We have sayings such as “window of opportunity” and “the door to your future.” These metaphors stir up all kinds of images and in the mystical realms, the door is a gateway or symbolic portal to higher consciousness.
In a very physical way, the main door to a house acts like a mouth. This opening is called a “qi gate” in Feng Shui terminology. The word “qi” is associated with air currents and qi is the supplier of energy. At the door we have a mingling of interior and exterior energies.
For example, if we have a road aligned directly with a main door, this exterior force will intensify whatever kind of energy resides at the door, for good or for bad. This is because of the understood flow of air currents or movement, similar even to a fan. It is commonly described as a negative circumstance when a road and door are directly aligned, but this is not necessarily the case. Once in a while this is a very lucky arrangement.
Unseen energies are created in a house based partly on when the house was built and its precise magnetic compass alignment. Feng Shui tracks the influence of electromagnetism on people and animals and there are twenty four different sectors on the compass to determine orientation. The more well known classical school which factors in time and direction is the Xuan Kong Fei Xing Flying Star School. There is also another ring on the Chinese Compass (luo pan) which divides the 360 degrees into even smaller segments of 5.6 degrees, which are each assigned one of the 60 Hexagrams from the Yi Jing. Use of the compass has been a part of Chinese metaphysics and divination for several thousand years. Masters were using cruder forms of directionology and distinguishing between True North and magnetic North a long time before the Chinese officially invented the compass.
Exactly where a door opens in relation to the geometric center of the house can determine a number of things such as how well or how poorly an occupant can attract or repel financial success. The door can also reveal what kinds of health issues an occupant may encounter while living there. These predictions are often tied into the birth data of the occupant.
The energy residing in the house just behind the door is not confined to the entrance. A person may pick up on this energy and drag it around the house to other rooms. This is another reason why the energy field at the main door is taken so seriously in a Feng Shui audit. This door energy usually ranks much higher in importance than what kind of energy exists in a dining room or a bathroom.
Common sense things you can do to enhance the energies at a door include clear, unobstructed access, as well as plenty of natural light. But aside from that, the decision to have a certain element at the door, inside or outside, will depend largely on the non-obvious, which Xuan Kong refers to as “the flying stars.” One famous author espouses that if a fountain is placed just outside a main door that it can bring infidelity to a marriage. While this might sound so specific as to be accurate, it is actually still too generic to apply in most circumstances.
A door might also be split between two different directions. This can be like entering a room with two different temperatures on each side. It can undermine equilibrium and sense of security. This is one of the design flaws a Feng Shui consultant should make sure does not happen if they are involved in the design phase of a project.
People often wonder if the color of a door can make a difference in what kind of luck they can attract or repel. A door is a fairly large surface area, more so than the average sized painting. When a door is a solid color, it may resonate some of that color’s energy. The decision to paint a door red or blue or white or any other color is partially reliant on the orientation of the house. In other words, you should ignore generic statements such as “a red door is lucky.” Often, these pronouncements are cultural myths or superstitions.
Author: Kartar Diamond
Company: Feng Shui Solutions
From the Architecture & Design Blog Series
