Five Elements in Nature - a Foundation in Chinese Medicine

Chinese medicine has existed for about 5,000 years, before CT scans, before X-Rays, before microscopes. Our instructor kept telling us that if we observe and understand nature, we can translate the same principles into Chinese Medicine. He then went on to share the foundation from which the concepts are built on, known as the five elements of nature.

The elements of nature in many cultures are typically the four elements of fire, earth, water, and wood. Aristotle, Hindu, and Buddhism added a fifth esoteric element, the esoteric aether, but in the Chinese culture, metal is the fifth element.

In Chinese culture, the list of natural elements is and their state of constant interaction and flux with one another is the foundation from which everything is built. The different characteristics, correspondences, and inter-relationships in nature uses the exact same principles to assess the body, diagnose problems, and treat diseases. That is why it is so important to have the foundation of understanding how nature works. You will need that same information to know how the body, disease, and treatment works.

This is known as the Cycle of Mutual Promotion of the Five Elements:

• Water promotes wood.
• Wood promotes fire.
• Fire promotes earth (when burning down wood).
• Earth promotes metal (when burying wood).
• Metal promotes water (when melted by fire).

This is known as the Cycle of Mutual Control of the Five Elements:

• Metal controls (chops) wood but controlled by fire.
• Fire controls metal but controlled by water.
• Water controls fire but controlled by earth.
• Earth controls water but controlled by wood.
• Wood controls earth but controlled by metal.

Here is how these cycles of promotion and control are often depicted:

These same characteristics of the five elements in nature, and their affect on each other, is the same paradigm used in the body. Each of the five elements in nature has a major Yin and Yang organ of the body associated with that element.

• The liver has the same characteristics as wood, growing and unfolding.
• The heart is the same as fire, warming and flaring up.
• The spleen is the same as earth, receiving, transforming and generating.
• The lung is the same as metal, purifying and descending.
• The kidneys are the same as water, nourishing and flowing downward.

As a result, the organs of the body can now be placed and used in the same cycle of of promotion and control used for the elements in nature:

In summary, the promotion works like this:

• Kidney (water) promotes liver (wood).
• Liver (wood) promotes heart (fire).
• Heart (fire) promotes spleen (earth).
• Spleen (earth) promotes lung (metal).
• Lung (metal) promotes kidney (water).

Control of the five vital organs works like this:

• Lung (metal) controls liver (wood) but controlled by heart (fire).
• Heart (fire) controls lung (metal) but controlled by kidney (water).
• Kidney (water) controls heart (fire) but controlled by spleen (earth).
• Spleen (earth) controls kidney (water) but controlled by liver (wood).
• Liver (wood) controls spleen (earth) but controlled by lung (metal).

By applying the law of nature to our body system, Chinese medicine can interpret the symptoms and determine the causes of our health problems. When one organ fails, the symptoms usually show up in another. For example, when the lung energy is weak, the liver energy becomes out of control and develops into headaches or high blood pressure. In this case, treating the lungs is necessary in curing liver-related symptoms.

Chinese Medicine also looks at the orifices and openings in a person's face as if they are mirrors to what is going on in the internal vital organs. By observing the orifices and the tissues of the face, the eyes, tongue, mouth, nose, and ears, you can tell what is going on inside a person's organs.

Chinese Medicine also takes into account each season and climate in their assessment and treatment plans. The reason they do this is because each season can have adverse effects on one of our organs. Seasons can also be used to know when to help nurture and store up certain organs to prepare for oncoming seasons and they often prepare for seasons with the use of nutrition. They have determined the five tastes of sour, bitter, sweet, pungent, and salty can have health promotional effects on the five organs and use this as part of their treatment and prevention of disease process.

In addition, Chinese Medicine recognizes emotions can have damaging effects on our vital organs. Too much sadness, for example, damages our lungs. Over joyfulness can cause heart attacks. Extreme anger hurts our livers. Too much worrying causes indigestion. Extreme frightfulness damages our kidneys. Chinese Medicine takes the different emotions and associates them with certain organs and then back to the initial five main elements found in nature.

Here is a summary of what is used in Chinese Medicine and how it translates to the five elements found in nature:

	Wood	Fire	Earth	Metal	Water
Yin Organ (Zang)	Liver	Heart	Spleen	Lungs	Kidneys
Yang Organ (Fu)	Gall bladder	Small intestine	Stomach	Large intestine	Bladder
Season	Spring	Summer	Late summer	Autumn	Winter
Climate	Wind	Heat	Dampness	Dryness	Cold
Orifice	Eyes	Tongue	Mouth	Nose	Ears
Tissue	Tendons	Blood vessels	Muscles	Skin	Bones
Taste	Sour	Bitter	Sweet	Pungent	Salty
Emotion	Anger	Joy	Worry	Grief	Fear

So the reason why our instructor says that if you can understand nature and how the five elements work together, you can understand Chinese Medicine. The five elements are the foundation for understanding the inter-workings and thought process used to assess, diagnose, treat, and prevent problems the Chinese Medicine way.

Five Elements in Nature - a Foundation in Chinese Medicine