https://open.spotify.com/episode/11IMNgPxMFMkv8hJD2oskf?si=-zAdDUtLRZOZVdrEetodmQ&t=5734

You know that cartoon dog drinking a coffee in a burning room saying “this is fine”. I’m not asking, I’m saying, you know who I mean, the poster dog for the last decade. That is what I think of every time somebody starts in with 18 ways to regulate your nervous system. I also think about a smoke detector going off and everybody being like ugh that smoke detector is so annoying with the beeping.

I have some colleagues in corporate wellness. They are paid to counsel people under inordinate, persistent, prolonged stress to regulate, and get back to work. In a recent post, I talked about how my displeasure with something not working properly was a greater subject of focus than the thing not working properly.

These are all examples of us being frustrated with our alarm systems, rather than what is alarming us. The nervous system has two modes - one for normal, peaceful circumstances and one for emergencies. It is generally thought that it is preferable for our nervous system to be in its peaceful (or parasympathetic) mode most of the time, and to only jolt into emergency (or sympathetic) mode in occasional, brief times of stress - or any excitement, really (peaceful-parasympathetic, stressful-sympathetic).

It is really good to have tools to regulate your nervous system. And it’s really good to be aware if your house is on fire. And if your house is on fire, the problem is not beep beep beep. The problem is your house is on fire. Beep beep beep is letting you know so you can take some important actions. The nervous system lets you know and gives you resources to take action.

In my Buddhism training, we focus on the mind, the response, noticing the response, unhooking it as much as possible from circumstances. It is a superpower and a direct path to happiness to have equanimity, meaning to have one’s peace of mind unreliant on whatever seems to be going on around us. Can I remain calm at the dentist, in the face of a bill with more zeroes in it than I was expecting, during an election, during a tough conversation? The more and more things in life that don’t trigger a panic attack, the better, for sure. No doubt.

But look, the nervous system goes off for REASONS. Fight, flight, freeze, fawn, fuck around, find out are all strategies for facing a threat. The strategies are physiological and instantaneous: our heart rate and blood pressure rise, our pupils and airways dilate, glucose is released, non-essential functions like digestion are slowed and suppressed - all to mobilize resources to survive the threat we face. It used to be that our existential threats were mainly tigers, storms, maybe a warring tribe. Now these threats are coming to us primarily electronically, the news, my God the news, email, slack, tiktok; although the weather and people who want to kill us do persist. Tigers are less of a threat, so that’s nice, although they are endangered and that is VERY UPSETTING TO MY NERVOUS SYSTEM. “Regulating your nervous system” seems to imply switching yourself back into parasympathetic mode - but why is the dog barking? Let’s ask that too. The goal is to not force calm onto ourselves in a burning room, or to punish a dog for barking at a murderous psychopath trying to break into the house.

I asked my very brilliant colleague the author and somatic coach Robin Lassiter* if she could shed some light on all this. Reader, she could. “This is a trap of somatic work and nervous system work,” she replied. “Because of internalized overculture/patriarchy, we think we’re aiming for a flat line. To be good little workers and consumers. What the goal actually is, to me, is an agile nervous system that responds appropriately for the situation, and can then come back to regulation. Not a flatline, but a heartbeat. And an expanded field of experience. We actually feel more highs and lows, but in the present moment. And in most present moments, there isn’t a tiger. And then we can more easily come back to regulation, because we’ve developed awareness of our system and how to tend to it. And how to bring a felt sense of safety in the many moments we are actually safe.”

All of which is to say: it’s hard out here, and when our nervous system goes off, it isn’t because it’s broken. It is because it is more attuned to our survival than our environment is. And it goes off so that we may have resources to respond. This year in this space I am going to be focusing on de-pathologizing our humanity. This incredible brain, this amazing heart, this profoundly sensitive nervous system are not problems. We are NOT BROKEN. We are sensitive, attuned, responsive, living conscious beings figuring out how to do this whole project of being sensitive, attuned, responsive, living conscious beings! And so we have thoughts, and feelings, and responses, and sometimes overreactions. Lots of smart and cool people have things to say about how to work wisely with all this, certainly I have a lot to say about that too. But I don’t want to say anything outside of the context of profound, optimistic, ecstatic reverence for humanity.

“What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty: in form and moving, how express and admirable! in action, how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals!”**

That’s you, honey. You’re not broken.

*https://www.robinlassiter.com

**from Hamlet, by William Shakespeare

Who said it? Can you name all 5 in the comments?

🌳 Wood: Each time the goal is reached, it becomes Not So Much Fun, and we’re off to reach the next one, then the next one, then the next. That doesn’t mean that the goals we have don’t count. They do, mostly because they cause us to go through the process and it’s the process that makes us wise, happy, or whatever. If we do things in the wrong sort of way, it makes us miserable, angry, confused, and things like that. The goal has to be right for us, and it has to be beneficial, in order to ensure a beneficial process. But aside from that, it’s really the process that’s important.

🔥Fire: The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear.

🌎 Earth: ooooooooohhhhhhhh cookie cookie cookie start with C!

🗡️ Metal: A poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every 25th of December.

💦 Water: And in despair I bowed my head;

“There is no peace on earth,” I said;

“For hate is strong,

And mocks the song

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:

“God is not dead, nor doth he sleep!

The Wrong shall fail,

the Right prevail,

With peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Has this ever happened to you? Someone says something I don’t like, or tells me to do something I don’t want to do, and, you know, I don’t like it. As I take a moment to decide how I am going to respond, they flip out. You are so reactive! Why are you getting so upset? It is really UNCOMFORTABLE for people to have to sit there while you are not liking something! Please no knives out! Stop yelling at me! Are things people have said to me while I am sitting unmoving in silence. Not sharpening knives or clearing my throat to prepare to yell, actually just thinking about a diplomatic way to give voice to my no. And because I have gotten so much feedback about, I guess, my face? also trying to find a way to say it that isn’t upsetting to anyone. Is my blood pressure audible? It’s been a solid 35 years since I called someone stupid out loud. It seems to me that my displeasure, my internal, unvoiced, felt displeasure is impossibly painful for others. And for the life of me I can’t understand - why is my no such a problem?

It seems to me that it is not even my no, because the response comes before I say no. It is the presence of my own displeasure, inside my own body. And that makes me feel policed, like my emotions are not allowed to roll through myself and rise into my own awareness as part of my process. Is it harmful to feel a feeling? Am I responsible for hiding my feelings from others?

(Is it - because I am a woman? I have gotten feedback to be “more maternal” but alas, I am not a mother and my mother would have told you to go to your room. I don’t think I actually am prettier when I smile. Am I womaning wrong?)

What is riding, outside of me, on my opinion of it? I am very comfortable not liking things, who likes everything? I know people who sort of like everything and they fall into two categories - enlightened beings and idiots. And dogs? Either way, it’s fine with me.

Am I too hard to please? Well what can I do about that? There is a great deal I love and like in this world, and the counterbalance of my deep appreciation for certain things is some antipathy toward other things. But I am not a critic for the New York Times, my opinion makes or breaks exactly nothing beyond perhaps what I will be eating for dinner.

There have been maybe four times in my 25-year acupuncture practice when I have realized that I can’t be the practitioner for a certain patient. In those moments, maybe four times, I have said, “You know - this isn’t a match. There’s no charge for today, you are free to go.” Generally, this is in the midst of a patient railing about my poor disposition and inadequacy. Usually, what has set them off is I have held a boundary around how long a session is (an hour) or what kind of information I need from them about their case. My no is so incredibly triggering. But from me, there are no hard feelings. Not everyone is a match. Is this too cold?

I try not to say no; I am an ideas person, a problem solver. I finish all the puzzles in the paper before going to work and solving clinical puzzles all day. I love figuring things out, making things work, unknotting the energetic blocks in our emotions, our channels. I take delight in hearing my patients’ perspectives and preferences, I derive clinical information from the difficulties, I see clues in the troubles. I do have a minute whenever a friend texts do you have a minute? I have an hour, I have all day, forever. And I am an optimist. I don’t believe in evil, just confusion. I think any thing can be worked with. I believe everyone can heal, even America. Even humanity. I laugh easily and often, I cry at silly commercials. I am not terrifying!

And I work to appreciate where anyone is coming from, how I might in some way agree with them, or how likely I would be to feel how they feel if I’d been through what they’d been through.

What do we owe each other - in friendship, in love, at work? As a clinician, I have a responsibility to my patients that includes holding them in continuous positive regard, which is both a crazy dream and something I take very seriously. In close relationships, my dream is to be a person of refuge, a port in the storm, a joy. And my dream is to be seen and accepted fully - even my feelings, even my aversions, even my displeasures. Is this, finally, really too much to ask?

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One of the goofiest things anyone has ever said to me - and people, there have been some goofy things - is “wow, I’m surprised a person like you would get angry.” Let’s unpack that. First, what is a person like me? An acupuncturist? A Buddhist? Someone interested in mental health and spiritual growth? A person like me is angry all the time. I am angry at environmental destruction, cruelty toward animals, injustice toward immigrating people, babies in cages, cold winds, bad drivers, you name it, I get angry all the time, every day. So maybe that disqualifies me from spirituality? But maybe it doesn’t. My feelings arise on their own, they happen to me. I am not sitting around generating them. I do sit around and try to generate patience and equanimity, I try to generate goodwill. But these are qualities. Feelings simply arise, and they bring with them some valuable information.

Feelings signal to me that I care about things, people. That I have preferences. In my body they can appear as redness in my face, heat in my head, cold in my feet, butterflies in my stomach, buzzing in my chest. Feelings let me know how close I am to myself, or how out of alignment I am. Like a scorecard, my feelings let me know how someone or something is functioning in my world.

🔥 Anxiety signals to me that my mind is racing ahead of where my body is. I am someone who actually does well in emergencies - I get calm, come into myself. I am anxious not when I am in trouble, but when I am imagining some future trouble, and projecting my mind into the future without a body to ground into. My heart and thoughts race. When I start feeling hot, racy, ungrounded, I know I need to come back to the present. Purring cats are a great help with this. I have 3 purry cats. They know how to help.

🌎 Overwhelm is a signal that I have picked up more than my share of a problem. This usually happens not when I am dealing with my own problems, but when I have leaned too far into someone else’s problems. I don’t really believe in “other people’s problems” - I am here to help and I don’t leave someone bleeding on the road. And yet, each of us has her own road to walk. Overwhelm signals to me that I have tried to walk someone’s road for them instead of with them.

🗡️ Righteous indignation signals to me that something in my environment is out of alignment with my morality. Someone is driving in a way I find careless, dangerous. Someone is taking advantage of someone vulnerable in a way I think should stop. I have a desire to point out the wrong and litigate the injustice, get everyone on my side against the perpetrator. When I start building a case and swelling with moral grandeur, I try to pause. Compassion is missing from this emotion, even though very often the indignation is triggered from a sense of moral justice. But I understand the solution to injustice can only be justice, which is love in action. Justice can never arise from hate.

🌊 Fear and panic in my body signal to me that I am feeling unresourced in the face of something big, usually an unknown, like “is our society going to collapse and if so what kind of car would it be best to drive” (and other worries). The opposite of fear is not courage, because courage menas being afraid and doing it anyway - they have to coexist. The true opposite of fear is surrender. I don’t control the weather and I don’t personally bear sole responsibility for the life of our democracy. I surrender to the fact that while there may be many right actions for me to take, I do not control any of the outcomes, not even one tiny little bit (ouch).

🌳 Anger signals to me that my vision for how things should be and could be in the world is not being heeded. In big and small ways, people and institutions make their own choices every day, very often at odds with how I think things should be. My amazing problem-solving, systems-thinking brain is generating solutions all day long. I spent my time in India dreaming up sweeping government programs to help the poor when really I was supposed to be meditating. But I can’t help it! My brain just does that all damn day. And then I get mad when India doesn’t reform. Talk about goofy. Anger signals to me to return to my deep care for others, the root and branch of why I am trying to generate solutions - so all these beings I care for can suffer less. Hating people for causing suffering is not entirely sensible, but that doesn’t stop me. I hate people because I love people. Anger is my signal that I am in this loop, and I am grateful to it for pointing me again and again back to my own great big beating heart.

I spend a lot of time thinking about what makes a good, healthy life. For me, that is hard work, lots of exercise, ample time to read and rest, a deep bathtub, the ability to walk among trees, to eat with my friends, to go on adventures. That’s what makes me feel good, and I am very happy to be blessed with the physical and material means to live the way I want. At 54, I have just recently started noticeably, visibly aging and it has weirdly come as a shock. I think because it took so long to start showing up that maybe…I thought aging wasn’t for me? Like somehow I thought that aging was an “other people problem”? I eat a lot of kale, but still, I age. Huh!

And now that it’s happening, I see that I must work to keep what I have. More vegetables, more rest, more exercise, added hormones coming in from the outside. I have been poor, grew up poor, spent a long time with very little, but I didn’t experience scarcity of energy, collagen, resilience until now. And I notice - scarcity makes me grumpy, selfish. I get why people get grumpy and selfish, I feel it in me, this clenching.

There is no question - I am in the autumn of my life. There will be no spring, I am in the third quarter. Writing this, I am watching the early November sun set on the golden trees and it is splendid, and fading. It feels heavy-handed, the metaphor I am looking at through the window. Dry air, falling leaves, weakening light, THE FALL.

In Chinese medicine, autumn is connected to the Metal element. Metal perceives the lesson in autumn, that your gorgeousness won’t save you, leaves are falling on the ground (time I was on my way), nothing gold can stay. It is a masterclass in grieving, in being in love with it all, and knowing everything must go; unclenching the fist, the sphincter, the big exhale of letting it all go. Even the most precious, the most beloved, the most beautiful yellows, become brittle and fall, and freaking out about it makes no difference at all. Of course we are free to freak out, it just isn’t any use. Metal runs the energy of the Lungs, who exhale, and the Large Intestine, who ruthlessly poops out even the most delicious, expensive food. Holding our breath and becoming anally retentive, while sometimes appealing, do not protect us, and Metal understands this. Autumn understands this. Grief as a process understands this.

What is scarcity, grumpiness, selfishness, but a refusal to grieve? And hey, if it worked, to clench, I would be for it. But the one true thing I absolutely know for sure is life is a forward game. And what I don’t absolutely know for sure but deeply suspect is true is that opening to it is some kind of magic.

The opposite of clenching - opening. The opposite of scarcity - generosity. To be in my life in its goldening is to be generous, with my time, my expertise, my money, my car, my garden, the teachings I have received and been tasked to share. Like the turning of a great wheel, the blessings I have been given turn into gifts I get to bestow. The nonsensical concept of scarcity in a Wisconsin forest or meadow, sky full of air, sun full of vitamin D (and I’m guessing much more than that, like the source of all life in our solar system) almost makes me laugh on a day like today. I turn toward, unclench, allow blessings to flow through me, sampling them as they pass by and savoring this light here together with you in this moment, and turning with wonder even toward night, even toward winter, with an ever more open heart, and fist, and mind.

photo by Dave Becker

We are in a crisis of crises - there are just so many to choose from! And to survive now is a whole thing. It is easier the higher your position on the White Supremacy pyramid, to be sure: that dictates whether you are struggling to not be abducted in broad daylight from your workplace or you are struggling to make rent, to be safe from assault walking down the street because of your gender or skin color or mental health status, or to make sense of the rapid degradation of what previously felt like a civilization with a lot of promise, a planet with no end of resources, a future.

And we are supposed to gain mastery over how to layer facial serums? Is it me or can we NOT??? I’d like to state for the record that it is unlikely at this late date that I am about to lose ten pounds through bio-hacking, even though I think that Diary of a CEO podcast guy is super lovely, I really do. I have started lifting weights though, because what is fun about menopause is everything hurts and you have to exercise four times as much and never drink wine.

Menopause is not a Crisis, I always say. It isn’t climate change, it isn’t genocide. It’s just that it is all happening at once and what menopause does not bring to the table is INCREASED EMOTIONAL RESILIENCE. So we do have to build that and it does look a lot like self-improvement. The vegetables, the protein, the hydration, the yoga. The meditating. Lord, the meditating!

I have a job where people come into my office and dump out their proverbial purses all over the floor and then I kind of make sense of it and help them sort it out and give them a plan for moving forward. And right now, that feels sort of mean. I don’t know if it even makes sense or is possible to get our heads together and our shit straight. It’s just - I don’t know any other way.

What I am intending to create is a shame-free or at least very low-shame environment for seeing what is possible in the cultivation of things that will help us suffer less, and help others suffer less, and protect people and land and freedoms. I’ve heard strong quads help with that, so I do squats. I have heard an ability to remain radically present in difficulty will help with that so, yes, I meditate (and I teach meditation on Zoom on Friday mornings, it is free and you and your Mom are welcome) and I’ve heard community will help with that so hi! Hi. How are you? What do you need? Do you have a good soup recipe? What’s something you are excited about?

(Also it is kind of my dream office, a shack on the water next to a mountain. But I live in Milwaukee, so.)

photo by Alexander Andrews

We are stardust, the consequence of the Nothing becoming so intense it exploded into the Everything. The Everything takes form through five dominant phases of matter, explained in Chinese medicine through the metaphor of the elements.

Each of us is a dynamic, evolving expression of all five phases, and we tend to have a perspective in which one or two are dominant, and a few are quieter, even hidden from us, in shadow. And as epic as this dance of phase shifts that defines our existence is, still we are required to do things like choose a profession and renew our license plates.

When I was learning the concept of Right Speech, part of the Four Noble Truths theory of Buddhism, I read that I should let my speech pass through four gates - is it true, is it helpful, is it kind, is now the time? That is a great metric for choosing what and when and to whom to speak, and I wish it was a physical filter I could put over my sometimes too quick and sharp tongue. Similarly, in Right Action, we are called upon to act with an eye toward the greatest good, the liberation of all beings from suffering.

So given that our worldview, our perspective, our mood, and our goals are all deeply inflected by the five phases - or elements - generally, and given that we each have our own dynamic ratio of which elements’ wisdoms are most apparent to us, I thought it might be fun to create a five element rubric for actions. When making a decision, let your action pass through five gates:

🔥 Is it in joyful service to the community? Are we connected, creatively, to a sense of purpose that makes our heart sing? Will it be fun to do?

🌎 Is it nourishing to you and those around you? Is it stabilizing, restorative, sustainable, abundant?

🗡️ Is it fair, just, and legal?

🌊 Is it connected spiritually? Is there room for instinct, dreams and visions, the inchoate wisdom of night?

🌳 Is there strategy to it? Will whatever course of action we undertake today work?

I don’t find it that fun to renew my license plates, but I don’t need to go through a big decision process on that. I just do it. (Because I have a reasonably healthy metal element and appreciate traffic laws and roads and stuff.) When I am really not sure about something, it helps to have a framework that allows me to check in not just with my obvious desires, but with my implicit values. Checking each element is one way to do that. Go forth and prosper!

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In Five Element theory, each element is connected to an emotional spectrum, and is in a very proscribed relationship to each other element. When we come to understand these resonances and relationships, we can begin to interact more functionally with all of it, and it starts to feel more like a symphony and less like a hurricane.

🔥imagines the joyful interconnected emergence of everything, or catatstrophizes (imaginatively!) how it is all falling apart. It is the dance of joy, humor, creativity, imagination, and anxiety, which is nothing more than a creatively imagined (negative) future.

🌎 is the very center around which everything spins, who in health nourishes and digests - what to take in and what to leave aside; but in stress can become stuck, overwhelmed by choice, unable to move forward, mulling, ruminating, overthinking.

🗡️ determines without nostalgia what serves, and what is no longer useful - the wisdom to exhale a spent breath knowing another will come and can only come once this breath is gone. Metal confers the ability to grieve the most precious things once it is time to let them go. In stress, it becomes cold, rigid, unfeeling, avoidant; in deficiency it can become grasping, insecure. Water grants the serenity to accept the things you cannot change, wood the capacity to change the things you can, and metal the wisdom to know the difference.

🌊 is the seat and basis of courage to face the unknown. To swim into the darkest waters not because the waters are safe, but because you know how to swim. In deficiency it becomes phobic, disconnected from intuition and inner power, paralyzed, frozen.

🌳is the energized problem solver who translates crisis as opportunity. Every impediment is seen as a chance to go back and create something more expansive, stronger, more durable. In stress, it feels impediments are personal and unsurmountable, and becomes enraged. In excess, it generates ideas and tasks at a pace that is impossible and punishing for those around them, and for themselves.

There is a cycle of nourishing whereby each element feeds the next. There is also a controlling cycle whereby each element subdues another from going into dysfunction.

In the controlling cycle, fire softens and tempers the rigidity of metal, making it moldable into something useful, like a sword. Similarly the fire element’s laughing nature eases a stressed metal’s desire to regain control of life with a spreadsheet of rules and regulations. In turn, metal’s dispassionate discernment keeps wood from excessive branching, just as an ax prunes away what does not serve the tree. A tree’s roots restrain earth from eroding just as the natural vision of wood helps earth stop spinning out and move into a workable routine. As earth forms the banks of bodies of water, earth’s routines and steadiness brings the formlessness of the water element into lake, river, ocean, stream - a manifestation into form from the unconscious.

I find this framework so hopeful and so useful. One million people have told me to be less angry. But only metal’s cool discernment has actually helped me to emerge from impotent frustration and into a sense of my own morality, and not a bar set by someone else’s annoying actions, to determine my course. And when my own metal starts acting a little self-righteous, my playful fire element parrots myself back to me in the guise of Sam the Eagle from the Muppets. I snort, and soften.

You’ll hear 5 Element people talking about creativity being within the domain of the fire element, and there is truth in that - grabbing a spark of an idea from the air and seeing in it a work of art, or hearing a song where there wasn’t one is a distinctly fire process. But that isn’t all there is to art, and it does a disservice to artists to say so. It also does a disservice to those of us who think we aren’t artists, aren’t creative, don’t contain that special thing that those people over there have.

We all contain and are comprised by nothing other than essence moving through time in archetypal forms of fire, earth, metal, water and wood. Every thought, impulse and body part is an expression of this movement, and you are not lacking any quality that would allow you to dance this dance.

To use the example of creativity…

🔥 is the spark of an idea

🌎 is the ability to manifest that idea into the form of a painting, sculpture, song, dance - to bring the idea into form

🗡️ can tell whether it’s any good, whether your art lives up to its spark (it almost never does and that is totally part of it)

🌊 goes into the depths and finds courage to present this tender baby to the cruel world, and

🌳 connects to collaborators, agents, networks and systems of people who every creative person needs to represent, show, promote their work to an audience.

To look at it another way…

🔥 is the opera

🌎 is the theater where it happens and the singer making the sound

🗡️ is the conductor, keeping time and holding the architecture of the piece

🌊 is the space within each audience member that hears and resonates with the art

🌳 is the director, calling the shots, choreographing the movement, seeing all the moving parts that need to be in sync backstage, onstage, and in the offices, to create a harmonic whole.

We all contain these capacities, it’s just that some of us are more in touch with certain elemental tendencies than others. Do you recognize yourself anywhere in here?

Each of us has a unique perspective and an approach for meeting the moment. Different approaches can lead to arguing about strategy and perspective, and advising/criticizing one another. Sometimes, a different approach is exactly what’s needed; trusted, wise counsel is inspiring and liberating. But there are so many ways for this to go wrong. Often, advice feels less like “hey, there may be a more helpful perspective here” and more “you are fundamentally wrong as a human and you need to be the opposite of you”. With any kind of advice, there is both intention and impact - what I mean to say, and how I am heard. Sometimes my words might be out of alignment with my true beliefs, and sometimes my words might be heard to mean something I did not intend them to mean. It’s hard to carry meaning from the center of my mind, through my mouth, across space, into your ears (or eyes) and into your mind, and have that original meaning unaltered by the process.

Some people are hypersensitive and will take almost anything as an insult, or correction.

And some people are trying to control us, seduce us, sell us something. Throwing us off our own center is a good way to leave us feeling like we need advice from outside, and vulnerable to manipulative messaging. Some people are kindly but perhaps misguidedly trying to save us from embarrassing ourselves, taking risks, making mistakes, enjoying ourselves at the beach.

Your own personal body has a set of signature preferences based on age, genetics, environment and its own past. When we can get in tune with THAT INSIDE INFORMATION, we can make better use of all the amazing outside information, namely by being able to tell for ourselves which of it to apply and when. There is simply no better health information than that coming from your internal compass.

Your body likely resonates along a few elemental lines. Some of us have one strong dominant element. Others of us have two or three. We are all comprised of all five. I offer this framework so you can see what feels good to you - what feels like you. Notice the urge to be aspirational toward one of them - “I wish I were metal!” and notice what feels most authentic to you, and how that feels - “oh cool, I’m fire” or “oh darn, I’m Earth.” There are no better or worse elements, just unkind judgements that have been installed into you about you to control you, and we don’t have to play like that any more. See what resonates, grapple with what provokes, and leave what does not serve. There is no one right way.

🌳 Wood loves New Year’s resolutions, a forty-step plan for getting in “your best shape ever!”, totally rearranging the pantry, a month of food planning, registering for a marathon. Does it actually want to live that way though? When wood is going strong, the master fitness plan is invigorating. But wood can be punishing, demanding more from the body and spirit than body and spirit have to give. Wood’s aspiration can outpace deliverables, leading to frustration and harsh self-criticism. Wood, listen to me: just have a pickle and go play Frisbee in the park and leave the whole plan for another day, sometimes, okay? Touch grass.

🔥Fire is inspired to move and eat through creativity and play. This is the child who needed their peas delivered by airplane. Their best exercise is rock climbing, African dance, capoeira, synchronized swimming. Ponies! Goat yoga! Variety and hilarity to spark expressive motion. Fire can go too hard as a gourmand, loving the splendor of food and wine and feasts with friends to the detriment of what the body can process, or they can go too bright and neglect food altogether for more interesting pursuits. A boring routine in the kitchen or gym will never last, dieting and withholding enjoyment will hurt your soul. Beautiful, colorful food is the healthiest. Rx: dark chocolate with raspberries.

🌎 Earth loves naps and snacks, long walks in the forest, swimming in a cold lake, apple cinnamon tea, pumpkin soup, spending the day in the garden, hauling heavy stuff around, tidying the house, roasting all the vegetables. Shire stuff. Earth types benefit from routine, roughly the same food in the same amount at the same time each day. (In their special cup, yes Earth I know you have a very favorite mug, bowl, spoon.) When overworked, Earth types neglect nutrition and fuel and soothe themselves with sweets, which in excess can stress their systems further, leading to the biggest Earth problem: inertia, couch potatohood. On the other hand, sometimes you really do need to lie on the couch all day. It’s a balance. Treat yourself like you would an adorable rescue donkey.

🗡️ Metal thrives on routine and structure. Disciplined and organized, metal is happy to get up at 5am, make a protein shake, count macros, do six workouts a week, cross-train. The metal body type is lean, muscular, triangular. I think of a swimmer’s body, broad shoulders, slim hips, toned. Washboard abs! Great job metal. Make sure to sometimes have a mint chip hot fudge sundae. Don’t let your lovely discipline curdle to emotional constipation. 🤘🏻

💦 Water likes salty, crunchy food and eating in peace. Imagine a bowl of miso, salmon, and sea vegetables in a serene room. Japanese cuisine has Water on lock, which makes sense as Japan is a nation of islands. Yoga, qi gong, flowing movement. Cycles of activity, meditation, and rest. Room for the mystery, the arising. The water body tends to be graceful, fluid. You don’t see the ripped lines of muscle but they don’t lack strength. When out of flow, water can become amorphous, unable to initiate or enact the changes they would like to make to their routine.

Do you find yourself anywhere in here? Does any of this suggest a sustainable, nourishing path forward that is specific to you, approachable and kind? Let me know what comes up, and how it goes.

PS It’s rough because my job involves a certain amount of giving advice, and I think about how and if and when to give it wisely all the time. On her podcast GOOD HANG, Amy Poehler said that for a whole year, she didn’t give anyone advice who didn’t ask - and NO ONE ASKED. People, if no one wants to hear from Amy Poehler, well, that should give us all pause.

PPS Amy Poehler, please advise me, I’m not kidding, open to feedback on literally everything, who are all these fools with access to you not asking your advice?????Thank you in advance, K great thx bye.

PPPS None of this is secretly advice on how to lose weight. You’ll never find that here. You are plenty good looking. This is about being healthy and in tune with yourself PERIOD.

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🌳 Wood plans the march - sees that we need to get on the streets, sets the date and time, gets the team in place, delegates responsibilities. Like, now.

🔥Fire inspires - paints hilarious and moving signs, leads group cheers to remind us who we are and what we are marching for. Potentially organizes some weirdly compelling street theater to happen along the way. With puppets or something?

🌎 Earth is craft services - makes snacks for the march, gives people rides, and offers a place to crash and take a bath after.

🗡️ Metal organizes the permits, bails us out of jail, represents us in court. What’s up, ACLU? SO METAL 🤘🏻

💦 Water holds down the fort energetically, sending reiki, anchoring our work in peace and the deeper wisdom that we are part of a much larger flow underlying all things.

The great thing about every system on the planet being in a completely inter-related set of crises is that whatever you add, whatever way you contribute, will help all of it. Baking brownies for the resistance is a real contribution. Meditating is a real contribution. Grieving this moment is a real contribution. There is so much to process right now and so much to do but none of us needs to or can do it all and none of us needs to do anything in a way that does’t align with our inner experience.

How do you feel like showing up now? I want to hear from you.

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And it’s all my fault.

I am sorry, on behalf of everyone in the health wellness beauty self-help self-improvement game. I think the chances are that most people in my field, like me, are just trying to help. To help you with your goals? And yet where did these goals come from in the first place? I am almost certain I was not born wishing for shinier hair, tighter abs, improved gut biota, or enlightenment. I think I was born marveling at sunlight, in thrall to all that is. I have seen pictures of me as a baby and I look comfortable as hell in my plump little body, all bald and downy and curious. Pretty delighted with life, unless I was cold, hungry, or wet. And you? When you were born, how much did you hate about yourself? How much did you lack?

So, hello! Hi. I am a Doctor of Acupuncture and Chinese medicine, specializing in complex, internal, integrative medicine. I am not against drugs or science, I am not against spirituality or nutrition-based solutions, chemotherapy, entheogens, anti-depressants, reiki, lorazepam, vaccines. I love to match a problem with its best tool, it’s kind of a superpower of mine. AND YET, the nature of doctoring is so rooted in diagnosis: how are you broken, what is your pathology called, and how have you caused this problem through being inadequately focused on health/perfection? There is something deeply gross in how closely medicine these days is hewing to an uber-mensch perfectionism, bio-hacking our way to immortality, one ten thousand dollar treatment at a time.

Well, fuck it. I respectfully withdraw from this approach (rooted, I am confident, almost entirely in a desire to help).

What I am offering now is something different: using the integrative tools I have to help you come out of the closet as the unique glorious weirdo you very likely are (if you are reading this I can almost guarantee a weirdo sent it to you, possibly me, and that you are a weirdo too), to shine and thrive as you are, as Rome burns, to show up in this world in all its crises, and to do good, somehow. Soul medicine for the resistance. Community, solidarity, and celebration of our imperfect offerings to make the world over as we want it to be; free from the plagues of famine and war, hating each other, degrading our only home/planet into something less than hospitable to ourselves.

The planet isn’t broken either. She’s fine, she’s great, but she’s got problems and so do we, and we are going to have to love ourselves and her back toward wholeness. Not through enumerating how wrong and shameful and disgusting we are, not through diagnosis. Through moving toward and then from our most radiantly authentic expression, the good stuff that inspires us and is us. (Yes I am sort of quoting Obi-Wan Kenobi but I am pretty confident he was sort of quoting a doctor of Chinese medicine, or at least we are both quoting Eastern wisdom.)

And here are the five questions we are going to ask and address to get there, for ourselves and our offerings:

1. Is it fun? Are we connected, playfully, to a sense of purpose that makes our heart sing?

2. Does it make any sense at all? Is it logical, ethical?

3. Is there strategy to it? Will whatever we undertake today lead to an evolving, dynamic course of action that will actually work today and bear fruit in the future?

4. Does it arise from and support a sense of community? Does it provide for everyone abundantly? Like, ALL beings?

5. Is it connected spiritually? Is there room for dreams and visions, the inchoate wisdom of night? (No witches will be oppressed in this framework, I can tell you that right now.)

These approaches are drawn from Five Element Theory of Chinese Medicine, and each set of questions arises from a specific element. It is likely and correct that some of them matter more to you, resonate more with you, than others, depending on your constitutional nature. Your job is to go toward the question that enlivens you, and work from there. There are enough of us, if we all give what we have from what inspires us, to get whole and happy, to live fully, and to co-create the future we want for our cats. And kids, or whatever. The bugs in the yard the birds at the beach.

This whole substack is going to be about the elements, your elemental nature, and how to work with it to better understand and accept yourself, and to thrive. And also probably some pep talks, because I am a rabble rouser and I like enthusiasm. I try hard.

This is the start, and I have already said a lot and I am going to say a whole bunch more. This is my newsletter, yes? I’d love to hear from you. Talk to me! (Unless you’re a jerk, in which case please zip it, I am not having it in here.) Let me know what resonates and what you are needing in these WEIRD ASS DAYS and just know, I am so totally here for it. Love you, mean it.

PS Hey also I am teaching a two-hour class this Sunday on figuring out your elemental nature and getting in alignment with it, lmk if you’re interested

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