5 Elements - TCM Week

Starting off with the 5 Elements or Wu Xing, Traditional Chinese Medicine believes heavily on the energies or qi which flows through both them and us. Also known as the 5 phases, it is only when you have a healthy blend of all five elements that your person is fully healthy. All these elements are constantly moving and adjusting, and a form of pathology and physiology. With each element they also represent specific organs, emotions, flavours, senses, and even weather! The elements consist of water, fire, wood, metal, and last but not least earth.

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Earth: Earth is embodied through your spleen, stomach, muscles and mouth while visually yellow. With a damp weather it is sweet flavoured and can be found in ingredients such as carrots as it can influence your growth. It is a rather pensive emotion while promoting metal, being promoted by fire controlling water and being controlled by fire.

Metal: Your bodies organs that are part of this element include lungs, nose and your skin. This element is displayed as white and is unfortunately emotionally balanced as sadness. Like our most recent ingredient, aged mandarin peels, it is pungent, and dry. Metal promotes water, and promoted by earth while controlling wood and being controlled by fire.

Wood: Wood controls earth, and is controlled by metal while being promoted through water and promoting fire. Being linked to your live, gallbladder, tendons and eyes; it holds a green colour. Surprisingly it is angry in emotion while being sour and representing wind with foods such as wasabi.

Fire: Representing the colour red, it symbolizes your bodies heart, tongue and pulse. Expressed through joy, you actually garner this through bitter foods such as bitter gourd. As expected fire is representative of heat, while enhancing earth, enhanced by fire, controlling metal and being controlled by water.

Water: With a black colour and a fearful emotion; this element is salty and are in foods such as wood-ear mushrooms. It is cold natured and embodied in your kidneys, ears and bones as well. They are promoted through metal, promote wood, controlling of fire, and controlled by earth.

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The belief is that when one of these elements becomes imbalanced or if they are not working in harmony, you become sick. This could be an element being too active or not active enough, or just not enough energy in general! Results can be seen through blood pressure, skin, and more tests that you would normally go through in a Western styled examination. Not only that but most treatments are through changes of diets and other therapies rather than medicine.

As a non-static, dynamic entity, it is one of natures fundamental properties in motion. You can think of it as two constantly adjusting sides as we said with too much activity or too little. This can be like a mother and child, too quick or too strong, too fast or too slow as you need to balance the support and generation. Everything is connected as the physics quote goes "for every action there is a reaction". This is particularly true to this as everything can be affected by one and another, such as your kidney being affected if your liver has issues. The five elements are so important in this lifestyle and to find out more about your own personal elemental balances, visit a Traditional Chinese Medicine practicer!