Interior Decoration and Feng Shui

I had planned to have a show of my Feng Shui paintings in October-Nov but, even before that, they have started selling. More important, Feng Shui paintings are more effective than mass produced Feng Shui products.

But I will write about my paintings later. This piece is an incident where two paintings played a crucial role in my Feng Shui advice. Within minutes of arriving in this Parsi house I said, “You will have to shift the painting from that north wall to the south and the one on the south wall to the north,” I said. It seemed an easy enough suggestion that looked mundane on the face of it. But it was to set the ball in motion that brought security back into this house. I think it is my Heaven Luck that my Feng Shui advice is working. This upper middle-class family of three at Napean Sea Road is grateful to Feng Shui as their days of misery have ended. Mistry (name changed) headed the Mumbai regional office of a company having its branches in all the metros. The salary and perks were generous enough for this family of three members to have a luxurious lifestyle. Everything was fine until the disaster struck. The company closed down! Now, the wife was the sole earning member in this house and she too had her own problems.

When you’re flying high getting another cushy job is not difficult. 33-year-old Mistry had several tempting offers if he could dump his employers. But he did not. Two months after this, his worried wife consulted me for Feng Shui changes in her house. It was a home built with love and the careful selection of artifacts and furniture.

“I do not know whether Feng Shui will help me but I’ve heard of many cases where people have benefitted,” said Mistry, trying hard to hide his tension.
“Since when do you live in this house?”
“For the last 7 years,” he replied. How could the house that was fortunate for seven years be unlucky? But my next question provided the clue.
“The décor seems recent. Did you renovate the house in the recent months?”
“Yes, it has been nine months.” His wife Meher said promptly.
The renovation had started the changes here too. Had his Heaven Luck been good, he would have accepted one of the jobs offered to him during this period. In that case, the changes could have been for his benefit. Life is like that. If you’re lucky, you miss the flight that crashes. The traffic jam on the road turns out to be a blessing in disguise. Mistry wasn’t so lucky.
I took a close look at the changes in the décor. Like most enthusiastic interior decorators do, the house was over-furnished. Perhaps because of an arrangement with a painter, the decorator had got two expensive oil paintings placed prominently in the drawing room. One of the paintings had geometrical patterns, dominated by triangles, and the dominant colour was red. Red symbolizes Fire. Also, a triangular shape represents Fire. Fire in the Career corner is taboo. Water rules this area! Ironically, the dominant theme on the other canvas was a ship and the main colour that attracted attention in it was blue with a bit of black. This painting would have been excellent in the Wealth corner or Career sector. But the young interior decorator had placed it in the Fame & Glory area. Fame is ruled by Fire. Placing a painting that has so much of blue in it in this area turned out to be catastrophic.

Mistry revealed to me that a few weeks before he lost his job, someone in his wife Meher’s office had circulated an anonymous note that contained defamatory innuendos about his her and a copy of it was mailed to him! But because the Mistry couple trusted each other, this note failed to affect them. However, Meher was very much agitated.

After my visit and advice, the changes were first noticeable in Meher’s office. The young colleague who she suspected of authoring the note – because she had snubbed him when he had once made an indecent proposal to her – came to his senses. He lost his son in an accident and considered this God’s way of punishing him for harassing a woman colleague. He confessed to his misdeed in front of all the staff members and apologized with tears in his eyes.

It took longer for the magic to happen in the life of her husband. Five long months of frustration seemed like five years. Finding a job of similar status, after losing one, is a tough situation. He had to keep a stiff upper lip, claiming to be freelancing while digging out his old useful contacts from his diary and memory. The feelers he sent to the other companies, which had once offered him, a job had to be subtle. After a hard bargaining that lasted three days, Mistry got a job that paid him almost the same salary and perks as his previous one. He heaved a sigh of relief.

His words, last month, were, “Now I sleep peacefully. I am relaxed. My tension is over. I must say that these Feng Shui changes were effective. Never again will I renovate my house without first consulting you.”