Vaastu, way of living in harmony

Aravinda Hettiarachchi

Nature is the pre-phase of culture. Thus every culture fundamentally relies on its immediate and natural terrestrial condition. In other words culture is something that is built vertically against nature, the foundation. Therefore some cultural phenomena are so close to its nature while others develop beyond it. Vaastu deals with nature in a friendly manner while maintaining its stature as a phenomenon of culture.

Thus most interpreters of Vaastu introduce it according to five natural elements in nature (water, fire, earth, air and space), though it talks about a spiritual method on architecture that uses these five elements for constructing civilization. The method of ayurveda also says that unhealthiness happens due to the inequity of the above five elements. Balancing these five elements can therefore bring a healthy life.

In other words, we, to a greater extent, have built cultures or civilizations against the nature. So we need these kinds of methods (phenomena) to keep the balance with the nature, because the fundamental biology of a human (the body) is basically a natural entity before the culture.

According to Dr Rupa Batra (the family Vaastu advisor and astrologer) Vaastu is a lifestyle. It is based on magnetic field, cosmic energy, gravity force, ultra violet rays and infrared rays. And the method of Vaastu can be applied on wherever we live: home, office, clinic, factory, industry and etc. Vaastu gives direction to these places or environments of civilization to be built in the correct and balanced way.

The basic equipment in Vaastu is the compass. You have to place this compass in the centre of the particular location and decide the directions such as North and South poles. Some directions of areas are good for the particular construction of a room, verandah, kitchen or toilet while some directions are not.

Dr Batra says that this is totally a science or a doctrine for all mankind to make them happy. It brings peace and the right decision. Whenever these two things are together you can easily make money and whatever the job (karma) you do become successful. Yet Vaastu can only do guidance with 20 percent effect. You must have 30 percent from the destiny (bhagya) and 50 percent from the work or the job (karma) you do. “If someone consults me, that person has to take me to his site where he lives and let me decide what is good or bad. Thus Vaastu can be any sort of building or an environment. For example, if it is a psychological illness, it is a problem of south-west as said in Vaastu. Then you have to change the map of your home. Yet I am not a psychiatric. I am a Vaastu consultant, a doctor of home,” said Dr Batra.

Vaastu is similar in ideology to Feng-shui the traditional Chinese way to assist spiritually in building construction and its maintenance. Yet Feng-shui relies on a binary-opposition called Ying and Yang. There you have only two elements. Vaastu, a method of India, is a developed version of it, with five elements. In ancient times these two methods started in a main base of cultural partnership. Yet today they have found their own ways of supporting their own cultures.

Thus, for the well-being of the human. Vaastu suggests the direction or the exact location to build and maintain the main door, worship or meditation room, drawing room, master bedroom, kitchen, dinning room, stairs, toilet, study room, overhead tank, store room, and underground tank of any kind of residence. This method also suggests a specific shape to a particular room for it is believed that this location direction, the shape of the place, placement of furniture and other things inside it can affect the fortune or the misfortune of the people who live in it.

So, according to Vaastu, the reason for any kind of a problem in life depend on the way the people locate themselves and arrange their day-to-day life with things.

Therefore, any kind of a problem can also be solved by replacing or changing the direction of location or residence and the placement of furniture and other things in it. People believe in such ideologies all around the world to fine-tune their own lives. Yet testing or rejecting an idea or any method is up to you and your free will.