subject: The Colorful History of Feng Shui [print this page] The Colorful History of Feng Shui The Colorful History of Feng Shui
Many people these days have heard of feng shui but not many know the true history of feng shui, where it comes from exactly, and what it is either. Many people have heard of it through movies or references made by friends and often think that feng shui is simply the moving of furniture to make a room harmonious. Although there is some truth in this, the movement of furniture alone is not feng shui. Feng shui is both the placement and the elements the furniture is made of, where it is in proximity to other elements and more.
Feng Shui started in China three centuries before Christ was born. This art form began in the West Han dynasty and was based on the earth being a living thing vibrant with a variety of incredible elements that all carried their own energy. In the beginning feng shui was based on building placement and it's energies as compared with and where it appeared in proximity of it's surrounding environment and elements in that environment.
it was known that certain areas were ripe with healthy and powerful energy while others were covered in negative and destructive energies. Over time these energies were defined collectively by an area yet eventually it was figured out that there was much more to this than simply a geographic point on the earth, but that there were several elements that contributed to what made one area more positive than another. It was discovered that you could build a building a certain way, using certain combinations of elements placed in certain ways that could in fact even change a negatively charged area into a positively charged space using this concept.
As the Chinese discovered over the next 3500 years the intricate details of how these elements carried these energies and how they affected one another it became a standard practice to generate buildings, even entire towns based on feng shui, the name given to this concept. In feng shui there are two extremes in one regard, the focused down space (personal space) and the bigger picture i.e. a city wide feng shui concept vs. someones bedroom. One is found to affect the other profoundly so rulers of China set up mandates that forced people to maintain certain feng shui design codes when building things.
Somewhere down the road in western civilization (America) the Chinese openly protested the fact that our railroads and other things were in direct violation with feng shui concepts and would bring bad energy if we continued to go the path we were. Many Westerners didn't care nor believed in the Chinese belief of feng shui, however over the years more and more have taken it very seriously. Today it is standard practice in many homes, interior designers use it religiously to build incredible rooms/homes/offices and so forth because it works!
Many of the Chinese kingdoms were build around feng shui concepts simply because it was said to bring great advantage and power to the rulers due to the lavish kingdoms and huge buildings, landscapes and elements incorporated into the building of these "power houses".
