Water speaks to movement, current, adaptability, and flow. It is pluripotent possibility, a multidirectional wonder. As the Mother of Wood, Water carries the seed of deep potential. In its poised quiescence as a reflective pool, it gathers the moonglow on its surface and stews the yin juices of mystery, a womb for creation to crawl out of. In its yang expression, it plunges forward with the wrath of a flood or the renewing geyser of a sulfur spring. Winter encapsulates the archetypal energy of Water, a sacred pause of nurturing stillness where the buried seed gathers energy before the bursting of Spring. As the Water element throughout the cosmos brings reserves, raw power, and a will to move forward undaunted whilst tapped into a mystical current of flow, the Water element within imparts fathomless resources and the discretion to use them justly, flowing along in the gentle current of nature.
In the physical realm, Water represents things that sink to the depths and flow through the innermost caverns of the body. Think glands, bones, discs, sex organs, and the juicy sap of marrow and blood that imparts the spiraling, fluid power of life. Under pressure, watery folks get introspective and frozen. Their internal weather might be cool, and their outer landscape might be like the winter, with puffiness, dark circles, and barren patches. Health issues are triggered by excess salt, processed foods, and drawing heavily upon their willpower without slowing down to replenish.
Winter
Cold
Metals
Earth
Seed, Dissolving, Flowing Downward
Maximum Yin
Storing, Hibernating, Gestating, Gathering, Potential Energy
Manifesting potential in stillness like a fathomless black lake under the pregnant moon
3 - 7 pm
The Kidneys, Bladder, Bones, Ears, Sex Organs
Vital circulation system: transporting substances throughout the bodies of living things, whose bodies in turn are at least 70 percent water.
Conduit of flow: moving nutrients, pathogens, and sediment in and out of aquatic ecosystems, flowing in and out of phases as water cycles from solid to liquid to gas.
Regulation & Regeneration: forming the basis of Earth’s climate system that cools and regulates temperature to make life possible, regenerating itself over as its cycles create air, clouds, oceans, lakes, vegetation, snowpacks, and glaciers.
Nourishment & Fertilization: propelling plant growth and providing the nutrients and minerals necessary to sustain physical life.
Storage & Habitat: providing a dwelling and breeding ground for fish, mammals, amphibians, insects and other water-birthed organisms as a reservoir of raw power.
The primordial realms of reproductive drives. Things that are deep, dark, cold, shadowy, and sink to the depths. The rivers and tributaries of bone marrow, lymph, cerebrospinal fluid, semen, and blood that yoke together the serpentine mysteries of DNA with the spiraling, fluid power of life. The sense of listening that allows us to know the unseen, what’s coming but isn’t yet known.
Epigenetic Ancestral Life Force & The Will To Live
The High Priestess, The Queen of Cups, Strength, The Moon, The Hanged Man
Feeling creative, intuitive, ingenious, imaginative, and perceptive. Awakening to your patterns, making the unconscious conscious. Being spontaneous, embodied, patient, and persevering. Flowing forward regardless of blocks. Craving rest and giving it to yourself, feeling the need to go inward, seeking solitude, reveling in quietude. Being determined, yet gentle and yielding. Possessing a deep inner world and connection to source, being in effortless flow, knowing how to just be.
Running on sheer will and adrenaline, pushing against the flow, feeling maxed out, frozen, aloof, phobic, suspicious, and pessimistic. Being lost in one’s own thoughts, acting absent-minded, scattered, resistant to structure, and prone to fantasy. Wallowing in fear, repressing instinctual impulses, suffering from emotional frigidity.
Premature aging, dark circles, water retention, poor circulation, cold extremities, kidney & bladder dysfunction, frequent urination, degenerated discs, back & knee pain, thyroid disorders, osteoporosis, grey hair, infertility, low libido, dental problems, weak eyesight & hearing, neurodegenerative conditions, hormonal imbalances, poor memory, drawing excessively on willpower, adrenaline-fueled bravado (and its twin, adrenal exhaustion), excessive sex drive, joint degeneration, an inability to face your fears.
People with strong Water energy tend to be intuitive, creative, fluid, and strong, with a deep inner world and obsession with the occult and the unknown. They are self-sufficient, uncompromising visionaries that possess an endless wellspring of creative potential and tenacious strength. When tapped into their current, they plod forward in their pursuits regardless of barriers, time, convention, or the needs of their body. As such, their inner landscape can be absent-minded, disembodied, and a bit aloof. They need structure (but are resistant to it), and are prone to getting lost in their thoughts, fantasies, and eccentric hobbies in private. Water energy needs to feel fertile and flowing, like a river, tributary, or moonlit lake, housing infinite mysteries and reservoirs of raw potential. When our Water element is stagnant or frozen, we may find ourselves in fight, flight, or freeze states, withdrawing into a world of irrational fears. A person with strong Water energy needs to be imagining and creating new worlds in order to feel fully alive.
Dive deep into stillness, spelunking the cavernous depths. Keep your eye on what’s emerging, what’s gestating in the inner sea, what’s dancing in the rhythms of your bone marrow.
