Etheric Gateways pt2: Garden Gates, Moon Doors, Feng Shui Courtyards and Unexplained Disappearances

Hey guys, welcome to the Learn Feng Shui podcast, where you'll learn Feng Shui from a classical point of view, taking out the myth and superstition. So if you're interested in learning Feng Shui, Chinese astrology, all things Chinese metaphysics, as well as the superstitions and myths that connected all, you'll enjoy learning Feng Shui with me. Hey guys, welcome to Learn Feng Shui podcast, where ancient traditions meet modern living up Candice Berlanga. Certified Feng Shui practitioner and red ribbon professional with the International Feng Shui Guild, and today we're going to talk about gateways. Kind of like an aetheric gateways part two, we're going to talk about Feng Shui formulas, moon doors, and even garden gates, and also these mysterious energies of sacred passageways.

We're also going to wrap up with the Folklore Friday segment, talking about everyday portals and clues and bonus audio from Christian Curiac with the House Whisperer. So let's get into it. Let's just see what's the most mysterious looking place anyone could imagine. The Secret Garden. Literature and stories have long hinted that garden walls and hidden doors are more than just boundaries, their gateways.

Whether it's the Secret Garden, where a forgotten key in locks a wall paradise or the show over the garden wall, where two brothers slip over a stone fence into the strange otherworldly realm, the idea is timeless. Crossing a threshold can lead some more magical, even the graceful moon gates and their iconic circular openings can be seen in classical gardens carrying the same symbolism they invite you not to just pass through, but to shift space and step into a different kind of energy. In classical Feng Shui methods like the castle gate, the placement of pass, entrances, and openings hold real energetic weight. A walkway gate and even a direction it faces is not just a design choice, but they're an intentional portal for Qi. Shaping how an energy flows into a home or a courtyard.

Today we're going to explore these eager meetings behind these gates and how ancient systems view them as true doorways between worlds. There is only a small TikTok where someone filmed this mossy weather cover garden gate in the English countryside. You couldn't really see what was on the other side. It was just a soft mist and vines curling around this beautiful frame. But garden gates were not just seen as entrance as they were seen as symbolic portals.

So I want to play the audio from that video now, which I'll of course link in the show notes so she can explain it better. Some old mansions have a door in the garden. Garden doors are most common in the UK, France, and Italy. Often led from the home into a private walled garden. Tucked into stone or brick walls, ivy or hedges designed to be portals to another world.

Door was often hidden on the property to create a sense of discovery that were a gate sometimes it would be called a kissing gate. A rounded archway into the garden would be called a moon gate or a moon door. This is when gardens were regularly used for flirting, reading, and being by yourself. Needless to say, this inspired my episodes into looking at garden gates. And I really thought about my previous episode with the House Whisperer Christian Kiriaku.

And I thought this would be a wonderful addition to his episode. But the point is across cultures these gates mark transitions to other worlds from the everyday to the sacred or from the known into the unknown. And even using the garden as a way of self discovery which I thought was pretty interesting. I also wanted to point out that even just the term gate originates from the old Norse word gat, meaning a opening or passage. And I think that's really kind of speaks or echoes what we're kind of talking about today.

Looking at these garden gates there was also something called a Lich gate which is an old English derived from the word corpse or a resurrection gate. This is a covered gateway found at the entrance to English or English style church yard. And it says here I'm going to link in the show and it's Wikipedia that examples also exist outside the British Isles in Newfoundland. And even two Texas so we got a little bit of a connection there guys. Love my UK listeners.

You guys I think message me the most. Love you guys. I also think the architecture and the whole UK is very lovely. The description of a Lich gate consists of a roof or a port like structure over a gate. It's often built of wood.

It usually consists of 4 to 6 upright wooden posts in a rectangular shape. On top of this are a number of beams that hold a pitched roof or a thatch. They have decorative carvings and the later times were erected as memorials. Under the roof of the gate usually two pales meet in the middle. So it's a gate where they meet in the middle and swing open.

And this was actually used to place a coffin where the person would lie in and wait or lie in rest. And people would come pay their respects to it usually inside the church yard. We're marking the beginning of the church yard into the hollow ground. The most common form of the Lich gate is here. It's just a simple structure composed of a roof with two gabled ends covered in tiles or thatch.

Here it says in the middle ages before mortuary. It's in a time when people died at home or they lay in rest at home. They were placed on what was called a buyer and taken to Lich gate. A buyer is essentially a large stone I would say slab that they would put the body on because they didn't bury in coffins. And so they would place the body under the Lich gate and guard the body because there was body stature as back then.

But it kind of kept the reign and the elements from getting to the body the watchers could come pay respects to the person. In traditionally usage the gate was sheltered at a point which the coffin was set down at the funeral. Once coffins came around and traditionally uses the gate was sheltered at a point which the coffin was set down at a funeral to wait. The clergyman's arrival so it looks like a more modern times as opposed to the handcuffins. They would just rest the body there to take it out over the sun and the heat.

Lich gates also serve to differentiate consecrated and unconsecrated spaces and serve as the liminal space between the two stone lich gates. Make create an increased oral awareness between the transition of one space to another by creating a tangible contrast between the inside and outside. In England there's a full belief that the spirit of the last person buried stands watch the gate until the next is buried leading to funeral fights at the entrance to decide which corpse should be buried first. I think that's kind of comical. It's also used as a wedding tradition traditionally in some parts of England particularly parts of New Yorkshire.

It says at the end of the wedding the bride and groom leave the church and the gates are closed or there's an absence of gates. A rope is held by local children and the couple have to pay to let them pass. Conversely though in other parts like Cheshire, wedding parties would not pass through the Lich gate as to avoid misfortune. We looked at those Lich gates and the garden gates that serve as thresholds between worlds and gardens and church yards kind of a place to pause and a transition between here and another world. But gates didn't just hold meaning in English garden design.

There's also the idea of the moon gate which was mentioned in that TikTok video. It's a circular passage used to create a feeling of stepping into a different world. The belief is that circular openings could transport you both visually, emotionally and even spiritually and it's not just poetic. So it's just something also rooted in Chinese culture also. In classical Chinese architecture moon gates also served as entryways but they were believed to be almost like an energetic conduit.

It was built with the intention to allow Cheshire energy to move in slowly and also making a shift from an outer to an inner space. It was a pedestrian walkway. The shapes of the gate and their tiles also have different meanings. Sloping roofs represent the half moon of the Chinese summers and the tips of the tile of the roof usually have talismans on the ends of them. Moon gates were also incorporated into architecture and Bermuda in the late 19th century.

They did differ from Chinese designs though and were usually just kind of like a free standing half circle. I'm honestly going to have to do probably a full episode on just moon gates because I found the most fascinating information on these moon gates all across different cultures which of course is what I like to cover. Although enough I didn't find a lot about the garden gates. It was more about the lich gates and the moon gates. But again going circling back to Chinese culture here.

While these moon gates were often admire for their beauty and symbolism, their roots stretched very deep into architectural intention. In Chinese homes, especially those built in like the ancient courtyard style. I don't know if you've ever seen this usually depicted like in movies and shows and stuff like that. Not just in Chinese culture but different Asian cultures. They're usually would be a building but it would almost be kind of encompassed in a courtyard style if you could kind of visualize what I'm talking about.

These openings weren't decorative though. This was probably the most true to what we call the eight mansions Feng Shui. This was deliberately placed gateway so it was designed to frame and direct and regulate energy that moved through a space. Just like these moon gates were, these courtyard acted like portals to balance the inner and outer Qi I suppose. It would balance the energy that was received or controlled energy that was received into your space.

I created this sacred container where everything could like the Qi could circulate. The philosophy also is echoed in what is called a Ming Tong theory, which emphasizes the importance of an open protective space in the front of a building. I kind of talk about this too. They call it the internal Ming Tong and external Ming Tong, which is basically your front yard in the open space in front of your house. Whether you live in an apartment or a home, it doesn't really matter.

There will be a space. Even if it's a parking lot that's still considered, it would be considered a Ming Tong. But in the Chinese courtyards, it would be the area where you enter in the courtyard and it would be that courtyard area outside your door. And then of course the door to your home opens up into what is called an internal Ming Tong, which the purpose of both is which to gather Qi or energy to allow to flow into your space. In this way, a doorway, whether it's like a moon gate or a square or palace gate, it becomes more than just an entrance.

It is this cosmic threshold that connects our world into another and it is almost like entering into another dimension. This castle gate is just a classical Feng Shui technique. It's based on the idea that certain gates or directional openings and buildings like doors, windows or even symbolic thresholds can activate specific energies. The term castle gate actually comes from the ancient Chinese military palace for these entryways replaced with extreme precision, not for defense, but to harness the energy for prosperity power and even protection. In a Feng Shui context, it is used to identify directional openings like your front door to align your home with the best energy.

It's often used alongside that Ming Tong theory, which focuses on that open space, but together they can create a formula that activates wealth to support your relationships and even flow. So it's kind of like finding an energy spot, I suppose, where the world meets your personal space and you're able to harness it. You can actually buy a book called the original eight mansions formula to show you exactly what I'm talking about here. It's by a Stephen Skinner who is a very accomplished writer in all things metaphysical. I'm going to try and give you an example here.

So say for example, you're the back of your house is sitting at east, right? It had to be east one. Well, the front, it would be facing west one. Okay. So that means you would want to gate on the south part of your home and the door would have to be on the north part of your home.

And this is what it says if this meets this criteria here, it says a winding snake is good for family paths that tells you where to put the path. It's at a pathway as long with water placed above giving fertility and wealth, both seem prosperous. The winding been reflected from the ten-yee door, which would be the eight mansions formula that means longevity causes wise men to live here. The Yangwood brightness and the Inwood water brightness produces a man who's incomparably noble and what a man knows is kind of excellent interior. Then he who knows this method needs to rapidly change to this position.

So it's basically saying if your house is facing west, you'd have a gate in a door in a specific area, then you have a winding path in a certain area. And it is said to promote fertility, wealth, and a noble man's career advancement also. That's a very kind of lengthy explanation, but that's how that formula works. So it's very specific criteria that you would have to adhere to to tap into these kind of formulas all in this segment by just kind of saying these stories and folklore. There often seems to be these portals and doorways to other realms.

Earlier I mentioned the show over the Garden Wall, where even just hopping over a simple fence could lead to an entirely different world. And the idea is not new. From those English lich gates to the Chinese moon gates, people really long believe that stepping through the right doorway at the right time could change everything. Since these gates and arches are seen as portals, I just no wonder they show up in stories tied to people vanishing. So across cultures also there's these rumors or whispers about people who have walked through gates or maybe just areas that are believed to be interdimensional where they were simply just gone.

Sometimes every turn sometimes they don't. So whether it's a myth folklore or something stranger. These thresholds have long been linked to the unexplainable. So let's go to our folklore Friday segment where we explore some of these places. I'd stepped through two and a half thousand years.

I could see the people sitting there and all the activity. It wasn't a memory. I was there. I stepped through a time portal and I could feel it smell it. We think we're in the real world or the 3D world that we're actually running parallel lives at the same time.

And I've experienced this in kind of dreams at night and dreams during the day, which kind of the same thing just different intensities. That guy brings us to this week's folklore Friday segment. That was audio from Christian Kieryaku. They guessed I had on last month talking about a third gateways. And that was one of his recollections or his encounters about going through one of these gateways and experiencing a different dimension.

As we talked about with Christian in his episode, we just briefly touched on the fact that some people do go missing and perhaps they stumble into one of these third gateways. So we know the gateways aren't always safe. Sometimes they're remembered to be places where people vanish also. The places like the Great Pyramid where explorers and mystics have said there's more than just tombs going on. The idea of these ancient structures being gateways isn't just folklore either.

It's a theme that's made its way into pop culture. For example, the movie Stargate, one of my favorite movies is this mysterious device hidden in ancient pyramid opens up this portal to another world. And it kind of blurs the lines between these ancient myth and the science fiction. But what if the concept wasn't entirely fictional? What if there is some sort of portal or the pyramids are close close to these ancient technologies?

You know, a lot of people believe that the pyramids hold more than just tombs and that they're built as energetic or even literal portals with a bunch of strange stories and even disappearances tied to their chambers of course death and curses are tied to them too. So one account is of Alistair Crowley spending the night in the King's chamber. He believed that it was a portal. And during a ritual he claimed to encounter a spiritual being that gave him a message from beyond. If you don't know who Alistair Crowley is, he was one of the most controversial occult figures of the 20th century.

In 1904 he was an Egypt I believe in as honeymoon he gained access to the King's chamber in the Great Pyramid and he performed a ritual that was meant to open a line of communication to different spiritual beings. I know he described some sort of light that kind of encompassed the pyramid during that that ritual and throughout the night during this he also claimed to receive messages from a entity and he believed that it was connected to an ancient god horse. It also became the foundation of a spiritual philosophy and he claims was given the book of law. So to Crowley these pyramids weren't just a tumor monument. It was this resident chamber kind of this cosmic transmitter that was tuned into these higher frequencies.

And in his writings he really described these pyramids as places that could amplify intention, he could channel messages and even awaken new senses. And he wasn't alone in this belief for centuries. Again, people I felt like the pyramids were designed to do something to align. We know they're aligned with the stars are supposed to magnify sound even carried messages up to heaven that brings us to this moderate account of Christian Karyaku who shared a personal experience from Egypt. So he goes into this meditative state and received what he described as celestial music.

So unlike many visionary experiences that fade this one really stayed with him and he later transcribed what you heard into a musical score. And of course is now weaving that into his film series. So we'll hear from him. It goes back to 1993. I think it was that year or the year before I'd gone to Egypt for the first time and only time this lifetime and it was an extraordinary transformation because it was if people haven't been to Egypt.

For me it was like no other country. I've been to Hawaii, Tibet, China, lots of other European countries. But there's something so different about Egypt. It's like so easy to go into parallel realities, other dimensions, maybe it's just me that you know, I thought that but I think it's very different from any other culture because it was the closest to what we have from Atlantis. When I came back suddenly these musical compositions were coming through and I started to sort of play them on the piano and I ended up with about five or six tracks and my brother who's a composer is that's film music.

You know, tidy up my orchestrations. I'm sure he came along in 1995 for me. Then a few years later I went to a Germancy weekend in East Sussex and I was playing a couple of the tracks on the piano and a couple of the ladies there, real earth women said, what are you playing? I just jokingly said I was something I composed a little earlier, you know, we'd all sort of had a bit to drink and whatever. And they started to tell me the story that what I was playing was the story of this planet that was about to explode from warfare and people had to leave to come to earth.

That's a catalyst for. Brighor book. Yeah, amazing. And then I think around 1999 when I was working in some kind of well I was kind of more and more aware of sacred geometry in the world of fun, Shway and teaching it and sacred sound. Suddenly there was one incident where I was I needed to sort out a house for some reason, a consultation and I was taken to an Egyptian cave temple and there was an Egyptian priest there and to his right there was a door that was shot.

But to his left it was a door that was open huge chamber which showed me how energy was created out of nothing in this building buildings and the sacred geometry and the design of them and the you know the temples and the stupas that they're all energy machines, cathedrals but what he showed me what he gave me because I was asking question what why what do I do with this and he handed me a golden orb. And I said what I do with that silly question to ask an Egyptian priest and he gave me a mantra which of course I've been working with mantras since the and and that mantra opened up this golden orb and all these sacred geometry is for spinning. And of course now look back on them there were light codes geometry of light codes is language language is geometry is like codes and so when we see scripts on sacred buildings they are like codes active so every sacred building especially something like sharp cathedral is got the light codes embedded in its physical structure. You know really at the heart of it these thresholds are more than just doorways and they really are transition point they can open up to you clarity or even chaos so these pyramids are built to amplify energy and even act as a cosmic receiver so maybe the idea of a portal is as far fetched as it seems I don't know I can't speak to that until I have the experience but do I want to have that experiences the questions these experiences aren't always tied to ancient monuments either sometimes they just happen to be really ordinary places. And who views home as a living resume structure described houses as having portals and just act like portals themselves especially when like the geometry or energy becomes aligned in a specific way and you know he is able to do that he says and some people you know without having training or intention to find themselves slipping into one of these portals again as I kind of talked about there's a lot of everyday stories around the world of people who just reported disappearing seeing strains distortions in a familiar place or even in the past.

They're just slipping through a place in a way they couldn't explain even just driving into a place maybe so we're going to look at some of these spots or some of these accounts of people who have vanished or were vanished and maybe they came back these places are suspected to be more than just remote or dangerous but what kind of makes some of these disappearances are at counseling settling is this you're not stepping into one of these known hot spots like if you go to the pyramids you may suspect that hey you know I may have an experience or if you're a very sensitive person who's just a different person who's just a different person. There are some experiences before you know you can kind of see him or feel him like like Christian sometimes these people are port just walking up a staircase turning a corner or even just driving down a stretch of road they've used for a long time and things feeling off color shifting air feeling heavy maybe they start not recognizing things or feeling very fatigued like they had a really long journey you know there are traditions that speak to this too appears a spirit rose which are said to be folkloric fairy pasts invisible lanes used by spirit or something like that. There are otherworldly entities even in Ireland or parts of Britain shaman's and elders avoid building or blocking on these lines are thought to bring illness disappearances or even spiritual interferences they weren't against homes in certain alignment and of course that can tie back to Feng Shui or doorways and sightlines are believed to carry energy disrupt Chi or allow it to flow naturally. Even things you wouldn't think of just like mushroom rings fall or even overgrown path are kind of rumored to be signs of thin places or even thresholds where this world and maybe another might overlap just like we heard in the audio at the beginning there's these parallel worlds that are set around together so and they might open up just long enough for people to slip through so let's look at some of these disappearances. The incident of David Long in 1880 David Long a farmer in Tennessee vamant vanished in front of his family and friends were walking across a field witnesses reported seeing him suddenly disappear leaving no trace behind I think these are almost a little bit craper it says here I would put these links in the show notes on a clear sunny day David Lings was crossing the field of his farm when he suddenly disappeared or an eyewitnesses he was walking normally and seemed to be swallowed by the ground there was no sound no sound.

There was no trace behind the explosion nothing indicating what happened he just simply vanish leaving no trace behind of course they tried to examine the field they even use dogs to search and it's just as if he evaporated with no trace very to me I think that's almost more disturbing as news of David Lings disappearance spread there he's began to emerge and then attempt to explain what happened some people thought he may have fallen to a well or pit. He's ever found other suggests he may have been abducted by aliens or maybe fallen into another dimension here in the modern theories it says as science advanced new theories emerged to explain David Lings disappearance some scientists suggest that the field may have been a site of rare phenomena such as a wormhole or a time portal others play that David Lings may have been involved in accident related to electromagnetic energy or even a secret government experiment which I mean it's you know Lings in far fetch but maybe not so much right a Papua New Guinea a portal encounter so in the 1980s this is you know 100 years later still happening a woman of Papua New Guinea turned over a stone on a reef and saw a modern town with people she recognized as deceased relatives upon calling her friend to witness the portal vanished and the stone suddenly appeared ordinary again and that was when they read it missing 4-1-1 that has so many accounts guys is pretty creepy some other examples I think it's even one of the things that fascinates me most I love paranormal accounts but I love the stranger ones where people just go missing or they slip into another dimension and these are people that have claimed to go to a different dimension and be able to return one of the most fascinating cases I've ever heard I had to find this for the for the podcast here but the white cement road and the egg shaped vehicles for college students so it wasn't just like one person but it was four girls in 1972 claim they turn into unfamiliar road in Utah which led them to a bizarre road house with futuristic vehicles and unrecognizable being the road eventually dead ended off of a cliff and they managed to flee but nothing on maps ever confirmed the area existed and I think this is one of the creepier ones they slipped into almost as futuristic dimension again they were almost like alien type figures their faces didn't look human I think that's pretty unsettling because I don't I mean they were terrified terrified I know in the account it took them quite a bit longer to get home they were on an unfamiliar road but they said they kind of just stumbled back into the dimension and everything just kind of turned normal again but they were actually chased by these beings in these strange vehicles so I thought that was that was the most unsettling one I've ever heard I'm civil driving drivers report ordinary grounds transforming into weird empty roads distorted sounds emotional drivers or stop traffic that snaps into motion all at once so one person described feeling a TV static and their bones were passing through one of these areas I found this one I read it which I think was pretty interesting he says unsure if this was relevant or if it counts but when I was eight or nine years old I lived in a two story house with my dad after my parents divorced way of living almost my entire life so it wasn't anything new I had a dream one night that I vividly remember and it never happened again I was walking up the stairs where my room was I got to the top of the stairs and I felt incredibly fatigued except that doesn't do the feeling justice I never felt so physically drained or experienced such a state of confusion I took a few steps down the hall towards my bedroom and notice what I described my entire life as a portal in the doorway literally as you'd imagine it resembled ripples and water after a rock was dropped in and that's where my memory stops but the mental pictures still there and I never experienced anything like it since and so while that was a dream again I'm kind of the audio we heard Christian he talks about these almost dreams where he's awake or he's dream very sleeping and he has these encounters so what's to say that sleep also isn't a doorway to one of these portals right I think it's interesting also when people go to places that didn't you know they don't exist or maybe they found out later on the place used to be there sometimes self visit places and it's not there but in the future they see that place being built which I think that's pretty interesting to British couples traveling through France in 1979 found a charming old fashion in with a gas light style furnishings and it was kind of like these they were in these 1900s like uniforms and they kind of thought it was just charming they just thought it was like a themed hotel I suppose but the hotel vanished the next day and the photos wouldn't develop and no such in had ever been registered in that area that would be so we were especially be safe the night there it's crazy empty tanks of gas sometimes just missing time a couple driving 45 minutes on a route lost over two hours of time with no memory of detours their gas tank drain have normally fast the radio stop working they recall a deep feeling of disorientation and silence as if they were driving in a suspended space which I think again some of these to me they're just almost a little bit unsettling I listened to a lot of different paranormal type podcasts so I recall one on a podcast where you can relate your own experiences the called campfire with Jim Harrell a gentleman said that he was going to the movies a lot he said he walked in he bought a ticket to the movies bought his popcorn and walked into the theater and when he walked into the theater the movie was at the end but he was thinking oh okay maybe I just caught the tail of the movie maybe I'm too early but no he literally lost like an hour and a half of time it was later he didn't realize till he looked at his watch that he seemingly just lost time going through that doorway from the possession stand into the movie theater and again it just kind of shows us that these accounts you know these ancient monuments right they may have served as doorways to other rooms or these invisible portals but it just goes to show us though but you know we look at these power these pyramids these stones you know the ancient stones where people have sent a disappear through a monolith stone hinge you know they're aligned and they're supposed to be these gateways to other realms but really maybe there's these invisible portals hidden in the little nooks and crannies of our life the idea of slipping between dimensions isn't so foreign to us right it's also fascinated us for centuries you know whether it's this child's ripple in the bedroom or a stretch of unfamiliar highway that's transformed or even just a mushroom ring these starchholes can challenge our understanding of reality and you know maybe these portals are all around us some obvious maybe subtle waiting for the right moment or just the right person to step through it and you know the science isn't there but the stories continue you know they remind us that the world we walk through might be more mysterious than we ever imagined guys will help you enjoy looking at these gateways and fun sway from these castle gate methods to moon doors garden gates and even traditional courtyard layouts and how they really can shape the energy of a space and of course that for a floor Friday segment gets to blend all the weird stuff that I like and explore these ideas of everything important as well as that bonus audio from the Christian karaoke thanks for listening to today's episode I have further been exploring some recording software so if the audio is a little bit off today this is because this is the episode I practiced with and so I feel like in some spots maybe the recording came through differently but I hope the audio level will all be leveled out and some of the issue I had with my other software should be fixed using this software all right guys I know you don't really you don't probably care too much about behind the scenes but just a little explanation there all right I'll catch you guys next week and we'll be talking about healing waters and func sway