Application of Five Elements

Applying this theory to the body is actually just a matter of

plugging in for the variables. Wherever you see an element, replace
it with it's corresponding zangfu organs. The examples below show
the zang organs.

Generating Cycle

Controlling Cycle

This simple substitution is enough to explain how the organs

interact within the body. Oriental Medicine, being mostly a system
based on imbalances as the cause of disease, now has a second
form of pathology along with the yin-yang theory. The examples
below will make more sense as you read on and learn the functions
of the organs.

Application Examples of the Cycles

1. One of the most common pathologies, as you will learn, is Liver

Qi Stagnation. This pathology is often accompanied by problems
with the digestive system. This is an excess of the liver. According to
this theory, the liver controls the spleen. If the liver is in excess as it
is here, it will over-act on the spleen and interfere with it's ability to
transform and transport food.

2. Using the generating cycle, we see that the kidneys generate or

are the mother of the liver. You will learn later on that the kidneys
are the root of the yin of the body. Additionally, the liver stores the
blood of the body and is susceptible to deficiency of blood if too
much is used during the active hours. Since the kidney is the
mother of the liver, you can nourish the yin of the kidneys, to in
turn nourish the blood of the liver (as blood is part of the yin of the
body).

3. The heart controls the lungs. When the heart is in excess it will
over-act upon the lungs. Symptoms of heart excess are often
accompanied by shortness of breath and chest oppression, affecting
the ability of the lungs to control the airways.

Application Examples of the 5 Element Chart

Five Elements Metal

Seasons

Autumn

Environment

Dry

Zang Lung
Fu

Large Intestine

Directions West
Tastes

Pungent

Sense Organs
Tissues

Nose

Skin and Hair

Emotions Grief
Remember the chart that you saw on the previous page. Lets take
the element Metal as an example. Here you have a chart of
correspondences. If a patient comes to you complaining of anything
in the chart you attribute it to an imbalance in that particular
organ. If someone comes in and is in grief, has either skin issues or
dry and brittle hair, or maybe a pungent taste in the mouth,
you attribute the imbalance to the Lung. The same goes for the rest
of the organs.
In addition, the colors are important, which are noted by the color
of the cell in chart. The Japanese school of five phase, for example,
rubs the skin of the forearm and then looks to see a color shading.
If it was green for example, they would attribute imbalances to the
liver. If it was red it would be heart, pale white would be lung, yellow
would spleen and dark or black would be kidney. I think you get the
idea.

Application Examples from the Nan Jing

In many chapters of the Nan Jing, particularly chapter 69, it

discusses how to utilize the mother-son principle for tonifying and
reducing the elements to create balance. The general principle is to
tonify the mother in case of deficiency and to reduce the son in case
of excess. For example, if the liver is excess, you should reduce the
heart. If the kidney is deficient, you should tonify the lung and so
on.

If Deficient in ...

Spleen
Lung
Kidney
Liver
Heart

If Excess in ...

Spleen
Lung

Tonify

Heart
Spleen
Lung
Kidney
Liver

Reduce

Lung
Kidney

Kidney
Liver
Heart

Liver
Heart
Spleen

Multitude of Possibilities

Okay, now to tie it all together here. So imagine, if you see a

deficiency in an organ there are a lot of possibilities as to what is
causing it. There is a good picture in Maciocia's Foundations of
Chinese Medicine book on page 32 that describes almost all of the
possible pathologies that any organ can have according to five
phase. Take a look to get a cool pictoral view. For our purposes, let's
take the spleen (earth) as an example here. The spleen is
susceptible to becoming deficient or attacked at least 4 different
ways.

The liver controls the spleen. If the liver is excess it can over-act on
the spleen.
The spleen controls the kidneys. If the kidneys are excess they can
insult the spleen.
The heart is the mother of the spleen. If the heart is deficient, it will
not have enough to nourish the spleen.
The lung is the son of the spleen. If the lungs are deficient, they
may drain too much from the mother spleen.

Now you can see how complex diagnosing can become. If you take
into account the fact that there are 2 organs per element (four for
fire since the pericardium and triple warmer are both associated
with fire), at least 4 different ways for imbalance to occur per organ,
you get a nice and easy 48 possible diagnoses to look at. Let's not
think that this is just one aspect of organ and body disharmony.
Don't worry, it gets worse :)

I have put the explanation of the zang/fu next. Usually a discussion

of the fluids and influences of the body come next in most texts but
I think this way will make it easier to understand the concepts of qi
and blood.