IMG_0902The Yi Jing – Feng Shui class was taught during two weeks to 12 students from Poland, Mexico, Ireland, Germany, America, France, Portugal and Australia.

Yi Jing and Feng Shui are two branches of study of extremely vast and complex knowledge. The main purpose of the class was to transmit to the students the aspects of those two subjects that could help someone regulate their health, as complementary aspects of Daoist Medicine. This is a perspective specific to the higher vision of Daoism, that seeks to lessen desires and develop more compassion, and not to search for fame or wealth, as it is commonly found in society. Therefore Yi Jing and Feng Shui are used by the Daoist Doctors to harmonize humans with nature and the universe.

The first week was dedicated to studying the Yi Jing, the Book of Changes, the most ancient and foundational scripture of Daoism, that encompasses the totality of the possibility of transformation of the manifested universe, of Heaven, Earth and Man, on the basis of the binary code (Yin-Yang). The Yi Jing is strongly related to human life, as it allows its student to find a direction for any aspect of life.
IMG_0891The students were first taught the basic theories behind it : its origin with the River Map (He Tu) and the Luo Scroll (Luo Shu), the pre-heaven and post-heaven Eight Trigrams arrangements (Ba Gua), and the 26 specific categories of each pure Trigram, to understand their interactions.
Then the students learnt to recognize and memorize the 64 hexagrams of the Yi Jing according to the Eight Palaces arrangement, as well as understand their image and inner meaning.
Finally, the students were taught various methods to cast an hexagram as an oracle : the coin method, the stone method, the yarrow stalks method, a method according to the time that uses the Heavenly Stems and the Earthly Branches, and a method using numbers (for exemple, phone numbers).

The second week was dedicated to the study of Feng Shui, or geomancy. Feng, the Wind, stands for Heaven, and Shui, the Water, stands for the Earth : it is about allowing humans to find the auspicious places within the energy fields of Heaven and Earth, about understanding how the fields of the earth, of the wind and of the water influence human’s health to then be able to regulate it.
IMG_0448The students learned the basic foundation for using the Feng Shui compass, the Luo Pan : using first the Earth ring to identify the direction of the Dragon’s veins (that are the meridians of the Earth, while the mountains are the spine of the Earth, the soil is the flesh of the Earth, and the trees and grasses are its hair), so as to place one’s houses on spaces of positive power; then using the Human ring to adjust the direction so as to avoid harmful influences; finally using the Heavenly ring to determine the auspicious direction for the water.
They learned the correspondances between the organs and the parts of the body and the directions, so as to be able to determine from which direction which kind of inauspicious influence may harm the body of a sick person; and how to support healing with 6 different methods of regulation of the Yang abode.
The students were taught the method of the 8 mansions 9 stars for the arrangement of the interior, how to use the Luo Pan accordingly, and how to match it with the birth year of the inhabitant, with the same purpose of facilitating healing.
Finally, the student learnt how to read a Chinese calendar and how to identify auspicious and inauspicious dates for important life-events.

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