A devoted reader ingeniously overlapped two diagrams from two of our books and applied them to the human body, illuminating a remarkable new tool.
Page 7 of Let's Do and Say We Didn't contains a map for constructing the elements of a believable lie. Upon this template, our reader doodled out a version of the Chinese bagua map from Seance Parlor Feng Shui. He noted: "They go so well together, one could easily conclude that you have illustrated the Feng Shui of Lying." But then our reader had a brainstorm — what if this new map were laid over the human body? The correspondences are uncanny. For example, the top left shoulder of the human body corresponds to both the "fortune" aspect of the bagua and the "alibi" of the lying map, and it is indeed fortuitous to have an alibi. One hand of the human body is associated with the "new beginnings" of the bagua and the "once upon a time" aspect of the lying map, appropriately writing or typing out the beginning of a story. The other hand is associated with "elements of truth" from the lying map and "creativity / metal" of the bagua, recalling the old proverb that "truth is golden." The two legs of the human body are also quite intriguing: one leg is associated with the bagua's "mentors" and the lying map's "second thoughts," and surely one's advisors offer additional thoughts and perspectives. The other leg is associated with the the bagua's "wisdom" and the lying map's "characters," and isn't it wisdom that gives a character a "leg up" or "legs" in terms of success? Also intriguing is how the human body's head is associated with the "obstacles" of the lying map and the "reputation" of the bagua, as it's commonly said that the stumbling blocks we face in life turn out to be mental constructs.
Our reader said, "Now what I believe you have done here is explain both physical Feng Shui (bagua map) and cerebral Feng Shui (story map). Place these over the body, and with a basic understanding of the difference between right and left brain activity, conscious/subconscious, I think you have discovered the holistic nature of Feng Shui. Body, Mind and Spirit. Prof. Oddfellow, I believe you are on the precipice of proving that all existence can be explained with the simple concept of Feng Shui."
We're crediting that as a Retroactive Lifetime Goal!
We also like how the reader has begun using the blank book Let's Do and Say We Didn't to create more of that blank book's front matter (along with some additional front matter from Seance Parlor Feng Shui, too!) It could turn into an entire book of front matter ... and then a second blank book would be required, with "Book 2" written onto the front cover, to restore the whole thing as a blank book. Yet the process would have to continue -- a new blank book added every time one is filled. But there's a hack to this vicious circle -- merely retain a single blank page at the very end of the first book, and it will technically still be a blank book (merely one that demands very careful consideration on how the reader/writer might fill in that limited space).
