Where Is the Two Black Star in Your Home This Year — and How Do You Neutralize It?

Find the Direction First — Get the Location Right

Every year around the Lunar New Year, many people pull out the annual flying star chart and look for one thing first: where the Two Black star has landed. This habit makes sense, because the Two Black Bing Fu (illness) star is an annual flying star — it does not sit fixed in one corner. In 2024 (the Jia Chen year), the Two Black flew to due West; in 2025 (the Yi Si year), it moves to the Northeast. The position shifts with every new year, so working from last year's chart means all your effort goes to waste.

Locating it is straightforward: stand at the center of your home, use a compass or your phone's Luo Pan (Feng Shui Compass) app to confirm the eight cardinal and intercardinal directions, then cross-reference the year's nine-palace flying star chart and find the palace where the number "2" falls. That palace corresponds to the actual direction where the Two Black resides for that year. A lot of people skip this step and just act on something they read online — "the West has a harmful star this year" — without confirming the precise bearing. Even a ten- or twenty-degree error can undermine the whole layout.

One more point that often gets overlooked: beyond the annual Two Black, your home's own natal chart (based on its facing direction and construction period) may already contain a mountain star or facing star with the number 2 in a relatively fixed position. Where the two overlap, traditional practice considers extra attention warranted.

Why the Two Black Is Called the "Illness Star"

Among the nine stars, the Two Black belongs to Earth within the Five Elements (Wu Xing). Its elemental imagery encompasses the stomach and spleen, the abdominal region, and a heavy, stagnant quality of energy. Classical metaphysical texts have consistently cast it in a negative light: it governs lingering illness and physical depletion. A common saying holds that spending long hours sitting or sleeping in the Two Black sector invites unexplained fatigue and digestive trouble.

Whether this can be verified by modern medicine is a separate question. From a Feng Shui practice standpoint, the concern arises when the Two Black happens to land in a bedroom, a study where someone works long hours, or any space regularly occupied by a family member with a weaker constitution. If it falls in a kitchen, bathroom, or storage room — places people do not linger — the effect is considered much smaller, and sometimes no specific remedy is needed at all.

Common Remedies, Each Explained Clearly

Metal objects are the most widely used cure. Metal controls Earth in the Five Elements (Wu Xing), so metal items are thought to suppress the Two Black's Earth nature. Common choices include a string of six Emperor coins (ideally coins from the six emperors of the Qing dynasty), a copper Wu Lou (gourd), or a set of six-rod metal wind chimes. The gourd is placed with its mouth facing downward, drawing on the image of the gourd absorbing harmful energy; the six-rod chimes correspond to the Six White metal star, which is considered to neutralize and transform the Two Black.

These items are easy to find in stores or online, with wide price variation. My own view: solid copper is more traditionally accepted than copper-plated or alloy pieces, but there is no reason to spend a lot on versions marketed as "consecrated" or "blessed" at a premium — whether or not an object has been consecrated is a separate matter from its intrinsic elemental properties.

Plants are more contested. Some practitioners place Lucky Bamboo or other evergreen plants in the Two Black sector, invoking Wood controlling Earth in the cycle of the Five Elements (Wu Xing), while also arguing that living plants introduce vitality to counter stagnant illness energy. The logic holds up in elemental terms, but one premise is frequently ignored: the plant must stay healthy. A wilting or yellowing plant placed at an afflicted star position is broadly considered in practice to compound problems rather than solve them. If you do not have time to tend to houseplants, this approach is not well suited to you.

Adjusting how you use the space is often more effective than any object — and is also the step most commonly skipped. If the Two Black falls in your bedroom, traditional guidance is to avoid pointing your headboard toward that sector, and to keep anyone in the household with a delicate constitution from using that room for extended rest. If a room reassignment is possible, do it; if not, at minimum keep the area well-ventilated and free of clutter. A disorderly, stagnant environment is thought to amplify the effect of an afflicted star, and this kind of spatial adjustment goes deeper than placing an ornament.

Sound cures appear in certain schools as well. Hanging metal wind chimes in the Two Black sector to continuously "transform" the Earth energy through metal sound is one approach. If you try it, note that tradition favors metal-tube chimes — six tubes being the preferred count — while ceramic or bamboo alternatives are considered considerably less effective.

When Remedies Have Limited Effect

If the Two Black falls directly on the main entrance, the stove, or the entrance to the master bedroom, neutralizing it becomes significantly harder. The front door opens and closes constantly, generating airflow that a handful of coins struggles to redirect at the macro level; the stove carries its own Fire energy, and the Five Elements (Wu Xing) relationships become more complex, with objects easily disrupted by cooking heat and grease. Placing remedies at these locations calls for a reading of the home's full natal chart and all the other annual stars together — targeting the Two Black in isolation is not the right approach.

Another situation that often goes unaddressed: people whose personal life palace clashes with the Two Black may find that external cures alone offer limited protection. Traditional metaphysics holds that these individuals are more susceptible to the star's influence wherever they spend time. The recommendation in such cases is to attend to daily rhythms and lifestyle habits at the same time — rest, diet, and routine — rather than relying entirely on a few ornaments.

Some popular "Two Black cures" circulating online also deserve scrutiny: placing specific talismans in the sector, or setting out crystal balls of a particular color, for instance. These practices have no clear basis in classical Xuan Kong Flying Star texts and belong to later folk derivations. Believe them or not as you see fit, but there is no need to spend money on them.

Strictly speaking, the influence of annual flying stars is dynamic — it shifts every year. Remedies should be reviewed and adjusted annually rather than set once and forgotten.