The Five Elements and it’s Gems of Wisdom

Hugh Lee

Allow me take you on a short journey of what I have learnt from studying Classical Chinese Medicine - which blends ancient wisdom/philosophy from Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism. I have been taking the lessons from the 5 elements and integrated them into my life. Each element has a gem of wisdom for each of us to be inspired by and to incorporate into our lives, in order to live with more inner peace, contentment, liberation and fulfillment.

Water Element

Water relates to the season of winter, a time to withdraw inwards, the most Yin time of the year by doing less and resting more, slowing down, the lesson of the water element teaches us the concept of Wu Wei – effortless effort of non-striving. The practice of not forcing, pushing or striving, but taking the path of least resistance in life.

The lesson of slowing down and non-striving I have applied all through-out the year not just Winter. Slowing down when I feel I have over-committed myself with too many projects. Pulling back, doing less without feeling guilty has been a constant practice. We are conditioned as a culture to always strive and be forcing/pushing ourselves to exhaustion, as we always want to seek external validation, our egos become inflated but our bodies and minds burn out in the end.

How do I incorporate the wisdom of the water element into my life?

By living close to the water, I live in the coastal ocean town of Torquay, Victoria Australia. I see how water behaves, water flows in a way that finds the path of least resistance, when I surf in the ocean, I move my body with effort but not in an excessively forceful way, I don’t fight with or against the water. So I try to incorporate the way I move my body in the water into the way I move through each day.

How can I specifically apply the lesson of non-striving?

One valuable lesson I learnt from my Martial Arts teacher is the 70/30 Taoist Water method, use up 70% of your qi and save 30% at the end of each day. That way, you never end each day completely drained and empty, that way you have some qi in reserve.

If we deplete ourselves all the time, we can end up desperately trying to scrape for more energy at the bottom of the barrel and eventually end up in debt by digging into your reserves. Winter is a great reminder to slow down and to spend time restoring ourselves. I think we don’t have to wait for Winter time. Making time to get restorative, nourishing, healing deep rest, minimising stress, learn how to manage stressful events with Mindfulness Meditation practices, carve out some “down-time” and re-connecting with nature can be integrated in our regular routine to maintain long term health and vitality.

Earth Element

The spirit of Earth element is the “Yi” translated as our “Intention.” It is those moments in life when we are inspired by something we want to achieve or full-fill and we have an intention and vision, then follow our plan, then action. For me, it doesn’t always flow smoothly all the time from the start - intention through to the action. My blockage is my personal conflict with self- doubt and self-confidence. Constantly second guessing myself and feeling like I’m not “good enough”.

How do I overcome the roadblock of self-doubt?

I look at my habitual mental thought patterns, via the tool of Mindfulness style Meditation and what I find is my mental pattern is usually one of anxiety. Anxiety about failing or not being “good” enough to full-full my inspiration and intention. The way I work with the stress and worry that causes my blockage is to practice “grounding” myself, how do I do that?

The Earth element practice is radical self-acceptance. Be accepting of yourself as you are, even when you fail at trying to achieve.

How do I practice radical self-acceptance even though I fall over and stumble?

I start with self-forgiveness and then follow self acceptance. This definitely doesn’t come easy to me all the time, it is a practice. The lessons I learn about myself during those times of stress and worry are priceless in that I learn what triggers me to doubt myself and I work out ways I can overcome the self doubt so that I can full-fill my deepest intention. Ways I have overcome self doubt has been to create nourishing dialogue with myself. To befriend myself when I hear the self doubt voices.

Then I create new seeds of thoughts that are more life affirming and thus create new pathways and patterns that help me to fulfill my deepest intentions and true life purpose.

Fire Element

The spirit of fire is the “Shen” translated as our spirit, making up our heart/mind. The gem of wisdom here is to realise our true authentic self, who we really are which is our true identity.

Our authentic self that does not include the conditioned ways of thinking and behaving that we have adopted from society. What I mean by this ‘conditioning’ is for example after we are born, our parents raise us up and have conditioned us to think and behave in certain ways, then our school teachers, our peers all throughout our education, our employers, our employees, our friends, our partners, all have an heavy influence in conditioning us to a certain extent.

So with all this “conditioning”, how do we know our true self?

For me, I have used the tool of Mindfulness Meditation for 15 or so years. Sitting in meditation on a regular basis has helped me to observe my habitual mental patterns, my neurosis, my past traumas, the stories that I’ve held onto for so long which no longer serve me. An example is I'd been holding onto the story of my past childhood traumas, resulting in me always acting like the victim, I know now it’s time to allow those conscious and subconscious habits to slowly fall away.

The more I practice meditation, the more I understand myself on a deeper level, the more aware I become of my conditioned habits. The Tao teaches us to find our true identity, called “Shen realisation”, by utilising the tool of self awareness. We then learn to cultivate our Shen, called “Shen cultivation”. Shen cultivation is to continue to realise your true identity because it is too easy to forget our true selves, especially when we live in a society where we are heavily influenced by the media, we face pressure from society to behave and think in a certain way. When we are conditioned and exposed to so much societal conditioning/pressure to be a certain way in order to fit into society, we can lose our way, forget our life’s purpose. This can cause chaos, distress, confusion, thus lead to an unhappy and unsatisfying life for some people.

“When the Heart is agitated there is distress or chaos for the whole person, if the Shen are distrurbed you can no longer be yourself and live an authentic life.”

Claude Larre & Elizabeth Rochat

Personally, I’m nowhere near realising my true self/identity. But however, the path of self awareness has helped me to work on letting go of old outmoded conditioned habits and continues to empower me to create new seeds of habits that are more nurturing and life affirming.

Wood Element

When someone is balanced in Wood Element, in general they are generous, tolerant, warm-hearted and creative. When the Wood element is out of balance, one can become prone to anger, rage and aggressive behaviour. When one is frustrated, an outburst of rage could burst out, you could become easily flustered, agitated or get angered.

An imbalance in Wood element could manifest in a self destructive manner, especially when anger and aggression is directed inwards. That was an issue I have experienced, anger not expressed in a healthy way, but my anger and frustration was directed inwards and suppressed. Anger turned inwards is known to be a form of depression. I suffered from decades of depression, there was a lot of self loathing and frustration towards myself all those years.

The gem of wisdom I have incorporated in my life to balance the Wood element is the practice of forgiveness. Also, to practice expressing anger in a healthy way when one is feeling anger. Pent up anger as we know is very destructive, think of a “champagne bottle” getting shaken up!...it festers and builds up inside before exploding!

When we allow anger to be expressed, we give it a voice to be heard, practice sharing with people you trust, that you are feeling angry. Express why you are feeling angry, this allows the anger to be digested and flow, rather than being stuck inside of us.

Expression of anger in a healthy way through movement has also been effective in managing anger, examples are exercise, running, walking, Martial Arts, dance etc in fact any kind of expressive movement definitely helps the flow of anger.

The Tao teaches us in order to help bring balance to the Wood element by expressing love, kindness and being generous with forgiving others including yourself. Love and forgiveness helps restore the Wood element. I have certainly been practicing forgiveness over the years both towards myself and others. It has helped me to feel more centered when I face criticism or judgment from myself and others.

Metal Element

The season of Metal is autumn, the essence of autumn is condensation, letting go and turning inward. The Metal element is related to the emotions of grief, sadness and sorrow. The gem of wisdom taught in the Metal element is “letting go”.

If your Metal Element is unhealthy, you may have a tendency to cling to your opinions, values, possessions, objects or emotions. Excessive and prolonged sorrow can damage the lungs, which is the organ of Metal.

According to Classical Chinese Medicine, when we are inflicted with grief or sadness, the emotion impedes the flow of life energy in the lungs. I noticed that when we feel sad, our life energy withdraws inward and is contracted in the chest area. Some people show a sunken chest and hunched shoulders shaped posture. Sorrow off course is a necessary part of life, as it allows us to come to terms with pain and loss. I think it is important to experience sorrow thoroughly and then we must let go and move ahead with our lives. When the sorrow persists, this causes blockages in our ability to move forward in life.

I certainly noticed that holding onto persistent sorrow and sadness, affected my posture, immune system and ability to move forward in my life. My dad passed away when I was 19 years old, on-going grief and sorrow caused me to catch common cold and flu really easily. I had a sunken chest posture and always felt stagnant and sluggish each day. I felt very stuck, kept spiralling downwards and I found more reasons to be sad.

When I look back on my healing process with grief, back then I had hit rock bottom and I couldn't go any lower, so I learnt to let go of holding onto the past trauma and memory of my dad. I found ways to enjoy the present moment by savouring the little things in life. It can be as simple as enjoying time in nature. I started to heal, my immune system improved, I felt I could move through life a lot more smoothly. Each year passed I felt less and less of the sting of the pain of grief and sorrow.

As I reflect on all the gems of wisdom I learnt from Ancient Classical Chinese philosophy/wisdom, I feel blessed and grateful for they have inspired me with new ways to live life, thankful for the increased inner peace, groundedness, liberation and mental/emotional stability. I look forward to applying each of the gems to life in the present and future.