10. What should be the depth of the foundation for a house?
Answer: As per Vaastu Shastra the foundation should be of 9 feet, but presently as because of sky rise multi-story building are coming up, day by day, the depth of foundation shall depend on the load bearing capacity of soil and the number of storey, going to be constructed and the material to be used for construction.
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Other Frequently Asked Questions
Is Vaastu linked to any religion?
No. It is a science of structures and religion does not come in to the picture.
What are the effects on a tenant?
The question of ownership does not arise. Whoever occupies and stays in the building is the recipient of the effect.
How do we know if we are living in a Vaastu defective building?
Easy! If you are facing inexplicable problems which are normally not expected then you should suspect Vaastu.
Should one correct all defects? It may not be possible and expensive too?
Not necessary. Only prominent defects need to be corrected so that the energy flow changes for the better. The other defects can remain.If on the overall, a structure has a positive presence it will give good effect notwithstanding a few mistakes here and there.
What are the guidelines for Industries, offices, commercial establishments etc?
Basically the same. Build the structure so as to have a positive atmosphere inside. The principles remain the same as those for residential buildings.
When is the best time to adopt Vaastu?
While selecting plots and while the design of the house is still on the drawing board. At this time it is very easy to incorporate all Vaastu norms with out sacrificing aesthetics, comforts or economy of construction.
Is not the natural topography the best?
Unfortunately no. Nature does not seem to have designed any thing keeping the comfort of the human organism. On the other hand it is the organism which modifies itself to suit nature. Vaastu is one such modification that is necessary when levels are considered.
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Feng Shui
1. What is this Fengshui (Feng Shui) thing?
2. Can you Fengshui (Feng Shui) my place so I win the next lottery jackpot?
3. What if my front entrance has a bad door location?
4. I was told that my door is located at the wrong location so all the men walked by but how come my roommate just get engaged?
5. What are the five basic elements?
6. What is Bagua and why they all look like little short lines?
7. What are the relationships between the five elements?
8. Where is the center of the reference for a one family house?
9. Where is the center of the reference if I live in a two family town house?
10. What can I do if my stove is under the toilet?
11. What is the best direction for the stove knob?
12. What's wrong with TV in the bedroom
13. How do I adjust for Fengshui (Feng Shui) directions based on my location?
14. How do I determine the center of the reference if my house have multiple floors?
15. How do I find my wealth corner and what I am going to do with it?
Translate literally, Feng means wind and Shui means water. Therefore, you can call it the "wind and water". The wind and water are the stuff that flows and observed by the ancient. Fengshui (Feng Shui) is a description about how the "chi", the energy of the life force, flows around us and influences our lives. The practice of "Fengshui (Feng Shui)" is to achieve the optimum balance and harmony through the location and orientation of the living environment. There is also similar research for the deceased but will not be covered at this web site. Two major elements work together in Fengshui (Feng Shui). The with-birth part: where and when you where born. There is not much we can do about it. The after-birth part: where and how do you live. Fengshui (Feng Shui) is being excised on this part most. Fengshui (Feng Shui) is very technically strict and has been proven to be true statistically through out Chinese history.
No. Fengshui (Feng Shui) is about balance and harmony. It will minimize the ill and danger in your life surroundings and optimize your chance of health and prosperity. You get what you deserve is still true. If you work hard, have the right Fengshui (Feng Shui); you might get a 10% raise instead the average 3% raise in your company. You cannot put your couch on the wealth corner and watch TV all day waiting to win the next jackpot. Even if you win the lottery, you are still paying it somehow. Good Fengshui (Feng Shui) increases your chance but you have to do the work. There is no free lunch. YOU have to work on it.
If your door has a bad location, the simplest way is to try to use another door as your main entrance. Remember that it is not the front door that matters the most. It is the door that you use the most matters the most. It is common practice for people to use their kitchen or garage or balcony door as main entrance.
Another thing you can do is to put auspicious decors on your door. You can find red Chinese characters that contains auspicious meanings in any Chinese bookstore or even grocery store. Plants that have no needles (yes. This applies to roses too) and is red or green is good for the Fengshui (Feng Shui) of your home too.
First, Fengshui (Feng Shui) are specific to specific person. There are some basic dos and don’ts apply to everybody but it is possible that what is good for your roommate is not good for you. The second, the location of the door is not the only thing that influences Fengshui (Feng Shui). The direction it faces and what is inside the door also a matter. The bed is also very important, if you put your bed on the lonely location it is unlikely your are going to have a good "bedmate". The third, YOU must make things happen. It is good you are getting Fengshui (Feng Shui) consulting. Find out the age and direction of your best possible mate and meet as many men fits the criteria as possible.
Some common sense advice: make yourself AVAILABLE and only go out with man that is AVAILABLE NOW. Do not waste time on some one that is "just a friend". Do not believe or wish some one will "soon be available". He can call you to find out if you are still available when he is available.
The five basic elements are METAL, WOOD, WATER, FIRE and EARTH. The Ancient Chinese believe those are the basic elements of the universe and everything in our word is a compound of the five elements. The most important of all is the balance of all five elements. Although some times we see bad implications of certain elements in our certain area of life, there is no "bad elements". Every one is a necessity of our life. On the other hand, every element can bring disadvantage to our life too. The circle of life links the five elements with each other. The short of one element can and will bring the disturbance to all. Fengshui (Feng Shui) is specifically dealing with your living environment compensate and prevent disturbance in your life. It is all about balance.
Bagua or eight-Gua is the result of the ancient Chinese binary system. Each of the Gua is consists of three little Yao symbols. Each Yao represents either Ying, female or Yang, male force of nature. Ying, female, is two short little hyphens with a gap in between. Yang, male, is one continuous hyphen-like line. Use some graphic imagination to help you remember the female and male symbols or you can fashionably call them "zero" and "one".
If you are number oriented, you might be happy to know as a matter of fact, the Chinese character for number one, is exactly the same as the Yang (male) symbol, one continuous hyphen like line. I do not know if all the historians will agree the ancient Chinese use the Ying (female) symbol to represents "zero", it is definitely appropriate and academically accepted to call it zero today. When the ancient symbols were first put into computer, Ying (female) was represented by zero and one represented Yang (male). What an interesting coincidence! Or not?
If you are graphic oriented, you might be happy to know that certain historians believe the ancient human being noticed the first difference between female (Ying) and male (Yang) from the most direct and important areas of our body. This is supported in many I-ching related ancient literatures and the mating of Ying (female) and Yang (male) is related to balance and harmony.
The five elements interact with each other by 'generating" or "conquering" one an other. The metaphor of generating and conquering was intuitive and the individual character was assigned to individual element base on the statistical experience of the generations of Ancient wisdom. (For your nerds out there, do not try to match these five elements with the periodic table.) The metal melts down and generates water. The water waters the wood and helps it grow. Wood burns and generates fire. The fire ends up as ash that generates earth. From the ore of the earth comes the metal. In the mean time, we can see that water will extinguish the fire. The earth can stop the water flow. The wood grows on earth and controls the earth under its roots. The metal tools cut the wood. The fire melts all the metal.
The relationship of the five elements becomes more complicated and intriguing when you considering the secondary effect. For example, the water will kill the fire but it helps the wood to grow which helps the fire. Is the water good or bad for the fire? It totally depends on the amount of water relative to how much wood and how much fire you have. If you have a large fire and little wood, your fire probably will not last very long anyway. With the help of a little water, you will have more wood for lasting fire with the small price for a less flashing fire for now. On the other hand, if you do not have much fire to begin with, water is probably not a good idea, particularly when you have more than enough wood to burn. You see it is all about balance!
In the world of Fengshui (Feng Shui), there is nothing more important than the center of the reference. The reference point changes depends on what are you looking at. If you are living in a single-family house or you occupy one entire floor, the center is the geographic center of the square to which the house belongs. This is a little difficult to imaging but straightforward to figure out. Follow the three easy steps. Step 1: On your floor plan or house design or what ever you have that accurately describes your house, mark the furthest point of east, west, north and south. If there is a garage or any addition to the house, make sure you include it. Step 2: Connect the east and west points. Connect the south and north points. Step 3: From the middle point of east and west, draw a line that is perpendicular to the east west connection. Do the same thing for the north south connection. Congratulations! You have located the center of the reference for your house. It is the point where these two new lines across.
If you occupy one entire floor, consider yourself live in a one family house. If you and your neighbor occupy half of the floor on every level, it is a little difficult to decide the center. Because you and your neighbor is neither totally independent (like a one family house) nor totally intertwined (like a big family), the exact relationship between you and your neighbor needs to be taken into account. If your are your neighbor's landlord, consider the entire house as a one family house. Follow the steps in "Where is the center of the reference for a one family house?" to locate the center. In the time to re-new the lease, make sure that "your half" of the house has the Fengshui (Feng Shui) that is good for you. If you and your neighbor both own portion of the house, consider the common property and portion of the house that you own. In this case, you will probably need a copy of the original blue print to make sure you locate the center correctly. Regarding the common property, you can adjust that according to your relationship with your neighbor. If you and your neighbor are close buddies, you should definitely include the common wall, the entire garage and anything you have access even you only own half. If all the words you exchange with your neighbor is "good morning"; your portion should be exactly where your legal portion is. If you are the renter, only consider the portion of the property in which that you are living and definitely not include the walls. Then follow the steps in "Where is the center of the reference for a one family house".
If you have your kitchen on the first floor and there is a bathroom on the second floor, there is a chance that you can place your stove right under the toilet bowl. Sometimes we can scare ourselves just by standing in the kitchen and visually remove the ceiling. The correct way to verify this is to compare the floor plan of each level. If you can not afford to move either the bathroom or the kitchen, the most straightforward thing to do is to avoid using the upstairs bathroom. Please remember that you will need to keep the little reservoir behind the toilet filled even if you are not using that toilet. An empty toilet is an empty toilet. No matter you use it or not.
If you must use the upstairs bathroom AND the bathroom pipes are not visible from the kitchen, there are still several things you can do. If there is a fan right on top of the stove, keep the metal surface of the fan shiny and reflective. It can serve as a mirror thus deflects the flow of Chi. If you have a cabinet on top of the stove, you can use it to store your dishes and crystals. Clean them frequently and keep them shiny even you are not using them. One last thing you can do is to manage to put a layer of aluminum foil in between the stove and the ceiling on which the toilet sits. You got the idea, put some thing shiny on top of your stove and you are the best to decide how to make it work best.
The knob of the stove (not include soft keys) should not face the front door because it makes the food flow outside. It should not face the south because both south and stove are fire elements. Too much fire will set you off the balance. It cannot face the sink and it cannot face the fridge, because the sink and fridge are water elements. It should not face any direction that is opposite to the cook of the family. Because you know what will happen if the cook is not happy in the kitchen. Have you found the right direction yet? What about facing up? Actually, having the stove knob facing up is the best of all to avoid all the worries. You can find the right stovetop at any appliance store. It is easy enough to do it your self. If you really want your worries to go away, you should replace them with soft keys, the type you have on your microwave.
What if you are renting and it is not up to you about the stove? Then make sure the knobs are not facing the door is the most important. If your stove knob faces the door try to put a microwave, computer monitor, TV or anything with a shiny surface in the way. Put your TV (same with other stuff) on the height that you can watch TV while you have your back to the stove. It is not necessary that your reflection surface to by on the same height as the stove.
That's a very good question! Maybe the opposite is easier to answer. TV in the bed room is good for a lots of things. It brings the busy world to you as soon as you wake up in the morning. It entertains you when you cannot sleep at night. You can watch other people together when you have to be alone. You can even use it to help you to build a mood when you cannot build it yourself. It is practically your companion! The TV is most powerful when it is right at your feet so you do not have to look at anywhere else in your bedroom. Even when the TV is turned off, the surface can serve as a mirror using which you can admire your own image. You could have been admiring your own image when you are sleeping and feel so hard to wake up.
TV is doubly harmful for a bedroom. When put right at the feet, the uncovered surface serve as a mirror which directs the Chi back to the bed, make it too strong for resting. When the TV is on, no matter what program it is, no matter if you are actually watching, it creates an illusion of an open, busy world around you. This serves as if you have too many people in your bedroom, which is not positive for neither intimacy nor resting.
The direction is always a relative thing. When we travel all the way east, we could end up at some where west of where we started. The same thing could happen with south and north. Historically, Fengshui (Feng Shui) has been developed in a very localized way. This means that most of the time you need a center of reference. The scale of the motion is refer to the center of the reference.
Before we get into any details, people who live in the southern hemisphere need to be reminded that on your half of the earth, you need to replace the north with the south.
The easiest case, is that your concern is your house. You determine the center of the reference BASED ON your house. The east/west (same as south, north) direction is the vicinity of the center of the reference. The farther you go, the less the significance of the direction. Assume, the farthest distance between the farthest point on in the house and the center of the reference is 100 feet. The rule of thumb based on I-ching, the direction is meaningless if you are nine times the distance, which is 900 feet out of the house in that direction.
If your concern is travel, there are two different situation. If you travel in a small scale, such as within the continent of US, the direction is reference to the center of your regular activity area. If you live in LA and traveling to NY city, you are traveling northeast.
When you are traveling across the continents, particularly if you are traveling close to the north/south pole or equator, you need to do some work. First, you still use the center of your normal activity as reference point. You unfold the sphere of earth in such a way that your center of the reference is the center of the earth. The apply the normal direction.
If the house has multiple levels, determine the individual center of reference for each floor is generally a good idea. If you prefer, to do as little as possible, you can chose the main floor of the house and determine the center accordingly.
If your house is a one family house and has multiple levels, the first floor is usually the main floor and it is the largest. In this case, it is save to use the first floor to represent the entire house. However, there are some special situation, you need to make some modifications.
If your house is build by a hill or below a road, which means that when looked from one direction the first floor becomes the basement. In this case, the second floor becomes the main floor. The center of the reference should be based on this floor.
What if your main floor is not the largest floor? This usually indicates some kind of unbalance of the house. Unless you have very specific reason to keep the house that way, it is generally recommended that add some storage sheds or garage or whatever you see fit attached to the house on the main floor.
The eight basic directions of a house is characterized by Ba-Gua according to the birthtime of an individual. The corner pointed by the wealth direction is the wealth corner. The Ba Gua character can not only apply to the entire house, it is true for every individual room also. Therefore, if the wealth corner of the house is out of your control, you can still work on the individual rooms.
Rameshwar Prasad invites you to the Wonderful World of Vastu Shastra
