Lillian Too’s Irresistible Feng Shui Magic: Magic and Rituals for Love, Success and Happiness. Lillian Too

yourself against all manner of bad luck when you are about to embark on a journey. The rituals encompass the use of dragon fire energy, water energy, metal energy, earth energy, and wood energy, and require you to perform some simple acts, which take only a few minutes, just before you are about to set out on your journey.

      The observance of these rituals ensures that if you happen to be starting out at an inauspicious time, on an inauspicious date, or if the karma of that journey brings you obstructions, inconveniences, and bad business judgment, you will be guarded against any manifestations of bad Feng Shui. At the least these rituals guard against robbery, lost luggage, and missed connections. At their shining best, these rituals could save you from mortal danger.

      When traveling toward the southwest or northeast, swipe the air with a cut branch three or four times in the direction of travel.

      First, decide in which direction you will be traveling. Take this direction to mean from point A, your embarkation city, to point B, your destination city. Do the appropriate ritual just before leaving the house to set off on your journey.

       When you are traveling west or northwest, use a dragon incense holder and burn some joss sticks to create smoke, and then, as the smoke rises, use three red candles, and swipe the air in a wide broad curve nine times. The candles should remain lit. If the candles go out do it again until you are able to make three clean sweeps in the direction you are traveling to — west or northwest.

       Dragon water energy is required when you are traveling south. Look for a pail or a water goblet that has a dragon image on it. Just before leaving the house fill the goblet full of water and then, facing south, sprinkle water with your right hand once in a southerly direction.

       Dragon metal energy is required when you are traveling east or southeast. Look for a small curved knife, preferably one with the dragon image on its handle. The knife need not be very big but it should be made of metal and, if it is made of seven types of metal, so much the better. Just before leaving the house, stand facing east or southeast (depending on your travel direction) and, extending your arms wide, use the knife to swipe the air in the direction to which you are traveling six or seven times.

       Dragon earth energy is required when you are traveling in a northerly direction. Use a porcelain bowl decorated with a dragon for this. Place some earth inside the bowl and standing to face the direction you are going, sprinkle the earth eight times in that direction.

       Dragon wood energy is required when you are traveling to the southwest or northeast. Use a freshly cut branch with leaves, and then swipe the air three or four times in the direction of your destination.

      Sky Hangings Send Messages to the Cosmos

      Message banners are powerful affirmations of prosperity at Chinese New Year. Hung close to a door or window, they welcome abundance into your home.

      Like the wish balloons, the Chinese believe that sky hangings can send your messages into the cosmos, there to be read and acted upon by the powerful sky dragons that are in reality messengers to the gods and deities who reside in the pure Land of Paradise Mountains. The ritual requires you to hang these banners displaying auspicious words like “Let my wealth arrive,” or “May five types of good fortune visit this household” high above your home. The Chinese do this every new year when they place powerful wealth and prosperity affirmations near their doorways to attract good luck in the year ahead.

      There are no limits to your creativity here. You can make long banners that flutter in the breeze or you can make hundreds of little flag messages, which you can string up and hang across the front of your house like bunting. You can use some of the traditional Chinese messages —the message “Our wealth has arrived” or “Blessings on this home” are other powerful phrases. Alternatively, you can make up your own auspicious words or phrases. You can use any phrase in any language that you are comfortable with. You can stick your messages around the walls of your home during the New Year or place them on signboards, or hang them up as wealth flags or auspicious banners above your front door.

      If you decide to string up your messages, just be sure that you hang your banners up high so that the wind catches them for the wind contains all the chi, both positive and negative, in our environment. Each time the wind blows the messages get strengthened and your wish gets absorbed into the cosmic chi. Be careful to hang your banner in a gentle wind, which carries the benevolent sheng chi, or as the Chinese so lyrically describe it, the dragon’s cosmic breath. If the wind is too powerful, it is overwhelming and may contain killing energy that destroys your wishes.

      The Fook symbol is a bringer of good fortune. Many Chinese restaurants display it to keep their profits rolling in.

      The Chinese have many auspicious words and prosperity phrases that they know off by heart. These magical words that invoke money luck, abundance, and prosperity are almost second nature to them. Thus the word “fook,” for instance, which means luck, is universally recognized and acknowledged as an auspicious word which has the power to attract great good fortune to you and your household.

      Water Dragons Bring Money Luck

      There is good water flow and bad water flow, and these reflect the yin and yang chi of the powerful water dragon. To build a water dragon in the home is to attract fabulous good wealth luck yet it is also fraught with danger and risks as it is easy to get the application wrong. However, if you follow the ritual offered here you will find it is an extremely simple and easy way of making sure the flow of water around your home is auspicious.

      Do not mistake a body of water as being a water flow. A flow of water implies that the water should move in a certain direction. The more complex water dragon formula specifies the inward flow and the outward flow — the entry and exit of water to and from your property. The simple water dragon flow specifies only that the direction of water as it moves past your main front door should be correct.

      To determine the correct direction — that is whether the water should be flowing left to right or right to left — depends on the direction the front door faces. For the purposes of this formula, your front door is regarded as the door most often used by the home’s inhabitants.

      When your main door is facing a cardinal direction, in other words, north, south, east, or west, the water should flow past the main front door from left to right. This means that when you are standing inside the home looking out, the water should be moving from left to right.

      When the main door is facing a secondary direction, in other words, northeast, northwest, southeast, or southwest, the water should flow past the main front door from right to left. This means, once again, that if you are standing in the house looking outward the water is moving from right to left.

      Use a compass to determine your main door direction to see if the flow of water past your home is auspicious.

      This means you must stand at the doorway and look out and from there, take the compass direction. Use a good-quality compass, such as a surveyor’s compass, in order to measure this direction. Try to ensure as much accuracy as you can.

      A flow of water implies