Useful God

용신 · 用神

The element your chart most needs — the lever a reader recommends pulling.

Once strength is judged, one element usually emerges as the thing that would most improve the chart's balance. That element is the useful god.

It is the basis of most practical Saju advice: favourable colours, directions, careers and years all follow from it. It is also the most contested judgement in the system — competent readers disagree about it regularly, which is worth knowing before you treat any single answer as final.