Jade Mountain series: Are you burning the heart fire?

The Revelstoke Mountaineer welcomes Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) practitioner Erin Potter’s summer series focusing on the cornerstone elements of TCM, and how they relate to your physical, mental, and emotional health and well being. The series will explore how TCM is interconnected with the seasonal rhythms of mountain life, and how it can help you achieve goals like improved athletic performance or a more healthful harmony with our mountain climate. Part II: Burning the heart fire

A little while ago I went through a bout of not sleeping. I mean, not falling asleep. At all. It was terrible. And the more I thought about it, the worse it got. I would go to work exhausted and by about midday I really needed a pick me up so I would go over to the Modern and order myself an almond milk latte. This became my routine. The problem was, although I got that initial jolt of energy, in the long run I was setting myself back even further. This was hard on my system, but most directly challenging to my heart (the fire element in my body).

If you suffer from insomnia, you know what this is like — the morning after a long night of little sleep. Photo:
Mislav Marohnić photo via Creative Commons license https://www.flickr.com/photos/mislav-marohnic/5233928419/in/photostream/

The main reason I wasn’t sleeping was because I had a lot on my mind. I was finding myself anxious, constantly projecting into the future and finding it difficult to really be in the moment.

Anxiety, agitation, and frenzy are typical symptoms of problems with the fire element. The time between 11 a.m.—1 p.m. is when the energy is most vulnerable within the heart and is therefore the worst time to jolt it with a caffeinated substance.

So, instead of allowing my body to get the appropriate rest and relaxation it needed, I was demanding production at a time when there was a system malfunction.

This type of pattern is similar to a gambler who has run out of money, but begs, borrows and steals to stay in the game. This meant that when it was time to settle and relax, my heart and mind didn’t have the appropriate support to do so.

Seeing as we can’t really avoid the occasional stressors in our life, it is important to recognise when our body is overcompensating and needs a little help. When the fire element is overwhelmed or depleted, we can find ways to cool and nourish it.

If you look at a colour wheel, opposite to red (fire) is green. So taking walks in a green forest, eating more greens and cooling foods, taking appropriate rest, avoiding stimulating substances and minimizing stress all can be extremely beneficial.

Of course, meditation can be immensely helpful to reestablish the connection with our sympathetic nervous system — our rest and digest state. As an old Zen saying goes, “You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day, unless you’re too busy, then you should sit for an hour.”