A Complete Guide to Flying Star 5 Yellow(Dos, Don’ts and the best cure)

What is Flying Star Five Yellow?

Five Yellow is the annual Flying Star #5 in the nine Flying Stars family. Both “five” and “yellow” refer to a central earth element.  Suggesting void, conflicts, loss, illness, and catastrophe, Five Yellow is one of the most dangerous energies in Feng Shui practice.  Five Yellow changes its position annually and affects different relevant groups.

Five Yellow is one of the most important afflictions in Feng Shui practice. There are various cures, do and don’t you might have read/heard about in a seminar or online. Some of them are even conflicting with each other. As a beginner, you wonder which one is true and what are the pitfalls and misconceptions. In this article I will provide you a complete guide on the most essential things you need to know about Five Yellow. I will also share with you one of the secret but simple practice I have done in my feng shui consulting career to help people minimize this Five Yellow impact.

If you are coming only for 2023 (Year of Rabbit) or 2024(Year of Dragon) Five Yellow information, you can check out the Flying Star arrangement articles below, it has all details that you need to know for the annual arrangement.

2023 Flying Star Feng Shui – How to Feng Shui your house for the Year of Rabbit

2023 Flying Star Feng Shui – How to Feng Shui your house for the Year of Rabbit

2024 Flying Star Feng Shui – How to Feng Shui your house for the Year of Dragon

In this article, I will go over six topics in depth for Flying Star Five Yellow as below:

Five Yellow Characteristics and the most important take away

Five Yellow is generally known as a type of ominous energy that changes its location each year. Wherever it locates, it will cause loss (finance or career), accident, lawsuit, and sickness. Though there are many different Feng Shui schools with a variety of different methods in their practice, they can all agree in common that Five Yellow is a dangerous star and the Five Yellow region each year should be taken special care of in Feng Shui arrangement.

The term Five Yellow comes from the mysterious Chinese esoteric origin He Tu (Yellow River Chart) and the Luo Shu (Luo River Chart), where earth element 5 is in the center of both charts. Five Yellow is the representation of void and instability, and where it goes, it carries this effect to the corresponding people.

However, just like other flying stars, Five Yellow does not only come as an annual star, it also comes in the form of monthly, daily, and bi-hourly. That means, in addition to the annual Five Yellow, there is a monthly Five Yellow, a daily Five Yellow and a bi-hourly Five Yellow. Each Five Yellow (year, month, day, bi-hourly) may locate in different location, or they may overlap, which will push the ominous effect to extreme if that region happens to be activated. 

The general way to take care of Five Yellow region is to keep the area calm, to avoid reconstruction and long period of activity in that region, avoid active earth and fire element to strengthen its energy, and to use metal element cure.

For example, in the year of 2023, Year of Rabbit, Five Yellow locates in the northwest corner of a location. To avoid being affected by Five Yellow, you should avoid doing reconstruction in the northwest region of your house, if your bedroom happens to be northwest corner, you will be likely to affected by Five Yellow.

However, there are differences between effects caused by staying in that region for a long time and reconstruction. The negative effect that caused by a reconstruction often comes quick and sudden, sudden sickness, financial loss, or accident, etc., while staying in the Five Yellow’s region for long period of time (without actions to trigger Five Yellow) simply makes you a boiling-frog, the effect is slow and often manifested as obstacles, financial drainages, health declined, etc.

You can also take prudent action to deflect the energy of Five Yellow. Five Yellow belongs to earth element, so you can use metal element to exhaust the earth element, and thus lower the negative effect of Five Yellow. One of the most common metal element cures is to hang windchimes in Five Yellow’s corner, which is an acceptable practice. We will discuss different types of cures and some common misconceptions later this article.

Who will be affected by Five Yellow

Depending on Five Yellow’s position, there are certain groups of people who are particularly vulnerable to its impact. I listed five common groups as below so you can be aware of the potential negative effect.

You can be vulnerable to Five Yellow’s attack:

• If Five Yellow locates in the entry of your house, the entry of your bedroom, or the entry of your office.

Entry area is the most easily activated area because of the daily movement. For example, in the year of 2023, people with house entry in the northwest are particularly vulnerable to Five Yellow’s impact.

• If Five Yellow star locates in your kitchen area.

Five Yellow belongs to earth element. Earth element will be strengthened or activated by fire element of a kitchen and thus affect the whole family.

• If the annual Five Yellow star locates in the bed, office, or area you spent most time on daily.

For example, in the year of 2024, Five Yellow locates in the west region, if your bedroom happens to be in the west region of the house, you are vulnerable to Five Yellow’s effect.

• If your zodiac house overlaps with Five Yellow’s position.

For example, Five Yellow locates in the northwest region of a house in 2023, both houses of zodiac Dog and zodiac Pig belongs to northwest region, if you are a zodiac Pig, you are vulnerable to Five Yellow’s effect.

• If your attributes overlap with Gua archetype of Five Yellow’s position.

For example, Five Yellow locates in the northwest region of a house in 2023, northwest region represents the male household, the father or the elderly male, if your personal situation matches one of the northwest representations, you are vulnerable to Five Yellow’s effect.

• If the position of Five Yellow happens to have broken objects, poison arrow, cutting edge.

For example, in the year of 2024, Five Yellow locates in the west region, if there happens to be a sharp corner in the west region of your house, you are vulnerable to Five Yellow’s effect.

Do and Don’t for Five Yellow Corner

Having said that, Five Yellow is not as terrible as it sounds, the key factor is whether it is activated or not. As you may tell by the vulnerable groups we discussed above, the general house setting that will trigger Five Yellow’s energy will be activated if the region it flies to is an entry, a kitchen, having heavy vibrating appliances, or the external environment of that region have unpleasant forms. Below is a Do and Don’t checklist for the Five Yellow Corner:

Dos for Five Yellow corner:

1. Keep the area calm
2. Add proper metal element cure
3. Spray saltwater to calm the field

Don’ts for Five Yellow corner:

1. Avoid long period of activity in Five Yellow region
2. Avoid any type of reconstruction, breaking the grounds, taking down the walls, heavy hammering, activities that cause heavy vibration, etc.
3. Avoid adding fire and earth element to the region

Cures to Five Yellow, the bad, the good, and the best Cure

There are many cures you might have heard online or from a feng shui seminar, I will share with you my research and experience on the pros and cons of these cures, or misconception.

• Bells and windchimes

As a general rule, windchimes are the best cure to Five Yellow. Bell(s) may have a similar effect; however, the sound that bells make is often deeper thus its metal sound stays on the Ying metal spectrum. Wind chimes with light and crisp sounds stay on the Yang metal spectrum, which works best to resolve the earth element of Five Yellow. 

But let us go a couple of steps further.

A cure is often designed with a specific purpose to deflect or transform certain types of energy. Therefore, we are considering all aspects of a tool for feng shui purposes, with every layer of this time gearing towards the same direction, we can create a very effective tool for our purpose.

Assuming the windchimes are made of brass tubes(material), with a round top(shape), in golden color, what else can we do to make it the most helpful cure?

How about the number?  

Each number has its own element as well. However, there is a common misconception in Feng Shui circles, that people would use flying Stars’ numbers as this is their element. It is not correct. The number that goes with a flying star, Flying Star #1, #6, #8, etc., is simply the name/order of the stars, not their element. Just like someone with a family name Finch does not mean that person is a bird.

The element of numbers are actually indicated in the He Tu (Yellow River Chart)： 1 and 6 being water, 2 and 7 being fire, 3 and 8 being wood, and 4 and 9 being metal.  

To best drain the earth element of Five Yellow, we should use 9-rod golden windchimes.  However, most feng shui manufacturers in the mainstream market only make 6-rod windchimes for demand as that is what most people asked for. 

But do not get frustrated, because once you go down this path of Feng Shui, you will find that there is no perfection in feng shui practice.  For average people, golden windchimes will be a good enough start.

As I mentioned earlier, I would share with you an advanced yet very simple arrangement I provide to my clients as Five Yellow cure, which I barely see other people do it.  I often ask a client to hang golden shiny curtains in the Five Yellow corner, type of curtain being solid with a bit of reflective attributes in the material works the best. It is simple without adding a strong oriental accent in a European-style house.

Of course, to avoid hammering on the wall in the Five Yellow corner, you do it before February 4^th, or simply find a way to hang it there without banging the wall. This has been proven to be a very effective practice as it drains the earth element of Five Yellow without causing any side effects issue.

the golden color often works best for the purpose of exhausting the earth element. Number wise, 9 bells or a nine-rod windchimes work the best. 

• Saltwater Cure

There are multiple versions of how the Saltwater Cure should be put together: open lid or sealed, Himalayan Salt or raw sea salts, six plus one coins, five plus one coins or nine plus four coins, silver, copper, or brass, etc. you got the idea. 

The basic approach is to use a round glass jar filled with excessive salt and water, lay six brass/golden coins in a circular shape and one silver coin in the center on the top of the salt, and place this jar in the Five Yellow corner. See the sample below:

The key is that the saltwater needs to be in contact with air, and the number of coins-either the common 6 brass plus one silver coin, or the advanced 9 brass plus 4 silver coins makes little difference in the practical result. That is because the most essential part of the saltwater cure is not on the coins, but the salt water, which can help to calm a field. However, the tricky part is, to make this cure effective, the saltwater has to be exposed to the air, but with saltwater exposed in the air for too long, the container will get dirty, and the dirty container attracts Five Yellow as well.  So Saltwater is a great cure for short-term and immediate effects, but if you want to keep the saltwater cure for a long period of time, especially combined with coins, that can create some negative side effects.

In conclusion, use Saltwater Cure with prudence, for a short period of time. The best way to apply saltwater cure is to do it without any coins in the jar, just a glass jar of over-saturated saltwater will reach the same effect.

• Five-Emperor coins

Five-Emperor Coins are one of the most popular Feng Shui cures to Five Yellow and Two Black (Flying star #2). Five Emperors refer to the five powerful emperors in Qing Dynasty of China: Shunzhi, Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong, and Jiaqing.  Those were also prosperous and relevantly peaceful regions. There are folklores about how these coins can ward off evil spirit, protect house and even bring wealth.

The practice is to display six Five-Emperor coins in the Five Yellow corner. They can be either from the same emperor or different ones. The basic idea behind five emperor’s coins is use metal element of the coin and symbolism behind emperors (emperor being Qian gua, Qian gua being metal, etc.) to exhaust the earth element of Five Yellow.

Conclusion: The ancient coins (I-Ching coin or Five-Emperor coins), for some reason, were among the very popular “feng shui cures” in occidental world. I would not suggest using coins for the purpose of curing Five Yellow because, in advanced feng shui, coins are usually used to create a “field” for certain purpose (mostly to assemble energy), but there are too many levels of consideration that an advanced Feng Shui mater would do before applying this practice.   Practitioners will often create this “field” without acknowledging what they have done, and that can bring some damaging effect to person who uses it.  I would advise practitioners not to use coins as a metal cure to Five Yellow.

• Fans/ ceiling fan

The idea that fans or ceiling fans can even be a Five Yellow cure baffled me. I guess the logic behind it is to use moving metal to drain the 5 Yellow if people follow the logic of moving wind chimes help to drain the earth energy of Five Yellow.

Except it is a very wrong idea.

One of the basic requirements for Five Yellow corner is to keep that area calm. Anything that create constant movement can stir the energy of Five Yellow.  That is why wind chimes can work while displaying Boss Audio playing heavy metal can create a reverse effect, yes, that would be literally Death metal.

And the way that windchimes can drain the energy of Five Yellow is not because windchimes are moving metals but because it ADDS metal element to the field through sound, material, color and number.   Ceiling fans only creates moving air that would potentially activate the chi of Five Yellow.

Conclusion: Fans or Ceiling fans is not a Five Yellow Cure and may even exacerbate the negativity of Five Yellow.

• pendulum or chiming clock

Pendulum and Chiming clock, depending on the size and shape of a specific item, they can belong to earth element, water element and metal element. As a general rule, small size clock can belong to water element and metal element, while a large pendulum already have strong earth element in it, and the vibration can stir the chi of Five Yellow as well.

Conclusion: I would not suggest to use pendulum as Five Yellow cure without professional guidance.

• Five-Element Pagoda

The original purpose of a pagoda was to house relics and sacred writings. The five-element pagoda is a Buddhism architecture and the five element it refers to are void, wind/air, fire, water, and earth from top to bottom.

Though a brass five-element pagoda can be considered as a metal cure. It is more of a sacred symbol to remind people the truth of world in Buddhism teaching. Unless you are dedicated Buddhist, it is not something I would consider placing at home.

General misconception and why some cures bring more harm

There are some common misconceptions, especially among occidental feng shui practitioners.

• If your kitchen sink is located in the five yellow corner, it will help to drain away Five Yellow.

It will not. It is a typical way of mis-interpreting feng shui. If we follow the same logic, we will find that kitchen sink will drain away any energy…

• Use wood element to destroy the earth element of Five Yellow.

You had better not because, in most cases, wood element will only exacerbate the energy of Five Yellow.  To deflect the energy of a negative star, the best practice is always to calm the chi and drain its energy. There used to be a similar concept as Feng Shui battle in Hong Kong, which people will use different symbols and elements to fight against their competitor or opponents, it only produces negative results for both ends.

• Folklore practice

I have seen people displaying Chilin, Pi Yao and Fu Dogs as heavenly creatures to ward off the “evil spirit” of Five Yellow. Unfortunately, Five Yellow is not an “evil spirit” but a pocket of energy that does not get along with most mundane people. And this “protective guardians” type of arrangement often does not work so well because a series of reasons, for example, the creatures that you display may have inherent conflict of that region and cause even more issues, etc.

If you want to have an in depth understanding about annual afflictions, such as Three-killings, Tai Sui, Sui Po, please check out my series below:

Five yellow annual position and remedy Chart from 2022 to 2030

To save your time and keep a beginner from confusion, I have listed the flying star Five Yellow’s annual position for a next 9-year cycle (2022-2030) and the best cure I would suggest for each particular year and region:

• In the year of 2022, Year of Tiger, flying star Five Yellow locates in the center, thought the energy of Five will still be able affect other corners there is no cure necessary because the center is an infinitely small point. However, if there is a staircase or elevator in that region, you can display a round brass plate in the staircase area or by the exit of the elevator.  It will help to exhaust the earth energy of Five Yellow.

• In the year of 2023, Year of Rabbit, flying star Five Yellow locates in the northwest, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes in this northwest corner.

• In the year of 2024, Year of Dragon, flying star Five Yellow locates in the west, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this west corner.

• In the year of 2025, Year of Snake, flying star Five Yellow locates in the northeast, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this northeast corner.

• In the year of 2026, Year of Horse, flying star Five Yellow locates in the south, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this south corner.

• In the year of 2027, Year of Sheep, flying star Five Yellow locates in the north, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this north corner.

• In the year of 2028, Year of Monkey, flying star Five Yellow locates in the southwest, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this southwest corner.

• In the year of 2028, Year of Monkey, flying star Five Yellow locates in the southwest, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this southwest corner.

• In the year of 2029, Year of Rooster, flying star Five Yellow locates in the east, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with blue curling ribbon tied to it in this southwest corner.

• In the year of 2030 Year of Dog, flying star Five Yellow locates in the southeast, the cure to Five Yellow this year would be to hang windchimes with a natural Wu Lou in this southeast corner.