This article is part of a series that looks at some seasonal themes in classical Chinese medicine. In particular, we are looking at the season’s associations with the five phase elements and how those can help us understand and take care of our bodies. You can read about spring, late summer, fall and winter. Read below to learn about SUMMER!
It is July 2021 as I write this, and my world is reopening from the long COVID lockdowns. Hooray! The world is reopening! I can see old friends and make new ones! I can see others’ smiling faces at the store and on the street! And yet, oh no! The world is reopening! Is it safe? What about my still vulnerable patients, friends and family members? How do I even socialize with people anyway? I’ve forgotten how to do this.
A friend of mine, Elaina, described our current situation as being like how she felt when she came back from a long period of study in China.
She was prepared for the culture shock of going to China. But she was unprepared for the reverse culture shock of coming back, of being expected to fit back into her old ways of doing things and relating to people when she had been someplace so different for so long. This is where we all are right now.
We have had to live life in an entirely different manner for over a year. How do we go back to the old way of doing things? Should we even go back to the old way?
These are central questions of the Chinese Fire phase element, the element of early to mid-Summer, and right on time, we are all having to deal with these questions. The fire element is all about love, connections, and boundaries.
How do we share or withhold warmth from and with each other and the world?
A healthy fire catches and keeps burning, but doesn’t go out of control like the forest fires we’ve had in the past few years. In people the fire element shows up similarly. Without enough fire we can have withdrawal, lack of connection, lack of laughter, coldness.
With too much fire we can have insomnia, mania, anxiety and lack of stability of our emotions. With a healthy amount of fire, we have an open connecting heart with good boundaries.
Connection and the Rose
The Rose is a symbol of the heart in many cultures, and it is a wonderful example of the fire element, which is why I added it to my fire illustration above. Flowers are beautiful, showing the world something spectacular, in the case of the rose, sending out an intoxicating aroma. They say, “Come here bees! Look at me! Smell me! Fertilize me! Like a fire they change quickly, here for a short time and then gone.
Many people can get that way as well during summer. It’s a time where a lot of us want to have fun, to play, show more skin, get outside and do things. We know it doesn’t last, so we want to make the most of the summer. For me, I knew summer was really here when a few weeks ago I was out at the beach, waiting for sunset with a bunch of new friends, laughing and dancing to music around a little fire.
There are four Chinese medicine organ systems in the body that belong to the fire phase element. The Heart, the Pericardium, the Small Intestine and the Triple Burner. I’ll now explain each of these and finish up by suggesting how you can cultivate a healthy fire phase element in your own life.
The Heart
The first of these is the Heart: in Chinese thought, the heart is the emperor or empress, the ruler of the body. But the work of the ruler is not to worry about every little thing in the body and mind. The ruler has people for that (in our bodies that’s the other organ networks). The ruler’s job is to remain open and connected to spirit, to contain and hold joy, to keep time and rhythm, steadily providing an even heartbeat.
A bowl or vessel can be a symbol of the heart, which is why the fire in the illustration nearby springs up from a bowl. In ideal circumstances, the healthy heart is like an empty bowl. It’s not so filled up with stressors or worries or obsessions that it’s not able to feel love and calmness.
Keeping the bowl open and empty so that we can invite in greater love and higher connection is what makes a healthy heart.
The Heart and the Shen 神 Birds
Shen 神 is a Chinese word for spirit, and it has been likened to sweetly singing birds that nest in that open bowl space of the heart. To nurture the birds of the spirit, the heart bowl needs to be a calm, inviting space. However there are things in this world, severe stressors, shocks and traumas, that can cause those birds to fly from their nest. When that happens we don’t feel like ourselves. We may feel disassociated or numb, we may have a hard time speaking, we may be out of control or fearful and not know why. In these cases it can take time to coax those birds of the spirit back into the heart, to make their nest a safe place again.
The work of healing trauma is long and complex, involving body, emotions, mind and spirit.
The Heart Protector, or Pericardium
Because of how important a healthy and peaceful heart is, there are three other fire meridians that help to protect its peace. Surrounding the heart physically is the pericardium. The animal that corresponds to the Pericardium or Heart Protector meridian is the dog. The image of the dog in the fire illustration is a painting of one of my favorite doggos, Jethro.
Jethro embodies all of the aspects of the Heart Protector. A pit bull-mastiff mix, he is big, muscular and can appear dangerous. When a strange person or other animal approaches he has a loud fearsome bark to scare them away. However in truth he is a gentle giant, a snuggle bug who wants to crawl in your lap, or press his head into your hands so that you will scratch it for hours straight.
The healthy Heart Protector is like this, maintaining emotional boundaries so that those who are unsafe for us are kept out, and those who are safe are welcomed in.
The Small Intestine
The Small Intestine is another fire organ network. It helps us decide what is important and what isn’t. With food this translates into deciding what to absorb. With emotions and thoughts, this means that it acts almost like a secretary to the Empress or Emperor the Heart, deciding what thoughts or emotions are important enough to go to the head of the kingdom, and what would just cause needless stress and can go in the recycling basket.
The Triple Burner
The Triple Burner is somewhat complicated in its physical functions. It regulates fluid metabolism and other aspects of physiology. With respect to the Heart, its mental-emotional role is to regulate the boundaries between our Heart and groups of people and our wider social role, much like the Heart Protector does in more intimate one-to-one relationships. The social-emotional aspect of the Triple Burner helps us to navigate at work, in the grocery store, and talking or performing in front of groups. It helps us know when it’s safe to let our fire shine and when we need to hold back to protect our heart.
Keeping Your Fire Element Healthy
Now for some recommendations you can try to keep your fire phase element healthy, whatever the season.
1. Nourish Fire with Connections
Connect with friends, family. pets and others who see and appreciate your inner fire, your inner you, and who care for you just as you are. If they are nearby and you can see them in person, great! If not, call, text, email or send them a video message. Connections don’t just need to be with people you know! Books, movies, podcasts can connect you to so many others through time and place. Read or watch or listen to stories or ideas that open your heart and mind.
2. Laugh!
Laughter is the sound of the fire element. What makes you laugh? Is it funny movies or books or comics? Is it your dog or your cat or your kids or grandkids? Find something that makes you laugh every day.
3. Cultivate a sense of awe
Studies have shown that experiencing the sense of awe at least once a day helps your sense of well being, helps you make better decisions, and leads to greater life satisfaction. Awe is that feeling that comes from seeing or experiencing or learning something that expands our way of seeing the world and gives us a sense of something bigger than ourselves. On the North Coast we are rich in awe inspiring experiences. Most of the time we just have to look out the window to see the Columbia River, the forests, or the Pacific Ocean. Awe inspiring beauty is all around us.
4. Try this Heart meditation
I learned this simple meditation from my teacher Lorie Dechar, who learned it from the Heart Math Institute:
- Focus on your heart – imagine the space in your chest where your heart sits. You can put a hand over your heart to help.
- Breathe into your heart – take six or seven breaths, imagining that your breath is going into the space in your heart.
- Feel into your heart – imagine a place or person or animal that brings you a positive feeling, and keep breathing into your heart as you imagine bringing the positive image and feeling into your heart space.
5. Use “Rescue Remedy”
This blend of five Bach flower essences is readily available in stores or at the clinic and is something I recommend often to folks who are experiencing great stress, or those who have had a shock or trauma that is keeping their heart from feeling calm and relaxed, or has caused those Shen birds to have flown from the nest altogether, leaving them feeling as if they aren’t connected to their body.
Four drops or one tablet, four times per day can be very helpful at easing some of that stress. Finding a good counselor is essential as well and an important part of healing the heart and mind. You don’t have to go it alone.
6. Get Acupuncture!
Acupuncture is a wonderful way to support your fire element, calm stress and anxiety, and help with the healing of heart and mind. I am taking new acupuncture patients at Watershed Wellness, and would be very happy to meet you.
Thanks for reading! Now go out and laugh, feel awe, connect, and enjoy the summer, the season of the Fire element!