Qi Sha in the Life Palace: What the Marshal Star Says About You

Qi Sha is the marshal star. People with Qi Sha in the Life Palace are independent, driven, willing to fight and to change, dislike being managed, and do best leading their own team. They are decisive and fast, and do not back down from difficulty; setbacks only make them tougher.

The Qi Sha personality

Qi Sha, Po Jun and Tan Lang always sit in each other’s trine positions; this Sha-Po-Lang group is shorthand for change and pioneering. With Qi Sha in the Life Palace, the Wealth and Career palaces always hold Tan Lang and Po Jun, so life, money and career all carry a charge-and-change quality, and rarely stay smooth all the way.

• Career: Entrepreneurship, the military and police, sales, engineering, sport, surgery, highly competitive industries and work that means leading the charge.
• Money: Earns boldly and takes risks, so income swings; pairs well with conservative money management to balance the risk.
• Love: Direct and passionate in love, and very independent; dislikes being tied down and needs each partner to keep their own space.

Bright and fallen: where Qi Sha is strongest

Qi Sha has more bright positions than any other major star, and in most of them it is bold and gets things done. Qi Sha has no fallen position. In its neutral position it shares a palace with Zi Wei, and its drive is absorbed into Zi Wei’s authority. By the brightness table of the Complete Book used on this site: Exalted: Chou, Yin, Chen, Wei, Shen, Xu; Strong: Zi, Mao, Wu, You; Neutral: Si, Hai.

The table shows, for each of the twelve branches where Qi Sha can sit in the Life Palace, its brightness, the major stars sharing the palace, and the major stars of the opposite, Wealth and Career palaces. These positions are fixed by the placement rules: once Qi Sha is placed, every other major star follows, so Qi Sha in a given branch always has the same palace group.

“Empty” means that palace has no major star; in a reading you borrow the major stars from its opposite palace and pay extra attention to the minor stars and transformations inside it.

The six combinations of Qi Sha in the Life Palace

The twelve branches clash in opposite pairs, and each pair holds the same major stars, so Qi Sha in the Life Palace comes in only six combinations. The two branches of a pair differ in brightness and in how things look from the Travel Palace.

Qi Sha alone, facing Wu Qu and Tian Fu (Zi or Wu)

Zi: Qi Sha strong; Wu: Qi Sha strong. Opposite: Wu Qu and Tian Fu; Wealth: Tan Lang; Career: Po Jun. About 17.2% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

Qi Sha strong in Zi or Wu, with Wu Qu and Tian Fu opposite: fierce on the outside, with wealth stars behind it. Suited to entrepreneurship, sales and front-line work. The Wealth Palace holds Tan Lang and the Career Palace Po Jun, the classic Sha-Po-Lang pattern: a life with plenty of change and plenty of opportunity.

Lian Zhen with Qi Sha (Chou or Wei)

Chou: Qi Sha exalted, Lian Zhen fair; Wei: Qi Sha exalted, Lian Zhen fair. Opposite: Tian Fu; Wealth: Zi Wei and Tan Lang; Career: Wu Qu and Po Jun. About 16.6% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

The restraint star with the marshal star: strong drive, willing to work hard, and a fiery character. This pair sits in Chou and Wei with Qi Sha exalted, and the classics say “Lian Zhen and Qi Sha in Chou or Wei are people who accumulate wealth”, building it through hard work; with Sha stars, beware of impulsiveness and rash moves, and the classics are quite severe about this pair meeting Qing Yang and Tuo Luo. Further reading: Lian Zhen in the Life Palace.

Qi Sha alone, facing Zi Wei and Tian Fu (Yin or Shen)

Yin: Qi Sha exalted; Shen: Qi Sha exalted. Opposite: Zi Wei and Tian Fu; Wealth: Tan Lang; Career: Po Jun. About 18.3% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

Qi Sha exalted in Yin or Shen, with Zi Wei and Tian Fu opposite; the classics call it “Qi Sha facing the Dipper” (some books call Qi Sha in Zi or Wu “looking up to the Dipper”), the most admired Qi Sha arrangement: a leader able to stand alone. The lesson is being too hard and refusing to bend; life usually brings a few big rises and falls before it settles.

Wu Qu with Qi Sha (Mao or You)

Mao: Qi Sha strong, Wu Qu fair; You: Qi Sha strong, Wu Qu fair. Opposite: Tian Fu; Wealth: Lian Zhen and Tan Lang; Career: Zi Wei and Po Jun. About 16.9% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

The wealth star with the marshal star: tremendous drive and decisiveness, willing to take risks, suited to the military and police, engineering and fiercely competitive industries. The classics say “Wu Qu and Qi Sha in Mao or You are robbed because of money”, a warning that this pair earns in a hard-charging way and can lose out through money or impulsiveness; with Sha stars, risk control matters especially. Further reading: Wu Qu in the Life Palace.

Qi Sha alone, facing Lian Zhen and Tian Fu (Chen or Xu)

Chen: Qi Sha exalted; Xu: Qi Sha exalted. Opposite: Lian Zhen and Tian Fu; Wealth: Tan Lang; Career: Po Jun. About 15.0% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

Qi Sha exalted in Chen or Xu, with Lian Zhen and Tian Fu opposite: drive mixed with shrewdness and finesse, suited to work that combines management and pioneering. Chen and Xu are the “net of heaven and earth”, so the early stage of development often feels constrained; once through it, these people usually take real control.

Zi Wei with Qi Sha (Si or Hai)

Si: Qi Sha neutral, Zi Wei strong; Hai: Qi Sha neutral, Zi Wei strong. Opposite: Tian Fu; Wealth: Wu Qu and Tan Lang; Career: Lian Zhen and Po Jun. About 16.0% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace fall into this group.

The emperor star with the marshal star; the classics say “Zi Wei turns Qi Sha into authority”: Qi Sha’s drive is taken into Zi Wei’s service and becomes forceful leadership. Strong-willed and action-oriented, not afraid of difficulty, suited to lead-the-troops kinds of work. The downside is being domineering and impatient, which can feel oppressive to others. Further reading: Zi Wei in the Life Palace.

Birth-year transformations in the Life Palace

In the ten-stem table of the Complete Book, Qi Sha takes no transformation, so people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace never have a birth-year Hua Lu, Hua Quan, Hua Ke or Hua Ji on that star itself. The transformations come in through other major stars sharing the palace, minor stars such as Wen Chang, Wen Qu, Zuo Fu and You Bi, and the stars of the palace group. In other words, a Qi Sha Life Palace is moved less by the birth-year transformations, and the base colour of the personality comes mainly from Qi Sha itself and the stars beside it.

Men’s and women’s charts

Men: The classics say a man with Qi Sha is “hard-natured and suited to military posts”. A modern reading: he suits pioneering, competitive work that needs decisiveness; in love he is forceful and direct and needs to learn to slow down.

Women: The classics say a woman with Qi Sha is “hard-natured and should not marry young”, an old, conservative view of strong women. A modern reading: she is independent, decisive and career-minded, suited to entrepreneurship and management; in love she needs a partner who fights alongside her rather than trying to hold her back.

The classics were written in a traditional society, and their comments on men’s and women’s charts often carry the gender expectations of their time. We give the classical sayings alongside a modern reading, but we read charts for tendencies of character and never rank people by gender.

With auspicious stars, with Sha stars

With auspicious stars: Facing Zi Wei and Tian Fu, the classics call it “Qi Sha facing the Dipper”, the most admired Qi Sha arrangement; with Lu Cun or Hua Lu, drive turns into concrete results.

With Sha stars: With Qing Yang, Tuo Luo, Huo Xing or Ling Xing, drive can become recklessness, and the classics are severe; give yourself a cooling-off period before big decisions.

In our sample, about 42.4% of people with Qi Sha in the Life Palace have at least one of the six Sha stars there, about the same as the 41.8% for all charts. Sha stars are normal; what matters is which star they sit with and how bright it is. See the six auspicious and six Sha stars.

What the data says

How we counted: this site’s engine cast one Zi Wei chart for every day from 1960 to 2005 (birth hour drawn by a fixed-seed random sample), 16,802 charts in all. These figures describe how chart structures are distributed; they say nothing about whether anyone’s destiny is good or bad.

Other major stars in the Life Palace