The Chinese New Year begins today. So much of Chinese culture, whether medicine, astrology or cooking, incorporates the philosophy of the five-elements: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water. Each element has its characteristics and follows 2 cycles of interaction, the generating (clockwise circle in diagram) as well as the controlling (pentagram in diagram). Even each season is related to an element: spring to wood, summer to fire, late summer to earth, autumn to metal and winter to water. This year is the year of the Earth Pig. The Chinese revere this animal as a symbol of wealth and abundance.  

The Chinese follow parallel to the regular (Gregorian) calendar a traditional lunar-solar calendar. The Chinese New Year lands either on the second or third new moon after the winter solstice. Each year is associated with an animal, 12 altogether, and with one of the five element that changes every third year. So the same animal and element comes by again in 60 years. There is are many stories associated with the order of the animals. As a child, I recall seeing a calendar with a picture of the animals in the order of the years arriving to greet Buddha. I have heard of another one with the same animal order coming to greet the Jade Emperor. I imagine this is the Daoist version as opposed to the former, a Buddhist version. The animals obviously possess their strengths and weaknesses, affecting how the year will turn out. Depending on your element and animal, which also has its own related element, these also determine how your year unfolds. Personally, I do see some correlations to the traits of the animals and elements on the year's events, but my belief is that we create our own reality with our actions.
 
This is the beginning of spring for the Chinese. I remember going to the market with my parents as a child to the get new year decorations and food imported from China, as we do not have four seasons in Malaysia. Cherry tree branches with buds was a standard, symbolizing the start of spring, which I could never really understand in the scorching heat and constant growth of plants in the tropics. I don't think I really understood spring until I moved to the west and experienced it for myself. Right now, looking outside with snow flurries still falling or frost on the grass, the feeling of spring hasn't really set in here, yet if you really look deeper you will notice that some plants have already begun that springy action of breaking through earth to manifest its destiny to blossom, like the daffodils in my garden. They are just waiting for the most perfect moment to blossom their delicate blooms of golden. This happens just when the light and temperature are ideal. Something I learnt from planting and reading about Narcissus is that their leaves need to be left alone till they wilt and become brown, which you can then cut off, as these allows bulbs to store enough energy for the next year. For such a short time in the year, for maybe 2 to 4 weeks, these blossoms are at its fullest and then spend the majority of the year storing under the earth in a kind of hibernation.

​So different it is with us humans in our day. We spend little time sleeping or having time to contemplate. We give a lot of energy for action but little for quiet, self-reflection. We wonder then why we are often so tired or rundown. Maybe it's time we learn something from the plants around us and take time for quiet reflection and storing, go to bed a little earlier and spend time during the day doing calming things such as reading or even just breathing. So that when spring officially hits, at the vernal equinox on March 21, with bright sunshine and blossoming plants, we can manifest our life blossoms with a feeling of powerful strength and be able to maintain this all season long.

Photo by user:Bru-nO pixabay
Diagram by Elaine

Right at the beginning of my studies in Chinese Medicine in San Francisco, one of our professors asked us why we were studying the medicine. As I began to ponder on the reasons for it, I realized that part of it had an aspect of tradition and my lineage. My family name Yap (Chinese character on the right of the stamp in the picture), or Yè in Mandarin, means "leaf." I never met my grandparents, as they had passed before I was born, so I only had the stories of the Yap Chinese Medical pharmacy from my mother. My grandfather, from what I understand was a farmer in China, who had left around the turn of the 20th century for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (Malaya in that time). He sold imported herbs from China and learned to pick his own from the local jungles. I imagine my fascination with plants and healing may not just be unique to me but rather a continuation of a lineage of "plant people." 
 
I grew up in Malaysia, spent my twenties studying in the US and for the last 15 years I have been practicing Chinese Medicine in Basel, Switzerland. I find my experiences of living in 3 different continents very enriching, not just the experience of traditions, language and food, but also the energetics of the environment, plants and people. I have come to realize that I am an embodiment of East-meets-West. I feel Western on the inside yet Eastern on the outside.
 
Movement is nourishment for me. I started training in ballet at 5. It taught me control of my physical body, spatial awareness and ability to move in rhythm to music. As I began my Chinese Medicine studies, I also began a journey with Qi Gong and Tai Ji Quan. These were, still are, for me the application and manifesting of Qi, the practice of the theories I was learning in Chinese Medicine school and books. They opened an awareness of the energetic world that exists simultaneously to our physical. Over the past few years, I have started a practice of Yoga. I love stretching my body and mind. Yoga provides me with a space to play with my body-mind, to find balance in sometimes uncomfortable positions but still being able to breathe deeply.   
 
I like listening to stories, of people and plants - of how and where they grow, of things and beings they used to play with, and how they become who they are now. I like practicing Chinese Medicine as it provides me with this possibility. Chinese Medicine has also given me new perspectives to view the world we live in and help me develop skills in sensing as well as observing. 
 
It is this that I want to share with others in this blog, the stories and perspectives I have gained, with the hope that it will inspire others to be excited about life, the earth, people, animals and plants. That life is simple, if we allow it to be. To go back to having that child-like wonder of simple things. Dig your hands into the earth and plant a seed, stand on one leg and fall off balance, to go back to the source of who we really are as living beings on this planet.