Feng shui, a term meaning “wind and water,” is a type of terrestrial divination designed to help practitioners make practical decisions about living arrangements that will be in harmony with natural energies and forces. This symbolic system coordinates critical elements of time and space to allow for maximum harmony in every conceivable human interaction with nature. All natural features, including trees, rivers, mountains, and valleys, for example, have their distinctive influences on the flow of energy. Failure to take of these forces into account can make life much more difficult than it need be.

In practical terms, feng shui assists people most of all in choosing the orientation and design of the “built environment”—in other words, architecture and urban planning. A geomantic compass allows people to arrange the spaces in which they live and work in accordance with the principle of the “Nine Palaces.” The compass indicates where Yin and Yang energies flow. A grid of nine squares, each of which contains three numbers from one to nine, can be used in connection with building plans to indicate optimum placement of particular kinds of spaces within a home or office (e.g. storage, study, eating, or sleeping spaces). This ancient environmentalist system has grown from careful observation of the consequences of human interaction with the greater cosmos. Chinese tradition emphasizes the need to conform to the “way” of nature rather than attempting to dominate it. Daoism’s sensitivities to the natural world in general and its quest for harmony through seeking nature’s inherent balances make feng shui a critical ingredient in popular Daoism.