February - sprouting time

With some delay, I provide you with a new format of my monthly energy updates starting from this month.

With February 5th started off the first month of Spring according to the ancient cinese classics. It is a time of great expectations, of awaiting for the potential to take form, the period of being an embryo "in the womb". The ground is getting ready, the seeds and buds swell by longer days and warmer waether. But the potential is still enclosed inside of them. It is a potential to which we need to tender and care for correctly, according to the Nature's pace, to make it develop into a whole new being.

So accordingly, for us, it is time for each human being to renew himself /herself, a chance to conceive a part of us that has not yet been formed but yearns to become. This month it is all about preparing the ground. How best to flow with these energies in February?

I outline some simple but effective ideas that anyone can follow. They are focused on Body, Mind and Spirit.

BODY FOCUS: FIRST STEPS IN DETOX

If you'd have read my energy updates for December and January, you would remember I do not advocate doing detox during those Winter months. February is the first month after the Winter break when we can and should take the first steps in detoxing our bodies. The increasing energies in the Nature will assist you with shifting some accumulations and habits.

Take a look at my plan for February:

1. Gradual elimination of heavier foods

- from today take one thing out of your diet which you know you need a break from (e.g. wine, coffee, cigarettes, chocolate, fried foods, red meat, etc). Anything you have recently overdone on or food that is considered "heavier" to digest;

- after one week take a second food out of your diet (the more you are attached to some food the more your body will need a break from it now);

- following another week take out the third food and then the week after the fourth food. By the end of the month you will be in a much better shape and your body will hardly notice you cutting out all those foods.

Breaking off physical habits helps us breaking free from mental and behavioural ones as well. Plus, we give our senses a pause so that they have a heightened perception and help us awake from the winter lethargy.

2. Gradual addition of lighter foods

- from today drink at least 1L of herbal tea/decoction a day. Make it into a thermos and drink throughout the day (the body needs hydration and warmth to sprout this month);

- the next week, continue with at least 1L of herbal tea a day and start your days with a glass of warm water and a half of a lemon juice on an empty stomach (lemon is an alcaline acid but it is related to Wood/Spring element and moves the energy);

- the third week, continue with the previous and add just one raw vegetable (saying "one" as too much raw in cold whether is still too cooling) a day to your diet

- the fourth week, continue with the herbal tea, water with lemon juice, a raw veg a day and add fresh sprouts once a day to your diet. Sprouts are easily done at home and gives you just the right affinity to the season.

By the end of the month you will feel so much lighter and the passage of the change in season will be a smooth ride for you.

The herbal decoction I have prepared for myself for February consists of: Nettle, Horsetail, Parsley seeds, Fern root and Ginger root. It is a perfect start for the prep ground in February: gently detoxing but still warming and nourishing.

This month is good for giving your body some stretches, especially reaching up and bending the lumbar back.

MIND FOCUS: OUT WITH THE OLD, IN WITH THE NEW

February is probably the last chance to review the previous year cycle before the energy moves full on into a new life cycle.

Set yourself this month for reviewing the last year. What have you actually done during the last year, month by month? Was it time well spent? Do you feel completed, satisfied? Are there any issues, projects, relationships needing closing off. Put the dots on the "i's" and crosses on "t's" on the last year projects or those that are near their completion.

Once you've dealt with your review and closures, take some seeds (e.g. tomato, beans, sun flowers, calendula flowers, etc) and sow the seeds in a pot by the indoor window with the intention to grow one new specific project or intention. Each time you water it, look and care for it, remember the project/intention in mind. Are you giving it the right amount of attention? Before the end of the month speak about this project with at least one person. Speaking about the ideas and plans is like exchanging seeds, one can grow a more abundant garden.

SPIRIT FOCUS: RECONNECT TO YOUR ESSENCE

"When five organs are able to submit to the heart without resistance, then however powerful the rising of the will, the behaviour does not deviate. (...) the vital spirits thrive and the Qi are not scattered. (...) then there is perfect order. (...) then the spirits. With the spirits (...) in doing there is nothing that is not accomplished." (Huainanzi ch.7)

In other words, if your body follows the Hearts/Spirits it will lead you to accomplishment.

Coming out of Winter lethargy in February we are loaded with the will power to go forward. Let's be mindful of the Heart and Spirit connection in conceiving plans for the new life cycle. Check that your plans and intentions find a resonance with your Heart.

There may be some emotions or states of being that cloud the "music" of the Heart. Identify at least one such emotion/state during this month. It can be worry, anxiety, anger, frustration, procrastination, it can be chronic tiredness, poor health, depression, victimhood, state of poverty, or the so called "sacred cows" in your life. Challenge them. Why do these states repeat? Repeated emotional states are energies imprisoned by that emotion. Acupuncture can assist you in changing your emotional state by working with the body's energy points and liberating by that a lot of vital energy.

Book an appointment

One way to settle the emotional turmoil and hear your Heart is to join me in weekly on-line meditations on Mondays at 9.30pm (CET). Click below to register for a link:

Register for on-line meditation

---

January - balance of willpower

January is the third month of Winter and believe it or not but coming to February we will feel a real turn round in the energy around us. I somehow sense that this year Spring will come early. Until then, January's energy proceeds from that of December and is encouraging us to rest, especially now after a busy festive season. In January we still have that low time in which not much is happening in Nature, so follow it and rest and recharge your batteries (aka Kidney energy). In Celtic tradition the January's full moon is called "Stay Home Moon". So, let's not overdo on work or travel but rather rest, sleep and take care of our inner selves.

Rest is not intended to mean sitting on a couch but rather taking certain actions for the body, mind and spirit to have an off time. So, going for a walk or a run, go for a skiing weekend or a day at hot springs or a walk by the seaside, whilst at home take a bath, an afternoon nap or take up meditation (click here https://www.dorotao.com/clinic-contact to register for weekly on-line meditation at DoroTao). January continues to be a month of action intertwined with inaction, to which I will come back in a moment.

As I have mentioned in my last year's energy update (https://www.dorotao.com/post/the-third-month-of-winter-rebirth), December is the darkest month of the year. January, on the other hand, is the coldest month of the year. So, we must continue to keep warm. A chilled body is a fertile ground for viruses and catarrh. So, keep on cooking hot soups and stews and oven bake or fry foods. Use ginger, cinnamon, cloves, cayenne pepper, black pepper, garlic, onions and black tea, among others. Also exercise and movement will keep your body's circulation going and therefore warm it up.

This brings me to underline that the Winter energy is about balancing the extremes, of which I talked about in my December 2021 post: https://www.dorotao.com/post/the-second-month-of-winter-watch-out-for-extremes. Winter is associated with Water element, which is very versatile element and can change from a solid form of ice into a gassy steam in just a few minutes, passing through a liquid state in the interim. That adaptability is precisely the quality which we need to cultivate in Winter time. Water adapts as a matter of a physical terrestrial law. Us humans, although 60% water made, we have consciousness and free will to decide when to adapt and when to be constant, unchanged.

The resulting effect is that when we are not in balance ourselves, we may get it "wrong" for ourselves, meaning it may cause us illness. If we are influenced too easily by the external circumstances we may sway from our healthy resolutions or actions. On the other hand, we can become so fixed over many issues and for an extended period of time that we become calcified, immobile and therefore brittle. Balancing Water energy is not as much about finding a golden middle as being able to be fluid and change from one extreme to another as necessary.

It is also about a state of mind, meaning the believes we cherish about our personal will power. In our modern day culture, a strong willpower is so highly awarded and considered a desired virture. Most of us believe that a strong and constant willpower is a positive thing, right? Actually what I have found out is that the highly strung people, even those who apparently are always positive and on the go, consume constantly their willpower (Kidney energy) to maintain such state. Since we are born to experience all kinds of states, highs and lows, active and passive, positive and negative, using our willpower to constantly steer off unpleasant feelings can waste our energy, energy related to Water element and therefore our Kidneys. I have had clinical verifications of this.

It is not to say we should not strive for positivity but when arduous or less pleasant situations arise, to accept those moments for what they are. Use the willpower to get through them like an earthworm who must eat and digest the earth in order to plough and move on. At the end of the process you will come out stronger and wiser for it. In fact, it will be a new you who comes out at the end of a "worm's" tunnel. And the gained ability to get through or around smoothly what life presents you with is what will make your willpower even stronger.

You can also think of drops of water. Water first accumulates into a sufficient size before falling down. There is a moment of pause and accumulation first and the action later.

This is what I feel will help you all get through January and the time that comes at the end of Winter. Check on your willpower: be your own best judge and observe where you use it too much, where you push yourself relentlessly. There you need to pause to reflect. On the other hand: where do you not use it enough? Are there things suspended that wait to be completed or projects you desire to create that need your willpower to move them ahead?

If you need help in assessing your willpower, and therefore your Water element and Kidney energy, book yourself for a consultation and an appointment at DoroTao. Click below for contact details.

Contact me

---

Wild Rose - for finding a sparkle in life

Each time I eat rose hip fruits I feel that amazing sensation of being fully alive; be it for the physical energy and clarity it gives me, be it for the energy it gives me. That zesty taste of its fruits gives me just that: the zest for life.

Wild Rose is captivating both when flowering: with most beautiful, delicate and pastel-coloured rose flowers, and when bearing fruits: bright red shiny fruits in the grey of Winter's background. Despite its apparent fragile beauty of its flowers, it is a robust and resistant plant growing in windy fields or cold mountains. Simply, out of all the roses, this one is the toughest one.

Hence Dr.Bach had studied it and used as one of his flower essences for "those who without apparently sufficient reason become resigned to all that happens, and just glide through life, take it as it is, without any effort to improve things and find some joy. They have surrendered to the struggle of life without complaint."

So, Dr. Bach has indicated the flower essence of Wild Rose for a lack of enthusiasm, saying that "the remedy helps reawaken our interest in life. In a positive Wild Rose state we are happy-go-lucky. But instead of apathy we feel a sense of purpose that brings increased happiness and enjoyment."

It does sound like a perfect pick-me-up for the Winter blues.

I can confirm that such energy is not only contained in the flower essence but also in the fruits of this particular rose. Be mindful of this when you go to harvest fruits of the Wild Rose and even when you consume a rose hip jam or rose hip powder.

Although Chinese Medicine uses a similar Rose, Rosa laevigata variety in its herbal medicine, it has been studied as genetically very closely related to Rosa Canina (Wild Rose)*. In Classical Chinese Materia Medica the rose hips are used more than other parts of the plant. They are considered a tonic. They are neutral in temperature, hence we can eat them in Winter without the worry of cooling our body too much or drying it by overheating. Their taste is sweet and sour but sour taste dominates giving it astringent quality. Astringent holds onto the essence and the slight sweetness nourishes.

It is from its strongly astringent quality that most of its benefits derive: it prevents all kinds of leakage: of energy, fluids and substances. Hence it is suggested when a person is not able to hold onto essence: seminal or vaginal, blood: emorragie uterine, bleedings, fluids: urine or feces (giving rise to diarrhoea) due to Kidney and Spleen weakness. Even when you notice undigested food in your feces or in your child's, that can be a sign of Kidney and/or Spleen deficiency. So, a very good Winter remedy for that is a rose hip jam or rose hip powder. As you would have gathered by now, rose hips are related to organs of Bladder, Kidneys, Spleen and Large Intestine in their capacity to regulate how much to hold onto.

The way to observe its capacity to hold essence is to note the size of its fruits in Autumn and then in December. As more rain comes in November its fruits grow substantially in size and become more juicy just before ripening in Winter.

Further, its astringent quality can reverse prolapsed muscles of uterus and bladder. So, the pulling up effect of rose hips is not only on the mood but also on the muscles in the lower part of the body.

In Winter you can use it even if in good health, as a Winter tonic. If you had read my December blog you would have found out by now that Winter is the season of accumulation of our essence and energy https://www.dorotao.com/post/december-withdrawing-and-accumulating. Last but not least, as most of you know, rose hips contain loads of Vitamin C: 426 mg in 100 g of fruits, protecting us from the seasonal influenza.

So, when out for a Winter walk in Nature, pick some of its fruits. You can eat them raw, especially if soft, squeese out the pulp leaving out the seeds. You can also bring them home, cut in half, clean out the seeds and dry in low heat (up to 40-50°C). Then, you can chew the pieces or pulverise it into a powder and take a spoonful a day.

* https://cmjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13020-020-0298-x

---