In many of my articles on Feng Shui, there are references to directions. The compass is the tool of the trade and we refer to magnetic North (not geographic north) as our reference point.  Magnetic North and Geographic North can vary slightly to significantly around the world. Traditional compasses are designed to show you where the local magnetic North is.  Compass Apps may or may not be accurate.  Additionally, magnetic North shifts easterly or westerly over time.

This blog post was created primarily to show the twenty-four subdivisions of the compass for Flying Star feng shui purposes and so that I can link this to other articles for more clarification. The Feng Shui Compass is called a Luo Pan and some individuals create their own Luo Pan by taking a compass illustration (like the one provided here), copying it onto cardboard and placing a regular camping compass in the center.  That is actually not necessary in my opinion.

With a regular compass in hand, you can get your reading for the front or back of a property and until you have the degree divisions memorized, you can simply glance at the compass illustration to verify what sector or direction is relevant.  For example, if you do a compass reading in front of a house and you see it faces 118 degrees, you may not have yet memorized that 118 degrees is within the first sector of Southeast  (SE-1 and sometimes noted as the Dragon direction). You can check where a reading is located just by referencing the illustration.

Another way to use this compass illustration is to make a transparency of it onto a clear plastic sheet.  This is exactly what I use when dividing up floor plans. After locating the geometric center of a structure, you place the transparency onto the drawn floor plan. You line up the sitting and facing directions on the transparency over the floor plan.

The easiest way to draw out the dividing lines is by cutting the compass transparency page into a circle around the outer portion of the compass illustration.  Photo in this post shows me holding a compass transparency. You can make your compass transparency large or small to suit your needs and the floor plan reductions you work with.

Author: Kartar Diamond

Company: Feng Shui Solutions ®

From the Frequent Client Questions Blog Series