Overcoming obstacles
When hardship, obstacle or defeat make us small it can feel like the very winter of things. This is a Water Element message of optimism without judgment, and the silver lining we have yet to see. On the pathway of the seasons and the Taoist way we discover; it is all good.
Introducing the Water Element
Of all the Five Elements water is the hardest to truly know. Ruling the channels of the Kidney and Bladder housed in the back of the body, Water has a depth and an intangibility to it. Something that cannot ever be fully known or explored, held in your hands, or still long enough to understand.
The Seasonal Journey
If you think about the Five Element Theory like a rich unfolding spiral, a ladder to the stars, a celestial helix of evolutionary layers, it suddenly takes on a richer dimension. It is oversimplified to think we run on a single-dimensional wheel as we move between Summer and Winter, when in fact we are walking the spiralling arms of a labyrinth, stepping up, up, and up through our life experiences on our own uniquely evolving path.
The Metal Element & the Eclipse Cycle.
The status quo of our lives, shaken from the inside out feels the thunderous shift on the horizon as Autumn's quest for purity rings throughout the valley of the eclipse portal asking us to reflect on how we got here, and where we will go next.
Harvest in the Phase of Metal
Life among the summarizing, distilling, and purifying currents of Autumn is here and calling us to account. A series of seasonal and cosmological events await us in the coming months, as well as the joy of turning up to your practice knowing you are spinning it into Gold. Such is the Element of Metal.
Light on the Metal Element
The Metal Element calls us to account. It represents a maturing of our energy and our evolutionary process within that. It is Self-directed, internal, hard to grasp, and takes no shit.
Grab your sword. Autumn is here.
Harvest
Earth teaches us to see how far we have come and all that we have grown and gained. To recognize the feeling of completion, and to know what its like to experience contentment, satisfaction and gratitude is to align with Earth.
FIRE up your New Year
All the elements guide us physically and emotionally towards balance - it's their life's work. Nudging us back onto the path when we have strayed, lighting the way when we are lost, and helping us navigate the middle way. Summers heat and FIRES wisdom takes us over the threshold of the new year (Chinese New Year is January 22nd this year) firing our hopes and dreams for the coming cycle in its forge. While I'm not one for the traditional New Year's resolution list, the Fire element does offer a powerful reminder that we are not here just to pay bills…..
The ‘Way’ is easy
We often hear talk of the Law of Attraction among modern Self Help gurus and changemakers, however its not a new idea. The ancient Taoists were well and truly onto the concept that thoughts turn to things, and as such urged purity of thought and mind “in here” so that what we created “out there” matched the frequency of goodness in all ways.
They called this nourishment, and its discovery speaks the volume of who we are.
Sun, Rain and Wood.
As Spring gains momentum around us we are moving as rising Yang. From the belly of the family hearth of winter, outwards like the wind, to the very edges of the world this blog looks at growth and evolution through the lens of the Wood Element.
Late Winter Light
“Do not make plans. Do not be absorbed by activities. Do not think that you know. Be aware of all that is, and dwell in the infinite. Wander where there is no path. Be empty, that is all.”
- I Ching