Chinese Five Elements: Earth

The season of late summer and the time between each season, is also represented by the element of Earth. This is the difference between Earth and the other elements in terms of seasons – it has a special place, as the transformative part of the season and simultaneously the part of summer when it reaches its latest phase.

Earth quite simply is connected to the earth, and every kind of earth that exists – from deep under us to the mountains above. Thus that can be everything from sand to stones to soil and the earth’s continental plates.

Earth is connected to the transition of the seasons, between each season time. Late Summer time is the time when everything starts to stabilise and reach its peak, and mature after summer’s growth, and this is characterised by the fruits that begin to grow, and the maturation of the crops and plants, literally Summer is when everything becomes ripe after the period of initial growth and beginnings in summer. For animals, it’s when they become adult and fully developed.

Thus, in human nature, Earth represents the kind of qualities we see represented in late Summer time and by the flora’s and fauna’s characteristics of maturation, development and stabilisation. It is adulthood.

This means that the attributes of transformation, thinking, mental clarity and so on are the characteristics we see for the earth type of behaviour patterns we can see in humans.
Those ancients also determined that the Spleen and Stomach organs were also connected with the element of earth. Thus, when the Spleen (the main earth organ) is out of balance, the person can be very anxious and pensive.

This is when you can also see that Spleen disease will start to set in, if they don’t change and learn to develop and heal their Spleen.

When someone has Spleen blockages and or weakness, it was discovered that they can get mouth problems, muscle problems, weight problems, problems of dampness due to lack of transformation of fluids, digestion problems, weight problems and they will generally be experiencing heaviness and slowness in their lives.

In older times, the doctors used to describe people who were anxious as Spleenic, so you can see that not just the eastern peoples were clued into these observations, but it was there that they developed such a deep and complex understanding, that helps us today through energy healing and massage and relaxation other such natural healing methods to cure our ills and bad character deficits.