This meeting is the first of the seasonality and locality cues in oriental medicine. I call it oriental medicine, the human heritage going all the back to our creation. It combines local healing art, mostly from various parts of Asia, some from Africa and even Europe. All is so intensely and successfully road tested, well-documented and even filtered through the scope of the science of the times. It treats the patient, not the disease. It primarily focuses on prevention, which is critical to public health.
The physicians ensured that the people followed the seasonal guidelines not to jeopardize the health of others. In that aspect, people were educated and urged to live by the season, and each season had its diet, lifestyle, emotions, and internal organs linked to them, together with rituals and even prevalent pathologies and preventative applications. The wisdom and seasonal knowledge were passed on from parents to their children, which continued for many generations until recently.
February 3 marked the beginning of spring in the far eastern medical calendars; the vernal equinox was halfway through it. The transformation into yang is gaining pace as the days get longer. Our dragon is slowly awakening. He feels the urge to step out and move around freely, generating momentum and vitality. He can be very compassionate and cruel; if his adventurous side is satisfied and he can fly high and above, he can keep calm and provide enormous torque for new projects: if he feels stuck and remains sedentary, his temper can be short. It can set everything on fire and can be destructive. He is strong with much flexibility, has a reptilian spine, and can quickly move. His vision is far and wide. He sees everything from high up as a whole.
It is the season to let the dragon go loose. His mom is the winter, the season of the bear, which is the water component of the annual cycle. If the mother is strong, the dragon will thrive and flourish. If we have had a good winter reflecting on the past year, enjoying the slow pace of indoor life and looking into the flames by a fireplace chatting with an old friend and close family, if we’ve waited successfully and effectively for the new beginning of the life cycle to kick in by the thaw, the dragon will rise solid and ready to fly out. He will be gentle and kind.
In oriental medicine, the liver is the organ associated with the spring. Liver health is attributed enormous importance, and it is called the chief of staff since it reaches out to all other organs of the digestive tract, checking with them and collecting blood 7/24. As far as we know, it carries out more than 600 physiological functions; there may be more. It is located right under the diaphragm occupying an ample space and connecting to it through three different ligaments. It weighs 6 pounds, soaked with blood almost like a sponge, blood moving in and out equally round the clock with millimeter accuracy. It is a large organ with many duties crucial to women’s health. Many gynecological issues are related to poor liver function and numerous other pathologies such as allergies, digestive issues, bloating, skin disorders such as rash, vision problems, dry eyes, floaters, hair loss, migraines, and general tightness that may cause musculoskeletal issues. Low iron levels may also result from an unbalanced liver. Chronic stress syndrome is the failure of the liver to turn off the histaminic response by failing to produce a specific enzyme.
Whatever goes through the mouth ends up in the liver. It is the most oversized filter in the body carrying out the critical task of filtering out the toxins in food and fluids. Once it hardens due to stress, it may fail to do its filtering job and can even send some of the blood back to the organs from which it collects, which is called the hepatic portal vein backflow, thus creating more significant stress internally. It is brilliant, doesn’t want to waste any good, and tends to save it for further use in the form of fat and stores it nearby. Liver malfunctioning is, therefore, closely related to weight gain. In addition, the relationship between the severity of covid cases and liver health was published in various research articles worldwide.
The good side is that the liver can heal itself. Between 11 pm and 3 am, the liver rejuvenates and draws extra blood, especially from the limbs. However, we should help him by eating fewer sweets and moving around more by sitting less, doing early morning exercise, consuming less packaged and processed food, diaphragm breathing, not staying up late and trying not to get angry, especially in springtime. Intermittent fasting is an excellent idea to give the liver a break. Floor sitting is also a great idea to keep mobile and active since it will change the sitting posture frequently. Taking 10 min walks before breakfast, starching the sides of the body, working on a fluid spine, and forcing powerful exhales are the seasonal priorities in establishing daily exercise routines. Administering too many supplements will do more harm than good, tiring out the liver and thus metabolizing insufficiently.
The liver is not fond of excessive sugar intake. It will be a great idea to cut down on sweets during the spring months if not the whole year. The same applies to alcohol. If not my favourite candies, will my life be the same? Well, let’s say at least do your sweets until 3 pm when your gut energy is higher before it starts slowing down towards the evening. To allow you know, rice, corn, sweet potatoes, carrots, parsley, chestnut, and dry fruits like apricots will help with the sugar cravings.
The liver doesn’t like a sedentary lifestyle either. Moving more during the day, a short and brisk walk of up to 20 minutes in the morning before breakfast is an excellent idea to move the excess blood out from the liver into the extremities will help transition from the winter months hibernation mode into the livelihood of the summertime. I can’t overemphasize the importance of belly breathing since the movement of the diaphragm will give the liver a gentle massage to retain its spongy texture. Work on your adventurous side in the springtime, travel to a place you have never been to, read a book that you thought you’d never be interested in, eat a food or an exotic dish that you never tried before, meet new people, walk out of your routine to test yourself and see how you’d feel about it.
Spring is the wood element in Chinese Medicine’s five-element theory. It is the son of the water element and the mother to fire, winter, and summer, respectively. It is best to visualize and personalize as a tree in the springtime; what would a tree do? How would it behave, and what happens from winter to summer? What makes it strong, and what may hurt it? Grounding, strong roots, and a resilient form may all contribute to the health of a tree. The goals of the daily exercise routines may involve the typical characteristics of a tree; shaking, lateral bending, stretching, strengthening the legs ( our roots), and joint health. The spine’s fluidity is the focus of all exercise plans, moving it gently in all three planes. Please try not to use the backup camera often; turn around and look over your shoulder when backing up your car; that is a fantastic way to practice spine fluidity. I wouldn’t say I like the power windows either; if we had returned to the manual windows, there would be fewer shoulder issues.
They say the artichokes are the darling of the liver, making it one of the best culinary items in the spring. Asparagus, basil, broccoli, celery, fermented food like sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, kale, fresh ginger, radish, seaweed, sprouts like alfalfa and grains, small amounts of vinegar, anything the colour of green, root vegetables help improve the effectiveness of the gut relieving the stress on the liver between February and June in our geography. Dandelion is renowned for its healing powers on the liver, making it the primary herbal choice among all wildflowers. Milk thistle is another popular wildflower treating the liver as it opens to longer days. The fresh leaves may go very well in salads, and the coffee substitute from its roots and chicory is a yummy gourmet item during this time of the year.
The liver is known as the sea of plans. Planning things is excellent, but making too many plans is believed to harm the dragon; it is accommodating. Focus on planning you can execute and fulfill and avoid being too dreamy. Disturbed sleeping with heavy dreams, for example, maybe a sign that things are not going well with your liver, either physically or emotionally. The suppression of anger is one of the most severe challenges of the dragon; it needs to be let out. The best is to try to change our thoughts and not get angry. If you feel angry, don’t hide it; kick a few empty cardboard boxes to ease the frustration.! My most extensive advice is to do some breathwork to tackle chronic stress. There are tons of videos online, and there is no way to do it wrong and hurt yourself. Try out a few and see which ones fit you the best. Breath is believed to be where the body meets the mind; you will observe excellent results in a few weeks if you are consistent.
Intolerance and impatience, volatile emotions, impulsive or overdisciplined, self-indulgent or self-punishing behaviour are familiar with a disturbed wood element that gets aggravated in the springtime. Temporal headaches, muscle spasms, nerve inflammations, migratory pain and even high blood pressure may result from emotional imbalances, especially around this time of the year. 11 pm-3 am is when our dragon is in a deep sleep; please don’t disturb.! Your dragon needs attention if you have difficulty falling or staying asleep during those hours.
Confident, assertive, bold, ambitious, competitive, direct, committed, and decisive are the characteristic futures of the wood. If there is too much of it, one can get arrogant, aggressive, reckless, and compulsive-impulsive. In the case of insufficiency of the wood element, the result is usually peevish, pretentious, erratic, premature, devious, fickle, and ambivalent behaviour. Wood-type people often have issues with intensity, equality, sharing, cooperation, ambiguity, and anger.