• An I Ching with No Texts?
• Frequently Asked Questions
• About Catherine
• Links
• Acknowledgements
• Technical Credits

Energy is the foundation on which our universe is built. Energy changing form is the basis of all life, and changing energies carry information. This information is encoded within the I Ching, or Chinese ‘Classic of Change’.

For thousands of years the Yi Jing (I Ching) has been consulted for practical, concrete guidance. Only in very recent times, and particularly in the West, has it been used as a tool for personal growth.

Imperial Yi Jing belongs to the original, pragmatic tradition of I Ching readings. It’s based on an unpublished and uncannily revealing technique known as ‘Chue Style Six Kinships Hexagram Yi Jing’. Questions of all kinds (even ‘yes or no’ queries) are answered in detail by means of a complex arrangement of logical rules that have been tested and refined for millennia. The technique is independent of the Yi Jing texts, which is why it offers such a high degree of precision and objectivity.

This site provides detailed information about the fascinating history of Chue Style Yuen Hom Feng Shui, of which the 'I Ching' is a part. The articles and anecdotes here – informative, amusing, eerie and amazing -- will give you a real insight into what it means to be a Master. This background has been passed on by Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah to his students, and with Grand Master Chan’s permission I’m making it available to you. I’m grateful to Grand Master Chan, too, for the beautiful and eloquent calligraphy on this website.

Unfortunately I don’t speak Mandarin or Cantonese. I’ve worked with the Yi Jing for some 40 years, and in that time I’ve acquired a vocabulary that’s a mixture of pinyin, Wade-Giles and phonetic guesswork. This will be obvious to the scholars among you!

What Is the Yi Jing?
The Yi Jing (I Ching) is a collection of Chinese texts relating human experiences to natural cycles. It’s also used as a method to forecast the direction in which a person or situation is progressing. (read more …)

What’s Different About Imperial Yi Jing?
Imperial Yi Jing delivers precise, straightforward answers to specific queries – even to ‘yes or no’ and ‘third party’ questions. It doesn’t depend on published translations. Instead, it analyses your situation through a complex arrangement of logical, proven rules that have been handed down directly from Master to student. (read more …)

How Authentic Is This Method?
Chue Style Six Kinships Hexagram Yi Jing takes its name from Taoist Great Grand Master Chue Yen, and has a history that can be traced back for centuries to the ancient Chinese Imperial Courts. (read more …)

Why Is It Sometimes Called Yi Jing ‘Divination’?
The term ‘divination’ refers us back to a time when people turned to Nature for help in understanding the will of the gods. (read more …)

Isn’t Yi Jing Forecasting Very Subjective?
Not with Imperial Yi Jing. (read more …)

What About Free Will?
Even Imperial Yi Jing can’t bring you a future carved in stone! (read more …)

What’s Your Theory About Forecasting?
Here are two theories that may be a little different from those you’ll find elsewhere. (read more …)

Like our own scientists and philosophers, the intellectuals of early societies studied various patterns of environmental and social change. They noted correspondences between natural phenomena and human experiences. Over many centuries they built up both an empirical body of knowledge and a belief system to explain it. The Yi Jing (pronounced ‘ee-JING’) is a collection of writings that are one product of this scholarship. It uses both pictures and words to illustrate the parallels between natural phases and human lives.

The complementary principles of yin and yang are fundamental in Chinese thought, and they arose from observing the ebb and flow of natural forces. All change reflects the ongoing transformation of yin to yang, and of yang to yin. The Yi Jing, or ‘Classic of Change’, began to evolve more than 3000 years ago as understanding of yin and yang grew more and more sophisticated.

Yin and yang are represented pictorially in the Yi Jing by short horizontal lines. Yang is assertive, and shown as a continuous line; yin is receptive, and shown as a line ‘broken’ in the middle. By means of yang and yin lines, the Yi Jing can describe our current position and suggest how we’ll progress to a future situation.

Because change is an unfolding process, the Yi Jing also depicts the interaction between yin and yang in other ways. One of these is by means of the so-called ‘moving lines’, where a yang line becomes yin, or a yin line becomes yang. Yang becoming yin is drawn as a continuous line in which a ‘break’ is appearing. Yin becoming yang is drawn as a broken line whose segments are coming together.

Change is also indicated by the arrangement of lines into vertical groups of three or six, known as ‘trigrams’ and ‘hexagrams’ respectively. The lines carry their theme of change from the bottom to the top of the group, with yin and yang lines appearing in various combinations of stillness and movement. Where trigrams and hexagrams contain moving lines, the movement is followed forward and new groups are created.

There are 8 possible trigrams that can combine in various ways to form 64 different hexagrams. These 64 hexagrams broadly symbolise the full range of life situations.

A specific hexagram results from asking a question and ‘casting lots’ with yarrow sticks or coins. This hexagram reflects the circumstances surrounding the matter concerned, as well as the direction in which events are leading. Often this hexagram will contain moving lines, and therefore a second hexagram is created to carry the question forward to its solution.

Imperial Yi Jing provides a down-to-earth answer to virtually any question that concerns you personally or professionally, no matter how ‘tricky’ your question may appear. You can enquire about circumstances affecting you, someone else, or a group of people. You can even ask ‘yes or no’ questions.

The usual way that Western people consult the Yi Jing is by interpreting its elegant but often obscure texts and commentaries as though they were analogies for an individual’s circumstances. This approach tends to produce vague and ambiguous readings that only make sense with effort and hindsight.

Imperial Yi Jing doesn't rely on the Yi Jing texts because they’re not connected with the analytical and forecasting method described here. Instead, I use an unpublished, sophisticated and uncannily precise technique known as ‘Chue Style Six Kinships Hexagram Yi Jing’. This involves applying an intricate arrangement of logical rules that have been tested and refined over many centuries. Using the ‘Chue Style’ approach facilitates a high degree of objectivity and exactitude, and means that the Yi Jing’s answer to a question is likely to be clear-cut, unambiguous and forthright. The Yi Jing won’t always tell you what you’ve been hoping to hear, so it’s inadvisable to have a reading if you’re not sure you’re ready to accept the answer.

Very little has been disclosed in the West about non-textual use of the Yi Jing. This method was raised to a high level of skill, detail and accuracy by certain sages within the Chinese Imperial Courts. Imperial Yi Jing is rooted in one branch of this tradition, 'Chue Yi', whose particular strengths and secrets have been handed down over the ages, directly from Master to student. It was Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah, one of the world’s highest-ranking Feng Shui Masters, who introduced Chue Style Six Kinships Hexagram Yi Jing to the West. 'Chue Style' has a fascinating history dating back more than 1000 years to the Tang Dynasty and beyond. (read more …)

The term ‘Yi Jing divination’ reflects the context in which the ‘Classic of Change’ developed.

For millennia, humanity has wanted to uncover hidden knowledge. Divination was a practice that developed across all ancient cultures, to reveal the unseen future or clarify a situation. The psychological benefit of divination was to help the enquirer feel more secure, prepared or empowered. Its overall purpose was to enable a person to make better decisions or take more appropriate action.

Divination began at a time when human survival depended directly on respecting and adjusting to the natural world. The oceans approach and recede, the luminaries rise and set, the seasons warm and cool the landscape. A life is born, grows, declines and passes away. Change is a characteristic of nature, and early cultures thrived in proportion to how well they anticipated and adapted to it.

The word ‘divination’ has its roots in both the Latin word for ‘a god’ and the Old French word for ‘a soothsayer’. The ancient soothsayer conducted his rituals reverently. His purpose was to comprehend divine will so that individuals and society could adapt themselves to it. His methods may seem strange to some of us because he made no conceptual distinction between God and Nature – and because traditional methods of divination have been corrupted over the centuries.

Many Westerners are deeply suspicious of prediction, which is one reason why some Yi Jing practitioners describe their approach as ‘tapping into subconscious wisdom’. Engaging the subconscious can be valuable when working with the Yi Jing, but subconscious input is very inconsistent. Because the subconscious mind communicates through symbolism and intangible feelings, relying on it tends to result in foggy impressions, ambiguity and mistaken conclusions.

Another danger in the ‘subconscious wisdom approach’ is that the fears and hopes of the enquirer can compromise the accuracy of a reading, distorting it or even reversing its conclusions. Powerful feelings can have an impact whether we do readings for ourselves, or work with a sympathetic consultant who’s discussed the question with us before the reading takes place. When we rely on subconscious promptings, it’s difficult for empathy and objectivity to exist side by side. This can be even more of a problem when the Yi Jing is approached in a spirit of ‘personal growth’.

Imperial Yi Jing reduces subjectivity to a minimum. With the ‘Chue Style’ method, the associations and complicated interrelationships found in each hexagram are identified and analysed in unusual detail. Many centuries of observation and experimentation have gone into delivering results that are much more precise than those that depend on the usual translations and commentaries.

If we can look into the future, is what we see inevitable? We all like to think we have some say in what happens to us. We need to believe that our choices can affect the outcome of situations that we meet. Ultimately we want to feel that, within the context of our particular religious or philosophical perspective, we direct our own lives.

The Yi Jing or ‘Classic of Change’ reflects a sophisticated understanding of environmental and human cycles. By definition, cycles have a predictable pattern. Part of the greatness of the ‘Classic of Change’ is that it takes into account how cycles themselves can be influenced and modified.

Skilled use of the Yi Jing can identify many of the choices, changes and other interventions that may alter the course of events. At any point, circumstances or free will can disturb the equilibrium sufficiently to change the future. A well-trained and gifted practitioner can describe these potential turning points and take your reading to a very high level of accuracy. However, there are no absolutes. We ourselves, and those whose lives touch ours, can step outside the pattern and change direction. Imperial Yi Jing can help you decide whether this is what you want to do.

This is based on the way I understand chi (pronounced ‘chee’). For me, chi is the omnipresent, invisible and subtle energy connecting everything that is, has been or will be. Chi can be expressed as yin and yang energies, which relate and adjust to each other in an ever-changing equilibrium.

When this dynamic equilibrium is disturbed, the flow of chi is affected. In human life, disturbances to the flow of chi may be experienced as desirable or undesirable changes in health, relationships, self-esteem, money, career and so forth. These disturbances are portrayed in the Yi Jing by the pattern and interaction of yin and yang lines, and by their comparatively static or mobile state.

My hypothesis is that to look ahead into the future is to follow the flow of chi – to chart its course by deduction, imagination or inspiration. Competent ‘seers’ – and I’m including here the whole range, from clairvoyants to physicists - are both pragmatic and receptive. These two qualities together enable them to gauge the flow of chi and use their own terms of reference to describe it. The best seers can align themselves with the chi flow, and follow it to its destination. In other words, they can perceive the direction that events are taking and recognise the likely outcome.

The human mind receives, transmits and stores energy in the form of thought. I suspect that everything that has ever existed, or will ever exist, contributes to the ocean of universal energy known as chi. In terms of chi, everything is interconnected and therefore within reach of the mind.

This interconnection means, too, that nothing happens by chance. Thanks to the ‘ripple effect’, even apparently random or accidental events are a response to something else that’s taking place, however distant or apparently unrelated. We’re never entirely correct when we say that two actions have nothing in common.

When we consult the Yi Jing by casting coins, for example, we let the coins bypass our conscious control and fall as they choose. What happens when control is set aside for a moment is that the coins’ movement, in some way that I can’t explain, resonates more intimately with the relevant flow of chi. Such chi includes, among other things, the energy imprints of the moment of the question, the intention of the questioner, the context in which the question is asked, the symbolism of the Yi Jing, the likely direction of events, and the face on which each coin will fall. This complexity is summarised in binary form (yin and yang, heads and tails) and presented to a practitioner who now can observe the chi flow symbolically and interpret it in practical terms.

There’s a contrasting theory as to why the ‘Classic of Change’ can be so accurate. Because of the Yi Jing’s popularity and antiquity, the experience of consulting it is firmly embedded in the collective unconscious. Today when we cast the coins, perhaps we vicariously attune to the flow of chi and unconsciously keep control of how the coins fall. The Yi Jing may work for us now because for a brief moment we borrow the sensibilities of our ancestors.

Feng shui caught my attention during its 1990’s heyday. I read round the subject as widely as I could, and much of what I read was contradictory and illogical.

Looking for authentic knowledge, I enrolled on a feng shui course in London with Derek Walters as the principal tutor. Derek proved to have an extraordinary level of scholarship leavened by a wicked sense of humour. He was an inspiration, though an unintentionally humbling one. It’s largely thanks to Derek’s course that I held my head above water during a year that challenged many of my beliefs.

In that year I also began ongoing study with The Imperial School of Feng Shui and Chinese Horoscopes in Edinburgh. Here, in addition to learning a very powerful style of feng shui, I became a first-generation Yi Jing and astrology student of Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah. To sum up Grand Master Chan as ‘one of the world’s highest-ranking Masters’ is to overlook his wit, compassion, enthusiasm, patience and dedication. You can read more about Grand Master Chan elsewhere on this website.

Studying with Grand Master Chan eventually led to my creating the Imperial Yi Jing website. Most of my time now is given to research, writing and design, including the creation of a range of materials and activities for corporate training and personal development.

The Nepal Trust

The Nepal Trust works in one of the world’s most remote and impoverished locations, the Himalayas of northwest Nepal. It's closely involved with local people, responding to their needs and wants in fields such as health, education, renewable energy and heritage. The Trust is a dedicated, cost effective and ethical organisation that gives the Nepalese people hands-on help to fight poverty and implement their community development projects.

The Imperial School of Feng Shui and Chinese Horoscopes

Here you'll find information and booking details for courses conducted by Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah, and guidance as to how to book a consultation with Grand Master Chan or one of his trained practitioners.

The Chue Foundation

This is the UK web home of authentic Imperial Feng Shui, with informative articles and guidance in choosing a practitioner.

Chue Francophone - for French-speaking members of the Chue Foundation
This website was created in 2005 by the French-speaking students of Grand Master Chan Kun Wah, who are members of the (International) Chue Foundation. Its goal is to inform people about Chue Style Feng Shui, to regulate the practice, to organise the teaching and to provide its members with a platform for research.

MatthewDBauer.com
Matthew D. Bauer has studied Taoist spirituality, philosophy, and folk history with 74th generation Taoist Master Hua-Ching Ni since 1978. Matthew is a licensed acupuncturist, herbalist and qi-gong healer whose great interest in early Chinese culture and healing inspired him to research how acupuncture and other aspects of Chinese medicine first evolved. His book, “The Healing Power of Acupressure and Acupuncture – A Complete Guide to Timeless Traditions and Modern Practice”, offers insights into early Taoist thought as well as practical advice on health matters.

Ancient Wisdom for Today
This fascinating site is a first step in the development of an international organisation to promote and support dialogue on the contemporary value of ancient mystical thought. It aims to address the disenchantment of the modern world by bringing together insightful commentators and practitioners from every culture and all walks of life.

I Ching with Clarity
Here you'll find a route to sensitive, text-based, Western-style readings from a personal growth perspective. The site is also a very comprehensive gathering of Yi Jing resources such as annotated links, articles and reviews; I Ching courses by email (including a free course introducing the basics); regular newsletters; and a friendly, active, online community.

Yi Jing Algebra
An innovative approach to the interpretation of Yi Jing imagery, ‘the Yi Jing in the Information Age’ presents Boolean algebra as a framework for inspiring the imagination and interpreting an I Ching divination. Andreas' current emphasis is on the commonality of basic metaphysics between the Yijing and the Taiji Quan. In particular he's focusing on parallels between the energetic descriptions of the trigrams and the techniques of generating power in Taiji. His website features downloadable articles and tools, intriguing reviews and annotated links as well as details of consultations, tuition and workshops.

Six Filming
As an international film agency, Six Filming works closely with the Chinese broadcasting and film industry. They support location filming and cultural exchange activities across Britain. In 2007, Six Filming started to explore the exciting field of commercial video services in the UK. They work at the forefront of British-Chinese cultural exchange, bringing vivid images to both countries.

Komilla Sutton
Komilla Sutton is an internationally renowned Vedic astrologer, writer, teacher and lecturer. The co-founder and chair of the British Association for Vedic Astrology, India-born Komilla is one of the pioneers who’ve made this subject accessible to western readers.

A T Mann: Sacred Arts
A T Mann is an innovative astrologer, graphic designer, lecturer and prolific author whose books have been translated into twenty languages. He is on the advisory board of Kepler College in Seattle and the International Centre for Creativity, Innovation and Sustainability in Copenhagen. This ‘Renaissance Mann’ of numerous accomplishments is currently working on a range of inspiring documentary films.

I'm indebted to the following for their help in providing information, illustrations and general assistance for the articles in the series, History of Chue Style Six Kinships Hexagram Yi Jing:

• Anecdotes:
  • Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah
  • Lana Cook
  • Tom Coxon
  • Marianne Druant
  • Aine McCaffrey
  • Kajal Sheth
  • Kaiser Shroff
  • Jillian Stott
  • Ian Wallace
  • Jared Westcott
  • Oliver Winkler
• Editorial Assistance:
  • Ivy Morgan (Qing Zhao)
• General Assistance:
  • Mike Chester
  • Pamela Forsyth
  • Maria Green
  • David Knowles
  • Arthur Tatchell
  • Kay Tom
  • Ian Wallace
  • Michael Warden
  • Linda Watt
• Calligraphy:
  • Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah
• Illustrations:
  • Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah
  • Val Burnham
  • Bernard Cloutier
  • Pamela Forsyth
  • Kaiser Shroff
• Ambient Music:
  • David Knowles

Room 108 Limited
Working in collaboration with its clients, Room 108 offers Web Design and New Media consultancy, and provides individual solutions that match the clients' needs.

The Fourth Craw
Logo artwork from a creative team who deliver effective design solutions for corporate literature, magazine production and more.

Site music created by David Knowles, a Feng Shui Consultant and Teacher accredited by Grand Master Chue Yan Chan Kun Wah. David can be contacted by mobile phone on +44 (0)781 507 3636.

Certain images and/or photos used in this website are the copyrighted property of JupiterImages and are being used with permission under license. These images and/or photos may not be re-used without permission from JupiterImages. All other images and/or photos used on this website are the copyrighted property of their respective owners as indicated, and may not be stored or re-used without permission.