Emotions of the FIRE Element in Traditional Chinese Medicine

FIRE... bubbly, giggly, social, charismatic, easily distracted and excited, can have addictive or thrill-seeking tendencies, tends to smile when uncomfortable. These are the qualities, or general personality traits, of the element of Fire, according to TCM.

What may happen when Fire is blocking another element? When Fire blocks Metal, joy transforms into anxiety and escapism. Metal requires silence and calm in order to process trauma, so Fire fills the senses with whatever stimulation it can find. Fire believes that joy and fun are much better than grief and suffering, so why not excite them all the time? People are afraid to be alone with their own thoughts, so they always have to have some stimulation, such as music, games, activities, etc. Fire uses distraction in order to keep Metal from thinking about everything. Even when there is no external stimulus, Fire can create sensations. This is most often seen as a restless mind that all of a sudden kicks into high gear as soon as one tries to go to sleep. 

What may it look like when Fire is the one being blocked? When Water blocks Fire, people struggle to identify even one thing that brings them joy. Life is too serious and too demanding to waste time and energy on frivolous things. Instead of living life, the person is just trying to survive it. They work hard everyday trying to do what is right. Every action is out of obligation to some responsibility that they took on. Activities, which once brought them joy, are now painful and exhausting. This is the kind of depression where one feels numb, disinterested, but keeps trudging along because they don't know what else to do. 

What happens when Fire is opened? When Fire is opened, everything becomes amusing and alluring. Fire deals with our wants and desires, which become inflamed during this time. People often spend too much money, waste too much time, and become fixated on all the shiny things around them. This will not only bring up old passions that had been forgotten, but also old addictions. It is healthy to give in to these to some extent. The question Fire is trying to process is "what is real joy and what is false joy?" False joy is empty stimulation. It comes into the heart, fills it up, feels good, then is suddenly gone. The person constantly needs more false joy in order to keep the heart filled up. Real joy is substantial. It comes into the heart, fills it up, feels good, and it stays. Even years after that joy has passed, the person can look back at memories and still find it. At the beginning of opening, Fire reaches for false joy, but quickly begins to realize its empty nature. The revelation that Fire has is that real joy is all around us all the time. It's all of the little things in life that make it worth living. The sun shining, your favorite shirt, delicious food, anything that brightens your day and puts a smile on your face. Children have a lot of Fire, they see magic and wonder everywhere they look. Opening Fire is about bringing back the magic. 

Fire is in charge of circulating and building blood. It is related to the heart and blood vessels, as well as the small intestine. Circulation not only nourishes the tissues of the body, but warms and stimulates them, as well. Too little circulation and the tissues become underactive or sluggish. Too much circulation and tissues become inflamed and irritated. Fire determines how much stimulation each part of the body gets.

Heart and vascular tonics strengthen the circulatory system so that it can move blood more efficiently. Circulatory stimulants create more excitement in the heart itself, thus giving the heart more Fire to stimulate other parts of the body. Blood deficiency impacts the heart by reducing its energy levels. When the heart is too stimulated, nervines and sedatives can calm down excess Fire.

In addition to emotions, there are many other correspondences to each of the five elements. For example, Fire's quality is heat/combustion, its movement flares upward, its season is summer, its direction is south, its color is red, its taste is bitter, its climate is heat.

For an explanation of the theory of the Five Elements of Traditional Chinese Medicine, please see our past post entitled, "A Simple Introduction to The Five Elements of Traditional Chinese Medicine". Past blogs, as well as future blogs, continue to explore individual elements of the Five Elements theory and how they relate to our emotions. We're excited to share more with you soon!

[The information in this blog is used with permission and taken directly from the transcript of "The Mind-Body Connection in TCM' by Paige Hill of Oak Leaf Herbal. It is for educational purposes only.]