn to. I like this method because it encourages us to tap into our own innate wisdom, which we all have. Just like everyone can sense whether a home or a place feels good or not, we can sense which element feels the best to us.

To help you figure out which element feels most supportive for you, spend a moment visualizing each of the following vacations and see which one sounds the most appealing. Go with your first instinct and try not to overthink it!

Taking a cooking and wine tour in Tuscany
Looking out the window of a modern penthouse in the middle of a bustling cosmopolitan city like New York City
Swimming in a deep, dark, cool lake
Hiking in a lush bamboo forest surrounded by tall trees all around you
Sunbathing on a hot summer day at the beach

If a food and wine tour in Tuscany sounds appealing to you, you’re nourished by the earth element. If you’d rather be in a modern penthouse in a busy city, you’re drawn to the metal element. If swimming in a cool lake sounds like your ideal vacation, water is supportive for you. If hiking in a tall, lush forest sounds ideal, you’re nourished by the wood element. If you prefer to be on a hot, sunny beach, you are attracted to the fire element.

It’s also totally normal to be nourished by more than one element, so don’t worry if you can’t decide between two of the above. This can also change over time based on what’s going on in your life. For example, I have friends who aren’t happy to be in New York right now when there isn’t a lot to do, but for me, being in my home in New York feels really nourishing and supportive.

Now that you know which element supports you, you can choose colors, shapes, and materials that make your home a more nourishing space for you. Stay tuned for future posts where we’ll go into each of the elements and how to incorporate each one into your home!

by Anjie Cho

Dive deeper into feng shui to transform your life!

Mindful Design is a new way to learn feng shui. Create sacred spaces that support, and nourish.

Visit us at mindfuldesignschool.com

Q&A Sunday: Inviting Benefactors with Feng Shui

Anjie Cho May 31, 2020

How do I invite help and support with feng shui?

I love talking about this, because the helpful people area is one of my favorite areas, or guas, of the feng shui bagua. Usually, people are most concerned with the relationships and wealth areas. The interesting thing about the feng shui bagua is that each area is connected to the one opposite from it. When someone is really concerned with the wealth area, it’s also really important to look at the area opposite wealth, which is related to helpful people. In order to bring more wealth and abundance into your life, you also need helpful people. It can be hard for a lot of people, myself included, to ask for help when we need it. You may be like me and be independent and like to do things a certain way, but it’s important to have people who support you. I have friends and mentors in my life who are really helpful to me, and make my life a lot better.

How do you activate the qian area of the bagua? First, you need to recognize when you need to ask for help. Feng shui works by doing things in your invisible world in tandem with taking actions in your physical environment. If you want help, you have to be open to receiving help and actually ask for it.

Next, it’s important that you become a helpful person to others as well. Your inner environment is a mirror of your outer environment, so being a helpful person will help you attract helpful people to you.

To activate the helpful people area in your home, I would recommend starting with your bedroom, since that’s the easiest place to lay the bagua. When you’re standing in the doorway of your bedroom looking in, the right hand corner closest to you is your qian or helpful people area. It’s related to heaven, benefactors, and the metal element.

In this area of your bedroom, you can use plants to invite life energy as well as slow and steady growth. Nine plants would be great, or you can add one robust plant. You can also ring bells, chimes, or gongs. This is really powerful because metal is the element of the helpful people area, and also because you’re putting sounds and vibrations out into the world to let people know you’re asking for help and support. Metal is also connected to the voice, and in order to receive help, you have to ask for it. You can also paint this area grey, or add grey decor.

by Anjie Cho