Ooooohhh, the mystery of 2012

2012 is interesting. Everywhere I turn I hear about 2012. As a practitioner of Network Spinal Analysis and Acupuncture in Kitsap County Washington, I am always interested in all thinsg related to human health, wellness, and evolution. This 2012 dialogue that I hear so much about relates to wellness. There are some very neat books, some really spirited dialogue, and some really crazy, superstitious, and strange things as well. So, this gave me a whole other perspective, and I think I agree with this.

What do you think? What does the arcehtype of 2012 mean to you? I want to know.

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The Goldilocks View

According to some interpretations of the ancient Mayan calendar, the year 2012 may mark the end of the world as we know it. And in the midst of our global economic crisis, many are starting to take such doom and gloom claims seriously. But do things have to fall apart completely before they can get better? In a recent interview with EnlightenNext magazine, cultural historian Gary Lachman offers a more nuanced perspective on our current trajectory:

We’re part of a long process that’s been going on now for a few hundred years. Modernity is an experiment. No one knew in advance what was going to happen. British historian Arnold Toynbee said that all civilizations have a kind of momentum: they move forward and then they hit a kind of plateau. Before long, they’re faced with a challenge. If the challenge is too great, the civilization collapses. If the challenge isn’t great enough, then the civilization overcomes it too easily and becomes weak, soft, and lazy. I take a “Goldilocks” view of history: the challenge has to be “just right.” It has to be just enough for civilization to muster its resources, but not so much that it destroys it. I think that what is happening right now is part of a much larger process. So am I worried about 2012? I’m already looking forward to 2013.
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For me, I see this as a point of critical tension that will require massive internal resources from all of us. I personally agree with the world’s best scientists who, simply from an ecological point of view, state that we only have 20 years at best until the polar ice caps begin deterioration to the point of no return. That can and will have devastating impacts upon the planet. Geopolitical tension is, well, tense (to say the least). So, the question for me is, can we all awaken en-masse, and create a new world? Do we have the guts to do that?

Its on the line. Do we check out…or do we so intently check-in that we create the shift, the tipping point. Don’t blink.

Our post modern culture (Gen X, Gen Y) has gotten soft as a culture. As you read above, most societies that had it too easy became weak, soft, and lazy. And, at the same time what we have in front of us is HUGE. Yet, there is something else in the air…a mystical wind that is blowing. That wind is kindling a fire in people who didn’t even know what fire was. There is an awakening happening that is so tangible if you simply have eyes to see and ears to hear.

I think we are at an absolutely magical time to be alive. The excitement of what we can create – right now – is staggering.

None of us are free until we are all free. The us is all beings. The planet is our heart.

The planet will self correct as we self correct – but this is time sensitive.

Can you feel it? That urge? that impulse of creation? What is asking you to do?

Tell your story, put the fire in a container and bring it to the person who doesn’t have any. Give her the fire. Pass it on. Pay it forward. Do it on Facebook. Do it at the health club. Do it in your political and social action circles. Write it on the walls. Just don’t stop. No matter what anyone says or thinks, don’t stop.

Like whirling dervishes of old, lets swirl and twirl and create a fire that people from everywhere will come to watch burn.

“There’s a Natural Mystic Blowin’ in the air” Robert Nesta Marley

Thomas Merton Tells it Like It Is

Brilliant Quote – Thomas Merton.

“Then it was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts, the depths of their hearts where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach, the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes. If only they could see themselves as they really are. If only we could see each other that way all the time, there would be no more war, no more hatred, no more cruelty, no more greed… I suppose the big problem would be that we would fall down and worship each other.”

- Thomas Merton

To see the secret beauty. to see past the veil of our own conditioning. To be kindness. Yes.

I love what the Dalai Lama has said in response to questions about becoming a Buddhist, he has stated, “Don’t bother being a Buddhist, my religion is kindness.”

To truly be kindness, I think we must first find that which stands in the way. This isn’t an abstraction, this is who we are. In Buddhist thought it is generally accepted that life is suffering and that there is a way out, there is a way to liberation. To move from that stuck suffering into freedom required first we know where we are at.

Where are you at? Where am I at? What is in the way? Does it hurt to feel that? Is it scary?

Most of the time we are not in this space because we are lost in the trance of thought and self. In that space, we might have ideas or thoughts or noble aspirations, but it is not an actually state. Its all theory.

Until that sacred presence really permeates who we are, we are not really living the visceral sense of loving. We are not authentic. You can feel that from a mile away, can’t you?

The idea that there is a self in here and a world out there is a result of the trance of self.

We can talk leadership, success, change, peace…and yet there is an emptiness without that juicy, limitless, and edgeless space of loving awareness. Its the frosting without the cake. Its like a spiritual tinsel town.

This quote challenges me to drop the act, to waken from the trance.

The Buddha stated in the Heart Sutra that loving kindness reverses the aging process. The quote was something to the effect that living with resentment and anger wrinkles your face like a rotten apple. Loving Kindness reverses that. I am not so worried about my face, its the heart I am concerned about. Your heart, my heart, one heart.

Our fear is great, but greater yet is the truth of our connectedness. We can wake up when we deeply experience our belongingness.

This is the heart of radical wellness.

Love,

Matt

Infinite Healing, Infinite Love

You are not who you think you are.....

The greatest potential for authentic healing comes from the deep experience of ourselves as Love itself. This experience has been transmitted through the ages by numerous mystics and masters. For most of us in the post-modern era, the actuality and experience of this is a mere intellectual exercise. For many of us in the post-modern era where so much of experience is culturally conditioned and dependent on context, we have literally cut ourselves off from the deep and joyous encounter with ourselves as Spirit. As we transcend limiting developmental states of consciousness while including the most useful parts of them, it IS possible to encounter, commune with, and be transformed by this deep and abiding presence.

I work with many people every day who are seeking “healing.” Most folks simply want to “feel better” so that they can get to where they were just before they started to hurt or feel uncomfortable symptoms. This is our cultural story around health care and medicine: It is there to get the uncomfortable stuff out of the way so we can get on with the business of living our lives just as we were before we felt uncomfortable. Yet, what if this very very lifestyle and all the choices we made was the reason we got to where we are? If that is the case, I would submit that our very symptoms are our wake up calls. They are the calls from deep within, from a place of profound wisdom that is calling us back to wholeness (NOTE: I am no way discouraging proper medical care when needed. Thank goodness for the life-saving technology of interventional allopathic medicine). Yet, most of the time the very self that is seeking healing is the very self that created the problem to begin with. This very self is rooted in a lifetime of programs of behavior, thought, and relationship that do NOT reflect our deepest, ever-present nature as Love and Spirit. Thus, does it make sense to attempt to solve a problem at the very level of mind that created the problem to begin with. As Albert Einstein said, “We cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”

Let us, then,  differentiate healing and curing. Healing entails a new, evolved, and vertically integrated manner of living, thinking, and being that reflects a higher state of moral, spiritual, emotional, and physical development. It means our relationships are healing, our relationship to Spirit is healing, our behaviors are congruent with our deepest reality of Love, and we begin to move towards a concern for “all of us” – not just ourselves or the selected few of our families, tribe, clan, or culture. Healing is integral and encompasses every aspect of our lives – nothing is excluded. In healing, we so not always arrive at the outcome we initially desired. Sometimes the pain doesn’t go away, sometimes we don’t go into remission, sometimes the questions do not get answered. In healing, however, a radical evolution of every part of our lives is always available. Joy is always available. And the healing of our fragmented and broken selves is always available. In fact, this re-integration is our birthright and part of our very curriculum on this planet. As we become free and experience ourselves as Love, we invisibly give everyone in our web of existence permission to do the same.The freedom, joy, and peace of this experience is beyond words.

To heal you have to have guts. You have to be willing to walk through the fire so that everything that does not reflect your innate wisdom and goodness can fall away like snake skin. For most of us, there is a lot to shed, so I suggest you hang on for the ride. Nestle your head in the breast of a community of support and find yourself in Spirit. Ask for help from the elders who have walked before you. Find the Master and sit at her feet. Trust God, forgive everything, and awaken to infinite Love. I assure, no matter how far down the scale you have gone, this is possible. It is WHO you ARE.

This experience is one of the  most powerful remedies for health and healing. As someone who spent years studying herbal medicine, nutrition, acupuncture, chiropractic, and manual medicine, NOTHING transcends this authentic experience in the path to total wholeness and radical wellness.

Cures can occur in this environment. There are numerous reports of spontaneous healing that occur in the presence of masters or at holy sites. As I look at my bookshelf now, I have an entire annotated bibliography of spontaneous healings that have occurred with all types of fatal illnesses. Miracles happen….all the time. However, they are simply part of the journey, not the goal. Healing and integral living is the goal. Love is the goal. If you are, by definition, Love, then You are the goal.

I have always had a deep connection to St. Teresa of Avila. If her writings she stated, “Remember, if you want to make progress on the path and ascend to the places you have longed for, the important thing is not to think much, but to love much, and so to do whatever best awakens you to love.” Awakening to love is health.

St. Augustine stated, “Love made me what I am, that I may be what I was not before.” Amen. May we never be the same again.

Finally, in one of the greatest Christian mystical texts ever written, the Anonymous author of the Cloud of Unknowing writes, “Be moderate in everything but Love.”

As my spiritual teacher, His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has always said, “Love is not an emotion, it is your very existence.”

Infinite healing and infinite love are available now. They are core foundations for the experience of health and radical wellness.

The Evolution of Wellness

The (R)Evolution of Wellness

In her book Spirituality and Social Action, social activist and spiritual teacher Vimala Thakar passionately calls spiritual seekers and activists alike to take responsibility for the totality of what it means to be human. This passage also points towards where the practice and art of WELLNESS MUST GO:

“A new challenge awaits us at the beginning of the twenty-first century: to go beyond fragmentation…and be open to total living and total revolution. In this era, to become a spiritual inquirer without social consciousness is a luxury that we can ill afford, and to be a social activist without a scientific understanding of the inner workings of the mind is the worst folly. Neither approach in isolation has had any significant success…. As we deepen in understanding, the arbitrary divisions between inner and outer disappear…. Life is not fragmented; it is not divided. It cannot be divided into spiritual and material, individual and collective…. And each passionate being who dares to explore beyond the fragmentary and superficial into the mystery of totality helps all humanity perceive what it is to be fully human. Revolution, total revolution, implies experimenting with the impossible. And when an individual takes a step in the direction of the new, the impossible, the whole human race travels through that individual.”

Wellness for the sake of preservation of the narcissistic self is dead. It no longer serves the world and it most certainly no longer serves the individual. Wellness that only creates comfort does not serve the individual. Wellness that only brings us to who we were just before we experienced symptoms is not wellness. If it is indeed our very life choices, attitudes, beliefs, and relationships that define our overall health, then it is only by radically awakening to new strategies for wellness and then implementing them in our lives that true wellness can occur.

Radical wellness in this sense is an evolution from our previous notions of health and wellness. Wellness is not separate from the rest of our life. In fact, the very experience and practice of wellness is completely integrated with every facet of our life experience – mond, body, spirit, culture, planet, and Kosmos.

My work with Network Spinal Analysis and Somato Respiratory integration is revolutionary in that it allows for the experience of radical wellness. Through this work, we are able to let go of our anchors to defense and habitual responses to life. The stress, tension, and holding patterns of a lifetime slowly melt away. As this occurs, the very choices and behaviors that we made in an attempt to run from our pain become more awakened and evolved. We thus experience conscious embodied awakening.  Naturally, we experience less pain, more energy, and a greater sense of well being. From this state of true wellness, we can contribute more to life and be more authentic in our being.

My practice as a doctor completely changed when I experienced Radical Wellness through Network and Somato Respiratory Integration.

Lynn and I are very excited to begin the process of opening a cutting edge,  integrative healing center in Charlotte, NC where we will integrate NSA, SRI, the Satir Method of body oriented psychotherapy, and Somatic Experiencing. It is our mission to facilitate a profound experience of Radical Wellness and create a new culture of embodied awakening in Charlotte.  We want to provide the community and platform in which anyone and everyone may experience themselves and their lives as completely new. We seek to inspire miracles and to facilitate growth. From this space, the impossible becomes possible. In this magical process, anyone we have every touched also becomes transformed.

“And when an individual takes a step in the direction of the new, the impossible, the whole human race travels through that individual.”

Dr. Matthew Lyon and Lynn Lyon will be opening the Integral Life Center of Charlotte in the Summer of 2009.

The Earth Element of Chinese Medicine
By Dr. Matthew Lyon, DC, L.Ac

The earth element is often depicted as the center fulcrum of the 5 elements, around which all of the other elements exist. The earth is the central grounding energy of life for the rest of the manifest experience of life. In general, this was a common idea for early agrarian Chinese cultures as well as early Native American cultures. The earth element is ultimately responsible for utilizing and processing all sources of sustenance and nutriment. In this way, our very potential to realize our destiny in life is made possible. From quantum physics we know that most of what we call the universe is actually empty space of pure potential. The earth element is the matter created by that space.

The organs associated with the earth element are the stomach and spleen. In Chinese Medicine, both of these organs allow us to take the food we eat, air we breathe, and the inherited energy we are born with and efficiently distribute to all aspects of our body, mind, and spirit. Imbalances in the earth element typically show up as a breakdown in this functional process. Psychologically, the earth element deals with our capacity to experience true empathy and caring for all life forms. Spiritually, the energy associated with the earth element, called yi, is the intention that directs all movement.

The highest virtue of the earth element is the selfless renunciation our self-centered need for comfort towards a more inclusive and integral life focused on others. Within the earth element, our raison d’etre transforms from wanting freedom and comfort for selves to wanting freedom, health, happiness, and evolution for all beings. When the earth is out of balance, we prefer comfort more than it wants radical wellness.  When the earth element is balanced, our capacity to create a healthy and wholesome future is unlimited.

I have often seen earth element imbalances present as problems with food, eating, and nourishment. Bulimia, anorexia, and obsessive-compulsive activities around eating reflect an imbalance in the earth element. When we sense a lack of nourishment within, we often look outside ourselves for something “to fill us up.” Most diets will, statistically speaking, fail. When the earth element is balanced, many diets can become much more effective. Many digestive problems can be alleviated when the earth element is balanced.

An imbalanced earth element can be very insecure and display excessive worry, over concern, and a neurotic tendency to try to take care of and fix those around them. Although well intentioned, this kind of behavior often drives people away. When the insecurity of the earth element combines with excess amounts of sympathy, we see the manifestation of obsessions, excessive thinking, and nightmares. Co-dependency, a very real addictive process, has its roots in an earth imbalance.

For the earth element to be balanced, we must have a daily practice of centering. In general, we should begin each day with a period of no less than 20 minutes of centering to help establish a centered and grounded course throughout the day. Only when we are deeply rooted in our center can our activities be grounded and resolute.

5 element Acupuncture is an unparalleled and powerful tool in which to create more balance and authentic wellness in our lives.

Dr. Matthew Lyon is a practitioner of 5 element acupuncture and Network Spinal Analysis. Dr. Lyon’s book and other articles can be found on his website at www.drmattlyon.com. He is in the process of opening an integral healing center in Charlotte, NC

Healing through the 5 Elements: Water

Healing with the Five Elements: The Water Element
By Dr. Matthew Lyon, DC, L.Ac

Winter is the season associated the water element in Chinese medicine. As I write this, the winter solstice is approaching. Darkness abounds and the purifying action of the northwest rains reminds me of the power inherent in the water element. The quiet stillness and rain of the winter nourish the seeds of the life that will bloom again in spring. Hence, the water element provides the deep nourishment for all activities of life, birth, and growth. In the darkest period of the year, the fire that blazes in the summer is born.  In the stillness of the Water element, we build the reserves needed to fulfill our function and destiny. Without the water element’s nourishment, we often burn out and lose touch with our original purpose. Water contains the seeds of our “curriculum” in this lifetime. Water holds the blueprint of our souls’ life purpose.

The organs associated with the water element are the bladder and the kidney. The bladder stores our body’s fluids and maintains our energy reserves. The kidneys balance and distribute fluids in our bodies. The kidney contains the well of vital life essence that we are born with called “Jing” in Chinese medicine. When the water element is depleted we may experience exhaustion and total depletion. Chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia are often manifestations of a water element imbalance. For men, impotence and a loss of libido may indicate a water imbalance. For women, infertility is one sign that the water element is disturbed. The water element in Chinese medicine governs the entire endocrine system.

The water element nourishes and lubricates every joint in our body. The water element provides the flexibility and fluidity for movement. Stiffness, tightness, and joint pains are often a manifestation of an imbalance in the water element. Degenerative arthritis, low back pain, knee problems, and various joint pains reflect disruptions in the water element.

The emotion associated with the water element is fear. When the water element is out of balance we may experience fear that shows up in every aspect of our lives: relationships, career, finances, and personal growth. An imbalanced water element habitually reacts to fear instead of responding with wisdom and equanimity. Often, the reserves of Jing are continually used up in a desperate attempt to control, manage or run away from fear.

The spirit associated with the water element is willpower that guides us to take steps in life that are congruent with our soul’s purpose. It is the commitment to live the highest virtues in life even when we are faced with fear and extraordinary difficulties.

Ironically, when we overuse this will through habitually reacting to fear, we end up exhausted and depleted. In order to find balance with fear, we must cultivate wisdom. The importance of the development of authentic wisdom cannot be overemphasized. Wisdom guides us to respond to life and utilize our resources appropriately.

Acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine are remarkable in their ability to help with exhaustion, fatigue, back pain, joint pain, arthritis, and various hormonal imbalances. In addition, Chinese medicine as discussed in this article can be an indispensable tool in reconnecting to your deeper purpose of life while developing new strategies and resources for living life to its fullest.

Healing through the 5 Elements: Metal

The 5 Elements of Chinese Medicine: The Metal Element
By Matthew Lyon DC, L.Ac

This month, we’ll continue with our look at the 5 elements of Chinese Medicine. In this issue, we will examine the Metal Element. The Metal Element corresponds to the season of Fall. In the physiology of Chinese medicine, the Metal Element corresponds to the Lungs and Large Intestines. The emotion related to the Metal Element is Grief.

Autumn is the time when we eliminate what is unnecessary, store up what is needed, and allow the proper process of withering and decay to unfold. The Metal Element represents contraction, cleansing, letting go, evolution through reduction, a return to simplicity, righteousness, ethics, morality, and an honoring of structure and form. In the righteousness of the Metal Element, we surrender to the will of something much greater than ourselves.

The Large intestine is the organ through which we let go of what is no longer needed. The Large Intestine is a major pathway of detoxification in our bodies. Our Lungs help us to take in life itself through the form of our breath. The Lungs allow is to “inspire” – literally to be filled not only with oxygen, but also with new levels of purpose, inspiration, and creative ideas. Thus, the two poles of the Metal Element help us maintain a balance of letting go while being receptive to new life and evolution. Physical problems that reflect an imbalance in the Metal Element are Asthma, chronic bronchitis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, diarrhea, constipation, allergies, chronic sinus problems, multiple food allergies, depression, fatigue, obsessive & compulsive tendencies, co-dependency, and pathological interpersonal control issues. Because the lung governs the skin in Chinese Medicine, we can also see a variety of skin problems such as eczema, psoriasis, rashes, and acne.

When Metal is out of balance, there is also a greater tendency to perceive life on a superficial level. When Metal is in balance, we will identify with the depth in all things.

An imbalanced Metal Element will often obsessively organize and create structure in life to a fault. This can lead one to become overly strict, rigid, self-righteous and cold. Likewise, a balanced Metal type has a wonderful sense of systems, stability, and structure.

When the Metal Element is healthy and balanced, we naturally let go of what is no longer needed with grace and dignity. We process grief in a healthy and appropriate manner. We understand our role in relationship with others, and we are able to relinquish the need to control others and challenging life situations. At the deepest level, the highest aspiration of the Metal Element is “Not my will, but Thine be done.” On another level, to the extent that we are completely transparent with our lives and have nothing to hide, and to the extent that we renounce the need to take all things personally, is to the extent that the Metal Element will be liberated within us.

I have often seen patients with a Metal imbalance who have spent their lives living in regret over a sense of loss, grief, and recrimination. “If only it had happened that way…” is a common mantra for a Metal imbalance. Often, there can be such a sense of loss, lack of “spark” and emptiness, leading one to search wildly and without genuine purpose and direction, to seek fulfillment of a void.  In balancing the Metal Element, the true self comes forth, which allows for an authentic connection with others and the Divine.

I have found no better way to balance the Metal Element than constitutional acupuncture and Chinese Herbal medicine.

Dr. Matt Lyon practices Chinese Medicine and Network Spinal Analysis. Visit www.drmattlyon.com for more information.

Healing through the Elements: Wood

The 5 Elements of Chinese Medicine: Wood

Wood is the element that provides the structure, rebirth, renewal, and new growth required for all of life. It is constantly expanding and branching out
The wood element controls wise decision-making, planning, and design into every area of our lives. The Wood element provides us with organized growth and movement through time into the future. Wood also allows for flexibility to adapt the changes and challenges. Wood provides order, symmetry, and clear leadership. The Wood element governs the Liver and Gallbladder in our body. In Chinese medicine, the liver is responsible for the smooth and efficient flow of your body’s Qi, or vital energy.

Physically, it is easy to recognize those with a Wood constitution, as they tend to be lean, muscular, and supple with strong and slim hands and feet. Wood types love the morning and enjoy the unbounded sense of potential each new day brings. They often appear slightly flushed. Often they appear tense in the neck, jaw and shoulders.

When the wood element is balanced, people with this constitution make great leaders, executives, and decision makers. They tend to be bold, assertive, confident, decisive, powerful, to the point, clearly see the big picture and make wise and effective strategic decisions. They thrive on working under pressure. Wood types can be very kind, benevolent, and forgiving.

When out of balance, wood types can appear angry, aggressive, confrontational, overly-goal oriented, tense, tight, and even tyrannical. At times, particularly when overly tired they can come across as snobby and conceited, devious, indecisive, erratic, compulsive, short, anxious, and demanding. Wood types become angry in the face of obstacles.  People often feel Wood types have “control issues”. Even when Wood types become exhausted, they hate to slow down. As Wood types get more and more run down, they become very volatile, intolerant, and impatient.

Physically, Wood types often struggle with high blood pressure, depression, anxiety, heartburn, sciatica, very tight muscles of the neck and shoulders, headaches, migraines, jaw pain (TMJ), menstrual problems, severe PMS, tendonitis, hypoglycemia, IBS, eye problems, impotence and pre-mature ejaculation, liver and gallbladder problems, and multiple addictions, Wood types often require alcohol or other drugs to slow down.

Here are some suggestions to help balance the Wood element:

Diet: Avoid spicy, greasy, creamy foods, refined carbohydrates, and stimulants. Focus on high fiber foods, protein rich legumes, and complex carbohydrates such as brown rice and quinoa. Steamed vegetables are particularly helpful for Wood imbalances. A focus on a plant-based diet is key with an integration of healthy and organic meats as needed. Eat slowly, chew your food, and be grateful for the very experience of nourishment.

Lifestyle: Regular exercise including yoga most days of the week is critical. Practices like meditation are invaluable. Have fun and enjoy the process and journey of life.

Health Care: Acupuncture from a rich tradition is critical. Acupuncture can help balance the body in a systematic and exact fashion yielding tremendous results on the physical, emotional, and spiritual levels. Numerous Chinese herbal formulas can be helpful. Plant based supplements such as Megafoods are wonderful. Western herbals such as Milk Thistle and Dandelion help balance the wood energy in the Liver. Network Spinal Analysis has been shown to be exceptionally helpful improving a perceived sense of wellness, health, and well-being.

Psychospiritual: Stay flexible, forgive, laugh often and much, go on retreat when you need to pull back, and never be afraid to express your beautiful intensity and leadership when needed. Create flexible structure for your life. Be kind. Use your gifts to serve humanity.

Dr. Matthew Lyon practices Chinese medicine, acupuncture, and Network Spinal Analysis. You can download his free eBook at www.drmattlyon.com.

Healing through the 5 Elements: Fire

The Five Elements of Chinese Medicine: The Fire Element

The 5-element system has been used for 2500 years to help treat a variety of health problems by individually and naturally restoring the body’s natural rhythms. As balance is restored through this gentle system, we can express our built-in capacity for boundless and radiant health.

The fire constitution relates to the season of summer. Imagine how summer feels to you: warmth, bright sun, excitement, activity, and expansion. The emotion related to fire is joy. The main organs associated with the Fire constitution are the heart and small intestine. Fire, like summer, is warm, extroverted, brilliant, radiant, and expansive. Just as the summer sun gives life and vitality to the entire earth, the heart controls and governs life within our bodies, pumping the living blood of life through our circulatory system.

Fire types are natural leaders: they are passionate, articulate and have that ineffable gift of being able to inspire large groups of people through inspiration, magnetism, and sheer charisma. Often, fire types are incredible bridge builders. Fire types make tremendous sales people.

When the fire burns too brightly, we can quickly zap the reserves in the rest of our body. Thus, fire types when out of balance can exhaust themselves and “burn out” those that are closest to them. They may “fall in love” with new ideas, people, concepts, and dreams only to burn out and feel hyperactive, nervous, unpredictable, and exhausted. That beautiful charisma and magnetism can quickly turn into depression, isolation, and weakness.

Many fire types will crave stimulants and have a natural predilection towards addictive tendencies. Imbalanced fire types love the feeling of being “high” and they love the excitement and rush of euphoria that comes from new relationships, new jobs, and new possibilities. Often, they spend more time in an exciting fantasy world than they do in the real world.

Common health problems that fire types experience are cardiovascular disorders, anemia, hypertension, anxiety, depression, urinary tract infections, hot flashes, canker sores, hives, frequent nightmares, digestive problems, insomnia, heart palpitations, hypoglycemia, and nervous exhaustion. On an emotional level, they will feel that life, people, and experiences are not safe and that it is impossible to find real intimacy. When in balance, fire types have balanced energy levels, graceful charisma, joy, connection, and deep wells of compassion.

Thus, this model allows us to observe and understand the precise psychological, spiritual, and energetic components of symptoms that we experience.

In order to maintain balance fire types require self-care. Acupuncture and gentle forms of chiropractic like Network Spinal Analysis are incredible tools to restore balance based on constitution. Whole food, plant based vitamin and mineral complexes such as B vitamins, magnesium, zinc, and vitamin C can be very helpful Supplements such as hemp protein and flax seed oil can be helpful. Certain herbs can also be very helpful to balance the fire type. Certain Chinese herbal formulas are unparalleled in their ability to restore balance. Individual herbs such as Schizandra, Hawthorne, Licorice, St. John’s Wort, and Rehmannia, can be exceptionally helpful. Consult the staff at Marlene’s or a qualified health provider before taking any supplements or herbs.

Fire types require the silence and space of deep contemplation to help direct their creative impulses from a deeper purpose. Just like a wood stove has a vent system to slow down the blaze, fire types need to tap into the quiet resources of their soul in order to engender a grounded expression of their natural fire. Burn out is a function of a forgotten purpose.

The diet of fire types should avoid over consumption of alcohol, coffee, black tea, hot, spicy and sweet foods. Often, fire types do well eating a lower calorie, plant based diet with healthy sources of fats and proteins. Fire types do terribly with over consumption and the Standard American Diet. Fire types benefit from calmer exercise programs like daily walking, yoga, tai chi, swimming, hiking, and a weight training programs such as the “Slow Burn” method.

Dr. Matt Lyon practice acupuncture, herbal medicine, and Network Spinal Analysis. You can download his free eBook at www.drmattlyon.com.

Healing through the 5 Elements of Chinese Medicine

Chinese Medicine, the 5 Elements, and Personal Transformation

I’d like to invite you on a journey with me. Over the next 5 months we’ll be taking a look at the 5 Elements of Chinese Medicine and Philosophy. My intention is to help you to understand and utilize the 5 Elements in order to 1) take more responsibility for your health and wellness, 2) improve your awareness of the connection between emotions and health, and 3) to provide practical tools that you can use on a daily basis to improve healthy, increase energy and vitality, and decrease pain. Ultimately, the 5 Elements take us into the very heart of healing and allow us to reconnect to the natural rhythms of our bodies. This aspect of health and healing has been painfully overlooked in modern healthcare. I firmly believe that to the extent that we can return to that natural, innate state of awareness health, we can regain a sense of vibrancy, life, and wellness. Finally, and perhaps more importantly, this connection to Life itself can have dramatic and profound implications for the health of our planet, our environment and our global family.

The 5 elements found in Chinese Medicine offer us a very unique and comprehensive paradigm in which to understand nature and health. I was recently blessed to have spent time with renowned Buddhist author and teacher Sharon Salzberg, I asked her what healing was and how to approach it from a deeply authentic place. She stated, “The nature of healing is to enter into a deep communion with each person you work with. Do not have a ready-made template, but let that healing come from the authentic space of communion.” One of the most phenomenal tools to enter into this communion is the 5 Element paradigm.

The magic of any authentic vitalistic healing practice is that it recognizes that our lives are part of an ever-changing interdependence of life experiences, traumas, belief systems, environmental inputs, physiological influences, emotional factors, and structural components. In other words, to separate parts from the whole is antithetical to a vitalistic paradigm. Curing a named disease or symptoms is not the purpose of the 5 element tradition, nor is it the purpose of any authentic vitalistic tradition. Healing from the deepest level of being is the function of the 5 Elements. In my clinical experience, many times my work will result in a reduction of subjective complaints (symptoms) and changes in objective measurements (X-Rays, Labs, MRIs, etc), but that is not the goal per se. Healing is not merely a diminution of pain or named disease, but rather a collective increase in quality of life, relationship to spirit, improved relationships, self-actualized behavior, better life choices (exercise, diet, spirituality), and ultimately an expanded sense of self that goes beyond our cultural norm of materialism and narcissism. The 5 elements are unique in their capacity to provide a roadmap and structure to this healing experience.

Because the 5 elements look at the entirety of a person’s makeup, we don’t look at symptoms as discrete entities. For instance, anxiety and depression often have a set number of medications prescribed (Paxil, Effexor, Prozac, etc). In our 5 element work, anxiety and depression are simply the body’s feedback system.  Anxiety and depression are thus only meaningful in the context of the person and their constitution.  Thus, a person who is predominantly a Fire constitution would be treated differently than someone who is primarily an Earth constitution. Returning to the wisdom of Sharon Salzberg, we approach healing through this communion, not through a fixed, pre-determined template that seeks to correct symptoms.

As we progress each month we’ll look at one element in detail (Fire, Earth, Metal, Water, and Wood).   Everyone has a specific constitution that they are born with and  each of us will reflect one fundamental elemental tendency. As you read end enjoy these articles, you will find one of the elements that resonates most closely with you (and those you spend time with). From this new awareness you’ll be able to use the information to tailor-fit a wellness program for yourself.  This includes herbs, supplements, exercises, attitudinal shifts, acupuncture, chiropractic, homeopathics, flower essences, and breathing/meditation techniques specific to each element.

Furthermore, once we have an awareness of our elemental constitution, we can learn new tools to cultivate health by learning to create balance according to our unique constitution. This is the magic of the 5 Element model. It provides us with an organic way in which to access an individualized healing program that is right for our unique makeup.

Join me on this fun and educational journey towards health and wholeness. In addition, we’ll have monthly lectures to delve more deeply into each element and how to apply this knowledge to your life.

Matthew Lyon, DC, L.Ac is a chiropractor, acupuncturist, and herbalist. You can learn more and download Dr. Lyon’s free eBook at www.drmattlyon.com.