iVillage

Calculating your personal Gua or trigram gives you just that: information on your personal orientation. Each person has their individual Gua, which tells them which are their preferred directions and which to avoid. However, when living with a family or group, these personal Guas are difficult to use in a family situation, except to orient your self within a particular room.

Instead, a group of individuals living together share what is called a House Gua. A House Gua is not derived from information on any one of the persons who will live in the house, but rather from the actual orientation of the house on the property, which way it faces and sits.

Once the House Gua is determined, all of the occupants who share the house can come to an agreement among themselves as to what rooms are best used for this or that purpose. Then, individuals can always use their Personal Gua to orient themselves within a particular room, like having their desk or chair face a Personal Gua direction, and so on. If you have a private bedroom, it will be important to examine what direction that room is using the House Gua, but also check out your Personal Gua direction, as well.

So let’s go over this one more time. It is important to understand the distinction between your personal Gua, which is based on your birth date, and the House Gua, which is derived by taking a compass reading of the main door or the facing side of the home.

The first (your personal gua) is for interroom orientation, like the direction you want to point the bed. If you are married, you may have to work out a mutually agreed upon direction, that will benefit both partners.

The second (the house gua) is the number/trigram that represents the orientation of the actual building on the land. Try to keep these two trigrams distinct in your mind. One is for the whole household and the second is for you personally.