Foods 'n' Herbs

The Five Elements and Our Internal System  

In nature, there are the five vital elements: wood, fire, earth, metal and water. They have very interesting inter-relationships with each other. They rely on each other to coexist through mutual promotion and control. This is the law of nature: a system for indefinite rejuvenation.

The Cycle of Mutual Promotion of the Five Elements:  

• Water promotes wood.
• Wood promotes fire.
• Fire promotes earth (when burning down wood).
• Earth promotes metal (when burying wood).
• Metal promotes water (when melted by fire).

• Metal controls (chops) wood but controlled by fire.
• Fire controls metal but controlled by water.
• Water controls fire but controlled by earth.
• Earth controls water but controlled by wood.
• Wood controls earth but controlled by metal.

This analogy is true to our five vital organs. Liver has the same characteristics as wood that is growing and unfolding. Heart is the same as fire that is warming and flaring up. Spleen is the same as earth that is receiving, transforming and generating. Lung is the same as metal that is purifying and descending. Kidney is the same as water that is nourishing and flowing downward.

The Cycle of Mutual Promotion of the Five Vital Organs: 

• Kidney (water) promotes liver (wood).
• Liver (wood) promotes heart (fire).
• Heart (fire) promotes spleen (earth).
• Spleen (earth) promotes lung (metal).
• Lung (metal) promotes kidney (water).

The Cycle of Mutual Control of the Five Vital Organs:  

• Lung (metal) controls liver (wood) but controlled by heart (fire).
• Heart (fire) controls lung (metal) but controlled by kidney (water).
• Kidney (water) controls heart (fire) but controlled by spleen (earth).
• Spleen (earth) controls kidney (water) but controlled by liver (wood).
• Liver (wood) controls spleen (earth) but controlled by lung (metal).

By applying the law of nature to our body system, Chinese medicine can interpret the symptoms and determine the causes of our health problems. When one organ fails, the symptoms usually show up in another. For example, when the lung energy is weak, the liver energy becomes out of control and develops into headaches or high blood pressure. In this case, treating the lungs is necessary in curing liver-related symptoms.

The following table describes the characteristics of our vital organs.

Each season and climate has adverse effects on one of our organs. However, during this time of vulnerability, it is also the time when we can treat and benefit the organ by feeding it with the right nutrition.

The five tastes are found to have health promotional effects on the five organs. For example, sweet benefits the spleen and digestion. That is why dessert is good after meals. But too much of a good thing can be bad. If the diet has too much sweet taste, it dampens the spleen system and makes it very sluggish and not able to function properly. Likewise, too much salt can lead to kidney stones. Meals with good balance of the five tastes are most beneficial to our health. 

Emotions can have damaging effects on our vital organs. Too much sadness damages our lungs. Over joyfulness causes heart attacks. Extreme anger hurts our livers. Too much worrying causes indigestion. Extreme frightfulness damages our kidneys.