According to Chinese Medicine the summer is associated with the Heart and Circulatory System, the Small Intestines, the metabolism and our thermoregulation. It is associated with love, the color red, eloquent speech, laughter and the emotions joy and friendliness. The summer is the season that resonates with the movements of luxurious expansion, growth, light, and the flowering of all that we have initiated during the spring.
In the summer the sun rises warmly above us early in the morning and the flowers respond by blossoming (luxurious expansion) and by reaching upwards to receive its glorious rays. We must also wake up early to receive the sun’s nourishing energy.
In the summer our work, play, travel, leisurely activities and relationships should be such that they fill us with joy, this is the concept of bountiful abundance that typifies the quality of summer, this is the blessing of the summer.
The imagery evoked here is; frolicking through flowery meadows filled with joyous delight in the pursuit of love and happiness.
The name of the game this season is self proprietorship and the renunciation of victimization. The key to realizing the virtue of the summer is to move past the injustices of the past and take full responsibility for our present and future. Self proprietorship and the renunciation of victimization empowers us to take autonomous charge of our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health and well being. It is analogous making lemonade from the lemons. This virtue allows for the aspect of our spiritual self that has never and could never be injured, to emerge and light our way through the darker moments towards the glorious future; self actualization and realization.
This is the season that is associated with the virtue of the fire element both within us and without. The movement and the quality of fire is a naturally occurring phenomenon in the summer, this makes it the ideal time to heal the Heart and Circulatory System, the Small Intestines and to regulate our internal thermostat. On the emotional level this is the perfect time to heal emotional wounds that we’ve carried from the past into the present so that they don’t negatively influence our future.
The positive mental-emotional attributes of the summer/heart are;
Joyfulness – love – proprietorship – faith – appropriate intimacy – passion
The negative mental-emotional attributes of the summer/heart are;
Lack of joy – sarcastic behaviour – bitterness – closed mind (heart) – victimization – lack of faith
The spring is about initiating the movement towards self realization and as such we ask ourselves “who am I?” The summer is about self realization and as such we ask ourselves “why am I here and now?”
In sum, the summer is the season of self realization, abundance, luminosity, joy and love. We are the autonomous captains of our own ships, we have unequivocal seniority of our own space and time, we are not victims of the past or anybody, it is totally up to us to create a bright future for ourselves. Nothing that has happened in the past, has ever, or could ever injure our Spiritual self. We all do indeed deserve our place in the sunshine.
The summer solstice is the apogee of summer and the movement of Fire element and the acupuncture points that are resonant with the summer solstice are; which are;
Heart 8: http://tcmdiscovery.com/2007/8-16/2007816102044.html
Small Intestine 5: http://tcmdiscovery.com/2007/8-16/2007816172533.html
Heart Protector 8: http://tcmdiscovery.com/2007/8-20/200782014479.html
Triple Warmer 6: http://tcmdiscovery.com/2007/8-22/200782210521.html
These acupuncture points can harmonize and synchronize us with the Fire energy of summer and are particularly active and relevant during the week of the summer solstice, they are the quintessential Fire points,
Straight ahead!
Michael Margulis, Ac.
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