Everyone of us have a Gua number that is computed from our Chinese Solar year of birth. The Chinese Solar year starts on or around the 4th February each year. If you are born after the 4th February then you are said to be born in the current Chinese Solar year. If you are born before you belong to the previous Chinese Solar year. If you are born on or close to the 4th February, then you need to refer to the Ten Thousand Year Calendar figure out exactly your Chinese Solar year of birth.
With the correct Chinese Solar year of birth, you can calculate your Kua Number manually (which I will not cover) or use one of numerous online Gua calculators (recommended). Do note that the method of calculating Gua number is different for men and for women Gua number for a male and female is usually different. In some year though they are the same.
There are although 8 numbers ranging from 1 to 4 and 6 to 9. Please note that 5 is excluded.
Some refer to the Gua Number as Ming or Life Number. Others call it a Destiny Number. Since we are but a ball of energy, the Gua Number can also be defined as an energy signature of some sort.
It is used in some astrology system to determine our destiny and luck in life.
There are also numerous uses for the Gua Number in Feng Shui and in this article, I will give some examples of their usage.
In the popular Eight Mansions (or Eight House) Feng Shui method, the Gua Number is uses to determine our favorable and unfavorable sectors and directions. In this system, we are classified into East and West Life groups. If your Gua Number is 1, 3, 4 or 9, you belong to the East Life Group. If your number is 2, 6, 7 or 8 you belong to the West Life Group.
If your belong to the East Life Group, your favorable sectors and directions are north, south, east and south-east. If your belong to the West Life Group, your favorable sectors and directions are north-west, south-west, west and north-east.
The concept of Gua Number also extends to a house. Thus a house also have a House Gua Number and some houses are more suitable for you depending on your Gua Number.
In the Flying Star system, you Gua Number is often used as another layer to assess your suitability for particular sectors of a house. Let’s say the east sector of a house has good energy and is highly suitable for use as a bedroom. A practitioner would then assess if you are suitable for the bedroom by checking your Gua number against the energy that is present in the bedroom. He may discover that the north sectors which is also suitable as a bedroom is more ideally suited for you and recommend you sleep there instead.
Yet another us of the Gua number is in date selection. Every year has a Gua Number as well. This concept is further extended to the month, day and hour and so you have a month Gua, day Gua and hourly Gua Numbers.
These numbers are matched against your Life Gua number to the suitability of any date and time for you for certain endeavors.
Other date selection method uses the Gua in a different way. For example in the Da Gua date selection method the Gua number of the head of the household is used to evaluate the date and the sitting direction of the house.
And the uses goes on an on!