I’m pretty sure the title of this post caught the attention of a lot of people. A bit clickbaity I know. Sorry! But then again, if you have friends who are on platforms like Tinder and Coffee Meets Bagel, and they are wondering if someone is the right match, they might find this post interesting and relevant to them. It just might save a lot of people some heartbreaks. I’m really starting to appreciate why Qi Men Dun Jia is so popular because if you really know how to apply it, it’s going to make life so much easier.
As you may or may not know, I mentioned previously that I’ve picked up Qi Men Dun Jia during my spare time and have been incorporating it into my consultations whenever my advice is sought. It’s opened up a whole new world of insights and applications, and I thought I’d introduce one of the earliest Chinese metaphysics techniques that were developed by our Chinese sages.
Some business matters before I start penning down my thoughts: I am concurrently applying all three techniques – BaZi, Zi Wei Dou Shu (紫微斗数) and Qi Men Dun Jia – during my consultations. The reason for that is the same as why I started using BaZi and Zi Wei Dou Shu concurrently. There’s a lot of synergies to be gained when you use different techniques concurrently, and theoretically speaking none of these techniques should contradict each other and it never ever did. Just see the consultation as compensation for my time instead of purchasing a specific product or technique because it’ll likely just end up confusing everyone – you won’t know the procs and cons of each technique. If you have areas of your life you need clarity on, it’s my job to see what’s ahead and it does not matter which technique I use.
Picking up this new technique brings me back to the time when I first started my Chinese metaphysics journey when my eyes and mind really opened up to this art and I started perceiving life very differently.
I hope this brief introduction to Qi Men Dun Jia helps you appreciate what it can do and some of the benefits you can read from it.
Qi Men Dun Jia is a divination method
I’ve not spoken about the topic of divination much because it’s not something that a lot of people can appreciate or are open to. If you ever went to a temple to cast a ‘lot’ (签) or went for a tarot card reading – that’s basically divination. Qi Men Dun Jia is no different.
There are several techniques out there developed throughout the course of history, with the I-Ching method being the earliest. The ancient Chinese used to put 3 coins into a turtle shell, shake them and then cast it 6 times to derive a hexagram for interpretation.
It’s going to take me ages to explain the theory behind it and I don’t think I’ll do a very good job at it either, so I’m just going to mention the word “synchronicity”. If I were to put it in the simplest way possible, synchronicity is the belief behind divination of why divinations work, and it proposes that objects or events can have a cause-and-effect relationship with each other not in the physical form, but through meaning and interpretation. I know it sounds like what New Age religions propose, but divination is something you can only appreciate if you really try it out for yourself.
Qi Men Dun Jia is best used when you have a question in mind. The process is similar to what happens when you go to the temple to cast a lot or for a tarot case reading. You have a question prepared and the Qi Men Dun Jia chart is generated. Here’s an example of how it looks like:
I’m not going to go into the technicals in this entry. Basically, you’re supposed to know where to look and interpret the ‘signs’ that appear in the chart. Fine, maybe just a teaser. The common things you hear about are:
- The 8 Gods (八神)
- The 8 Doors (八门)
- The Heavenly Trigrams (先天八卦) & Earthly Trigrams (后天八卦)
- The 10 Heavenly Stems (天干) & 12 Earthly Branches (地支)
The above are the basics. There are a lot of other signs to take note of but I’ll leave that out for now.
Divination-based astrology is not exclusive to Chinese astrology
Divination is basically a process where you ask a question and you get a response. The concept of using astrology as a form of divination is not mainstream for sure, but note that it’s not something that is exclusive to the Chinese.
The West has it as well and few people actually know this because everyone is busy generalizing each other based on their horoscope signs. It’s called horary astrology. Google the term and you’ll see.
So, no, Qi Men Dun Jia is not a secret weapon that only the Chinese had access to. Sages from different civilizations have developed their own methods for forecasting.
Qi Men Dun Jia is a micro-view technique good for short-term, tactical decisions
Qi Men Dun Jia’s use is different. It’s a more tactical technique which addresses a specific question or event.
If you’re looking for the exact action you need to take for a specific event, then use Qi Men Dun Jia; if you want to know the overall trajectory of your life and the major turning points or events long before they happen, then use other Chinese astrological techniques. Using a micro-view technique that is more tactical in nature does have it’s benefits, especially when you find yourself in a situation when you have multiple options and you don’t know which one to take. Macro-view techniques do miss out of a few tiny, ambiguous details.
My personal opinion is that Qi Men Dun Jia is best used when you have something you need addressing immediately as opposed to a general forecast, although it can also be used for long term forecasting depending on how you ask the question.
One important thing to note is that although this is a micro-view technique, it can only be used in the context of the macro-view. What this means is that if your BaZi or Zi Wei Dou Shu chart is bad, using Qi Men Dun Jia won’t let you be able to live like someone with a good chart. It’s just going to tell you what’s the best course of action as someone with a bad chart or while undergoing a bad Elemental Phase.
What I said above is important, so please remember that.
It feels as though Qi Men Dun Jia already knows you are going to ask the question
I gave an example of a Qi Men Dun Jia case I did in front of my wife’s colleagues. You can read about it here: Using BaZi For Child-Planning & Health Matters: How Chinese Metaphysics Is Still Relevant
Each time I use Qi Men Dun Jia, it’s as though it already knows what question I’m going to ask and why I’m asking it. It’s mind-boggling and fascinating at the same time. I know all this sounds a bit crazy, but I guess only practitioners can appreciate whatever’s going on.
There’s a saying in Chinese metaphysics「在天成象， 在地成形， 在人成事」 and this is basically the Cosmic Trinity (天地人) you hear so often in Chinese metaphysics. Qi Men Dun Jia is the study of space and time by our ancestors and how specific events manifest. It’s going to sound a bit fluffy, but the belief was that the Heavens governed the abstract representation of things or essence (象)，these abstract representations take form on Earth (形) and it becomes a specific event (事) when you add in the human element to it. This is the fundamental belief of what Chinese metaphysics is built on. Greek philosophers like Plato had their own interpretations of what essence means, although I can’t say for sure it’s the same idea the Chinese had although I’d personally like to think they were exploring the same concept.
When a Qi Men Dun Jia chart is generated, whatever that shows up on the chart is basically a representation of what’s manifesting or about to manifest based on this belief our Chinese ancestors held. The chart is a representation of the Cosmic Trinity, with parts of the chart representing Heavens (天), Earth (地) and Humans (人) respectively.
An example of how Qi Men Dun Jia can be used
Qi Men Dun Jia has countless practical uses, and I’ve been applying it to many areas of my life as an experiment.
Before I go on, I forgot to add one thing. Sometimes, the client doesn’t have to be the one who asks the question. The practitioner can be the one who wants to find out something about someone else and Qi Men Dun Jia is so useful that you don’t even need the person’s birth details to do it. This is the reason why I’m so fascinated by it.
I’m using an example of catching a cheating spouse as an example to make it a little more interesting and also to send a message that you can’t hide something from a (legitimate) practitioner.
The below image was a chart I generated at random (because I had nothing better to do and wanted to twiddle my thumbs) and I accidentally found out certain things that should people, naturally, wanted to keep secret. The title of this post will tell you what I accidentally found out.
I’ll try to keep the explanations really simple. Whenever a question is asked and a chart is generated, you just need to know where to look in order to derive the signs that are going to show you the answer. When I say signs, it can refer to anything from the Gods, Doors, Trigrams and Heavenly Stems. Everything you see on the chart is a sign and it represents something, and where you look depends on what kind of question you are asking.
In this case, because the question asked is related to love and marriage, we need to look out for signs that representing the following:
- The subject/person of the question
- The spouse of the subject/person
- The third party be it male or female
- The symbols that represent marriage
- And other areas and advanced techniques which I won’t go into for now
One of the 9 boxes in the chart holds the signal that the subject in question is having an affair. There’s a reason why I’m not going into the specifics for now. Finish reading up this post to find out why.
Somewhere in that chart above points out that the subject’s marriage is in trouble and there are people who shouldn’t be involved, involved.
The really, really interesting thing is that I cross-checked the charts using all three techniques I know, and it paints the same story. This is the reason why I mentioned Qi Men Dun Jia always operates in the context of what your BaZi and Zi Wei Dou Shu chart says. Knowing this ancient art doesn’t give you a tool to escape karma – it just gives you a better way and heads up for handling it.
Other common uses of Qi Men Dun Jia
I won’t go into how I do it for now, but I’ve been applying Qi Men Dun Jia to a lot of areas of my life now.
Just to give a few examples:
- Identifying potential health issues for my friends and family.
- Using it not only to pick but to time my investments because believe it or not, it can tell you the eventual outcome of certain events and I did make some bets on certain events happening. And no, don’t ask me for stock picks.
- Giving my friends some ‘love advice’. Basically, whether they should be wasting their time on someone who isn’t interested in something serious. People on Tinder and Coffee Meets Bagel – look here.
- Picking a good time to travel so that you’ll be safe and even avoid bad weather
- Assessing whether a collaboration or partnership with someone or a company will work out because, a lot of times, such collaborations do more harm than good.
You’ll be surprised just how much it can do.
Abuse this technique and karma will strike you down with no mercy
There is an old Chinese saying, 济世之宝不可传非贤之人。What it means is that this technique is meant to do good for the world and it is not to be passed on lightly to just anyone, especially to a non-virtuous person. There are stories in the past where people dig up graves just to get the manuscripts on Qi Men Dun Jia.
This technique was not widely taught in the past because of how powerful it is – it can be abused if it falls into the wrong hands. For some reason, it’s all over the place now and a very popular Chinese metaphysics technique where the courses sell like hotcakes.
Now that I’ve experienced what Qi Men Dun Jia can do, I can understand why one shouldn’t pass down such techniques lightly. If you’re thinking why I didn’t say much about the technicals in the above example, it’s because I don’t want people to start generating charts and end up mind-screwing themselves. Please just leave such things to the professionals.
Knowing our ancestors did not want to pass down this technique lightly does make me question if I ever wish to start teaching this technique one day while knowing that it can be abused. Perhaps I’ll just screen the students. Then again, I do believe Heavens has a way of making sure people who have the intention of abusing this art will never be true masters of it.
I hope this post gives you an idea of what Qi Men Dun Jia is and isn’t, and what it can do.
If you are trying to pick this art up on your own, my suggestion is that you just use it for yourself and not risk giving someone a wrong interpretation and messing up their lives. I think I’ve spoken enough about how Chinese metaphysics isn’t meant for just anyone and how the wrong words can impact people.
If you happen to be the rare few who somehow managed to become proficient with this technique, then please use it to do good.
Finally, don’t try to hide. Heavens is watching. Also, if you are a prick – you can bet your backside I will know before you even give your birth details.
– Sean
