The Secret of the Single Pillar and the Deer Painting

That afternoon, sunlight slanted through the window, casting light across the glossy tiled floor of a newly built villa. The air inside was heavy and still, weighed down by the presence of a strange guest — an aged feng shui master with a flowing white beard and eyes as deep as ancient wells. The owner of the house, a successful middle-aged man, sat across from him, holding a cup of hot tea while his heart churned restlessly, waiting for the master's verdict.

The old master did not rush to ask about birth dates or family circumstances. He simply rose quietly and walked slowly through every room. As he passed the living room, his gaze stopped on a large oil painting hanging on the wall. It depicted a herd of deer drinking from a clear stream. The master frowned, pointed a trembling finger at the painting, and turned to the owner of the house, his voice deep and grave:

"This painting... it cost you a great deal, didn't it?"

The owner nodded with pride. "Yes, master. It is the work of a famous artist. I spent a great deal of money to own it."

The master sighed and shook his head gently, yet with certainty. "Change it. Do not hang it anymore. It does not suit the harmony of your family."

The owner was bewildered, unable to understand why a beautiful, sophisticated work of art could be criticized so. But the master offered no explanation and continued observing the structure of the house. When he reached the central area, he stopped before a single pillar supporting the beam above. Usually an architect would design two symmetrical pillars to balance the forces and the aesthetics, but here there was only one pillar, leaning off to one side.

"This pillar..." the master murmured, his eyes fixed on the vast empty space remaining in the ceiling. "The architect did this correctly in terms of load-bearing technique, but spiritually, it signals misfortune."

The owner asked curiously, "Master, what do you mean?"

The master turned back, his cold, piercing gaze reaching into the listener's heart. "Your house has wealth, your children are well-behaved, but you and your wife... will have difficulty walking together to the end of life. There is only one pillar, which means the family lacks balance, lacks a second steady support."

Those words echoed in the owner's mind for many years afterward. At first, he laughed them off as superstition. Life flowed on peacefully, his career flourished, his children excelled in their studies. Until one fateful day, when a sudden accident took the life of his wife. At the funeral, as people were tidying up the belongings, he suddenly remembered the prophecy of years past. He looked at the painting of the deer: the stag stood on one side of the stream, while the doe and the young fawns stood on the other, separated by the rushing water. That image, together with the solitary pillar in the house, had in fact been clear omens from long ago, waiting only for their moment to come true.

This story testifies to the power of intuition — the ability to read information from the tiniest, most meager details that ordinary reason easily overlooks or explains away. A person with keen intuition does not need piles of statistical data. They need only look at the "form" of things and feel the "energy" of a space, and they can see an entire future hidden within.

The Meaning of the Story

Intuition is a special form of knowledge. It does not rely on logical deduction or the gathering of much data, but arises from the stillness of the inner self, reflecting the true nature of things. Through the image of the single pillar and the deer painting, we see that all things carry invisible messages within them. If our mind is pure and sensitive enough, we can "read" these omens to prepare for life, rather than merely chasing after surface judgments. Yet the deeper lesson lies in the connection between the physical and spiritual worlds. What we see with our ordinary eyes may not be everything, and sometimes, a painful truth has already been foretold through details that seem harmless.

Compiled from a dharma talk by Venerable Thích Chân Quang