Directions -- Personal and Otherwise

Are you sleeping fine where you are? Then don't worry.

If you are having problems sleeping, then it's worth thinking about moving the bed. But where? It could depend on the house. It could depend on your birthdate. It could depend on the circumstances of the room or the house.

Do not worry about north and south and whether you should sleep one way or the other. The north-south concern typically reflects the crackpot theories of Robert Fludd (1574-1637), the founder of English Rosicrucianism, who believed there were two principles to all things: condensation (the boreal or northern virtue) and rarefaction (the southern or austral virtue).

Fludd had peculiar ideas about magnetism. He believed that humans had north and south poles like the Earth, and magnetism could only take place when humans slept in a boreal position. That was supposed to be enough to remove the harmful effects of the demons that Fludd believed were inhabiting the human body and causing all illnesses.

When you learn more Fludd's ideas look even sillier.

The purveyors of McFengshui would have you believe a lot of bizarre things about feng shui, because it keeps them in business with an ever-increasing list of gimmickry.