The Teacher and the Student

After facilitating my first public Sacred Ceremony in June, I've taken a bit of time. A short sabbatical. Not because I've stepped away from the work. Quite the opposite.

This year's double Fire invited me to go deeper into the elements than I've ever gone before. And within this invitation, there was a subtle asking. An invitation to listen longer.

At the beginning of Summer, I shared insights about the Officials of the Fire element. Heart. Small Intestine. Heart Protector. Triple Burner. In doing so, I believed I was following my usual workshop prep. Write, share, teach, facilitate.

And yet, at some unmarked moment, it dawned on me. I had been prepping to teach Fire and simultaneously, Fire had been prepping to teach me.

This year carries something unusual. In Chinese cosmology, we are moving through a year of Double Fire. Fire in the heavens. Fire on the earth (via the Horse). As the seasonal Fire of Summer arrived, an additional log was tossed on. Further amplifying the elemental influence.

For months, I've approached this energetic unfolding through the lens of a teacher and facilitator.

• How do I translate ancient wisdom into something useful?

• How do I best convey this translation?

• How do I offer practices that help others heal?

All fair questions. Yet none touched on the deepest ask, which arrived quietly, seemingly unannounced.

What if transformation isn't something we make happen? As facilitator, teacher, participant, reader, or another human being. What if our role is to cultivate the conditions in which change naturally unfolds?

The more time I spend observing nature, the less interested I become in forcing. Anything. The gardener cannot push seeds to grow. The soil cannot convince roots to deepen. The oak does not strain toward maturity. Each simply participates in creating the conditions for the next movement.

“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.”

— Lao Tzu

As I've continued my study of the Five Elements, I've recognized a pattern (that I hadn't fully appreciated before).

The seasons don't simply follow one another. They prepare one another.

Fire transforms. It illuminates. It reveals what has been hidden, inviting discernment. It warms, it ripens. It reminds us who we are and allows us to express our true nature.

Then comes Late Summer. The container. The nourishment. The grounded stability that allows transformation to become rooted, without force, without dissociation.

Then Autumn arrives. Autumn isn't asking us to simply release. It's asking us to trust what Fire has revealed. The trees don't wrestle their leaves to the ground. They simply stop sending energy where it is no longer needed. The leaves fall. Not as an act of loss. As an act of wisdom.

Then Winter. The quietest season. The season modern culture often resists. Yet within ancient Chinese philosophy, Winter is not empty. It is the season of returning.

Returning to stillness. Returning to essence. Returning to the deep reservoir of potential that has been there all along. To remember who we were, before so much accumulated around us.

And then, almost effortlessly, Spring arrives. Not to invent something or become someone new. But to express what Winter helped us to remember.

The more I sit with this cycle, the more I realize it isn't simply describing nature. It is describing a living spiral, one that continuously cultivates the conditions for us to transform, nourish, release, remember, and begin again.

It seems so simple, so obvious, when written in plain text. Yet living it. Is another matter entirely.

This year of Double Fire has reminded me of something I didn't expect. I am still a teacher. And I am, and always will be, a student. Perhaps those two roles were never separate. And perhaps the most grounded teachers are the ones who remain deeply committed to being taught. By nature. By their participants, clients, and readers. By their own lives. And by the quiet wisdom that continues to reveal itself, season after season.

Thank you for allowing me the space to be both.

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The Four Flames of Fire

There is a moment in early summer that is impossible to mistake.

The light shifts. The air carries warmth that doesn't apologize for itself. Trees are fully leafed out, flowers have stopped rehearsing and simply opened, and something inside the body, responds. Not with thought. With recognition.

Fire Season has arrived.

In Five Elements theory, Summer is the season of the Fire element. It is the great outward movement of life, the moment when everything that rooted itself quietly through Winter and pushed upward through Spring, to finally arrive at full expression.

Nature does not hesitate during Summer. It radiates.

Fire is the energy of maturity, warmth, and light. It governs our capacity to love and be loved, to feel genuinely alive inside our own experience, to laugh from somewhere real rather than somewhere performed. Its color is red, the flush of vitality, of circulation, of life moving freely through the body. Its sound is laughter. Its emotion is joy.

But here's what most people don't know about Fire.

It has four flames. Not just one.

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Fire (huǒ 火)

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The Flames (Officials) of Summer

When we talk about the Fire element in the body, we are talking about four distinct meridians and associated organs, working in harmony with one another: Heart, Small Intestine, Pericardium, and Triple Burner.

Most conversations about Fire stop at Heart. And Heart deserves reverence, it is, in Five Elements Theory, the Supreme Controller. The Empress of the kingdom of body, mind, and spirit. More than a physical pump, Heart is the seat of our deepest loves, most profound passions, capacity for genuine warmth and connection. When Heart is healthy, the kingdom flourishes. Every other Official receives guidance, warmth, and direction. Life has meaning, purpose, and joy.

This is why heart coherence, heart centeredness, opening the heart, and forgiveness have become dominating conversations within modern wellness. And these conversations are not wrong.

Yet, they are, incomplete. And here is what I find fascinating (and what our bodies may already be trying to tell us). The Heart cannot easily do its job without having its 3 trusted advisors online. Interestingly, those 3 Officials provide critical support that is almost entirely absent from modern wellness conversations.

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The Small Intestine is the Heart's most trusted minister, known in ancient texts as the Alchemist, the Sorter, the one who separates the pure from the impure before anything reaches the Supreme Controller. Physically, Small Intestine extracts nourishment from everything we consume and sends the rest for elimination. But its medicine extends far beyond digestion. At the mental and energetic level, the Small Intestine governs discernment, the ability to sort what is truly ours from what is not, what nourishes from what depletes, what deserves a place in our fields from what needs to be released. A compromised Small Intestine doesn't just affect digestion. It affects perception. It leaves us absorbing indiscriminately, taking in what isn't ours, mistaking noise for signal, feeling chronically overwhelmed in a way that looks like sensitivity but is actually a sorting problem.

Of Note: The Large Intestine cannot let go of what the Small Intestine has not yet sorted. Read that again. Because if letting go practices have been a regular part of the healing journey and something is still hanging on…

Then there is the Pericardium, the Heart's protector. The membrane that determines who and what gets access to the most sacred space in the kingdom. Not a wall. A discerning boundary. The difference between a heart that is open and a heart that is safe enough to stay open.

And the Triple Burner, the sovereign of the body's thermal regulation, immunity, and relational safety. The official that asks, constantly: “is this environment safe enough for me to be fully present, fully alive?”

Together, these 4 Officials govern not just joy and warmth and connection, but discernment, protection, and sovereignty. The full architecture of a Fire element that can radiate without burning itself out.

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This June carries something rare.

In Chinese cosmology, we have entered a year of double Fire, elemental Fire and Horse Fire, arriving together.

With Summer Solstice approaching, seasonal Fire is added, raising the intensity even further. This creates a level of heat many people will feel in their bodies, their emotions, and lives, even if they cannot identify its source.

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“Fire this potent can burn you. Or it can transform you.
The difference is knowing how to sort, anchor, contain, and refine it.”

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Summer is not asking us to perform joy. It is not asking us to force open a heart that doesn't feel safe. It is asking something more specific and more honest than that.

It is asking what we are giving our energy to. What truly lights us up versus what is simply loud. Where warmth ends and depletion begins. Which relationships nourish our spirits and which ones scatter it.

These are not philosophical questions. They are Fire questions. And they deserve more than a journaling prompt.

If something in this landed, in the sorting problem, in the letting go that hasn't fully worked, in the overstimulation that looks like sensitivity, I will be offering multiple opportunities and tools to go deeper this Summer. Most of which, I’ve never brought forward before.

Let’s begin with something simple. Something that can be done today, without any equipment or extensive training. Because the Fire element's medicine is already inside each of us, it simply needs a point of entry.

The Source Points of the Fire element, which live exactly where we would expect to find them. In the wrist and hand. The same part of the body that reaches toward what nourishes us, and pushes away what does not. The physical gesture of discernment itself.

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Acupressure + Qi Practice

A Summer Self-Care Practice: The Fire Source Points

Every meridian has a Source Point, a concentrated holding tank of energy that flows directly to the organ system it governs. Working with these points speeds healing, revitalizes the organ, and stabilizes the physical body.

Source points are said to be 4x more electromagnetically active than other acupressure points. This is not subtle work. This is direct access.

The Fire element gives us 4 source points, one for each Official. And here is what makes this practice remarkable: all live in the wrist and hand. The same part of the body that reaches toward what nourishes us and pushes away what does not. The physical gesture of discernment itself.

Yin Fire Source Points

Located on the inner wrist at the crease.

Heart 7: Spirit Gate The Supreme Controller. The seat of our deepest love, capacity for genuine joy, and sense of meaning and purpose. When Heart 7 is supported, the entire kingdom settles. Work here if feeling disconnected from self, joy, or a sense of inner warmth.

Pericardium 7: Great Mound The Heart's Protector. The Official who determines who/ what receives access to our most sacred interior space. Not a wall, a discerning boundary. Work here if feeling overexposed, if connection has become costly, or when confusing boundaries with being loved/loving.

Small Intestine 4: Wrist Bone The Alchemist, the Official responsible for sorting the pure from the impure at every level of your being. Physical, mental, emotional. Work here when decisions feel impossible, when needing to locate a clear yes or no, when absorbing everything around and unable to find the signal beneath the noise.

Triple Burner 4: Yang Pool The Knight, governing the body's thermal regulation, immunity, and the fundamental question of safety. Asking, is this environment safe enough to be fully here? Work here when the nervous system is feeling chronically activated, when unable to settle into spaces or relationships that should feel safe, or when it takes more effort than it should to simply be present.

Yang Fire Source Points

Located on the outer and back wrist at the crease.

To work with any or all of these points:

Apply gentle steady pressure or slow circular massage on each point. Breathe slowly and deliberately. Spend 1-2 minutes per point, per hand. All points do not need to be worked in a single session. Feel invited to allow intuition to signal what is calling for attention.

Gently hold space to ask: What is actually mine?

The Fire element knows. It has always known. These points are simply the door.

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What is Biofield Tuning?

As Nikola Tesla once said, “If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.”

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This quote has resonated with me for years. And I find it fascinating that it has made its way into popular culture. And while Tesla was referring to the fundamental forces of the universe, his words offer a compelling bridge to modalities that view the human (and all living creatures) through the lens of energy, frequency and vibration.

The term biofield refers to our body’s energetic system, in its entirety. The energy centers located within the central channel, the electric currents that run through our bodies and the magnetic field that surrounds us.

Biofield Tuning is a form of sound therapy that works directly with the biofield, understanding the biofield as being inextricably connected with our bodies and minds (both conscious and subconscious, including thoughts, memories and emotions). When physical, mental and/or emotional dis-ease or disorder is being experienced, the resultant "dissonance" can be perceived in the biofield. Biofield Tuning is able to locate, diminish and resolve this dissonance and in doing so, alleviate (or even eradicate) the corresponding physical, mental and/or emotional symptoms.

What is a Biofield Tuning session like?

A Biofield Tuning session can be conducted in-person and from a distance, with a single client or group of participants. It is recommended that the client/participant be in an environment that is free from distraction and contains space to comfortably sit or lie down. A session often begins with activating the Central Channel. To do this, the practitioner strikes a tuning fork and begins to scan the biofield. During the scan process, the practitioner is:

sensing for resistance and turbulence in the biofield

listening for changes in the overtones and undertones of the tuning fork.

Once the Central Channel is activated, the practitioner will work with a focused area, again sensing for resistance and changes in tone. When the practitioner encounters an area of turbulence, they will continue to activate the tuning fork and hold it in a specific biofield location. Research suggests the body's organizing intelligence uses the coherent vibrational frequency of the fork to "tune" itself. In short order, the dissonance resolves and the sense of resistance gives way, which appears to correspond to the release of tension with the body.

Clients/participants often report a sense of relaxation and begin to breathe more freely, as the body adjusts to an increased state of flow. As dissonance continues to resolve over the course of the session, individuals may begin to feel "lighter" and experience diminishment or resolution of symptoms. One might interpret this as a kind of targeted nervous system biofeedback, which provides side-door entry into the psyche – allowing the practitioner to work with what has been hidden in plain view, thereby facilitating change within the biofield that clients/participants could not otherwise achieve on their own.

What might be “hidden from view” within the client’s biofield?

Biofield Tuning is the outcome of sound therapy pioneer Eileen McKusick. Eileen discovered a pattern that, just as most people have their digestive organs in the same physical location, biofields also demonstrate consistent anatomy. This hypothesis has been tested with thousands of clients and Biofield Tuning students around the world, and found to be an accurate system for accessing, reading and modulating the biofield into greater coherence and regulation.

What does the research show?

The formal study of Biofield Tuning is still in its early phases, with a small but emerging body of madality-specific research.

In 2020, a feasibility study was initiated, to enroll 15 volunteers with clinical anxiety in a feasibility study to receive 3 distance (Zoom) Biofield Tuning sessions, one hour a week for 3 weeks. The outcomes of this study were quite dramatic - every person who completed the process (13/15) experienced a significant drop in their anxiety symptoms.

This study yielded 2 peer reviewed papers - a Quantitative one, which can be found here; and a Qualitative paper, which goes into the experiences of participants, can be found here.

Alongside this, there is a much larger body of general research on sound, vibration, frequency and energy-related phenomena that helps frame the broader context in which this work is understood.

It is important to recognize that funding for modalities like Biofield Tuning is often limited. In a system shaped by commercial incentives, what cannot be patented is often dismissed, and what cannot be made into a product is often overlooked. That reality has profound implications for what healing modalities are studied, funded and taken seriously.

Biofield Tuning does not ask us to abandon reason, but to widen the lens through which we understand healing. It invites us to listen more closely and to consider that restoration may occur not only through chemistry and intervention, but also through resonance, coherence and balance.

Perhaps not everything meaningful can be immediately (scientifically) measured. Some things are first felt, and experienced, before being fully understood.

The Energy of Spring

Each season has a unique vibrational frequency – energy encoded information that moves in waves, circulating in and around all that is.

Spring energy has a vigorous, exuberant frequency and is represented by the Wood Element. In nature, we can easily recognize the forceful manifestation of new growth – a tree bud bursting free of its husk, a dandelion splitting the sidewalk in search of the sun. Energetically, the Wood Element grants us the power of birth — new beginnings, growth, breaking through boundaries and surging forward.

Within the body’s meridian system, Liver and Gallbladder are the Wood Officials. The Liver Official is considered the grand architect, who creates the vision and sets the plan. Liver’s partner, the Gallbladder Official, organizes, coordinates and provides wise judgment for carrying the plan forward and ultimately, achieving the vision. From the most miniscule adjustments and decisions (even unconscious) to our highest conscious aspirations, the Gallbladder Official is always active.

From the mental perspective, we are also continually assessing and planning – for the next hour, day, year and perhaps, lifetime. When the Wood Officials are balanced, we easily organize our lives to achieve goals, give birth to, plan and achieve new objectives and ultimately, live out our vision. The power of reason and logic are contingent on healthy Wood energy, as the Liver and Gallbladder enable us to "see" with the minds-eye ("I see what you mean"). Similarly, the Wood Officials provide the contingency plan – the ability to “see” from other points of view, to adapt according to shifting circumstances. Thus, we can deal with obstacles without losing sight of our goal (vision).

Without such flexibility, we can become close-minded, prejudiced, frustrated or outright angry. What was once "my" plan becomes "the" plan, to which everyone must abide.

From the opposing extreme, an elemental Wood imbalance can manifest as an inability to self-assert, where we cave to others’ opinions or too readily surrender our vision.

Physically, even the simple act of standing is the direct result of continuous adjustments – decisions about when and where to shift weight and which muscles to contract or relax to achieve and maintain balance. Likewise, constant decisions are happening within the deepest levels of the physical body. From digestion to respiration and circulation, intercellular exchange and all other microfunctions, all tasks are being carried out (Gallbladder) according to the master plan (Liver). And just as imbalances can materialize on the mental level, they also manifest physically – resulting in malabsorption, poor detoxification and toxic build-up (think brain-fog, fatigue, gas and bloating, weight gain, hormonal imbalances and skin rashes and blemishes).

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The Way of the Universe

The Chinese symbol for Tao translates into "path", ”method”, “principle” and "way".

When we recall the Five Element Theory emerged from Taoism, it can be helpful to review the basic premises.

Classical Taoist (Daoist) philosophy is believed to have been devised during the 5th-4th centuries BCE. Classical (philosophical) Taoism grew out of observations of the natural world and ancient shamanic practices. It was distinguished from religious Taoism – with philosophical Taoism emphasizing living life in accordance with the Tao. For the order and harmony of nature, Taoist philosophers alleged, were far more stable and enduring than the power of state or institutions constructed by humans.

The philosophy of Tao signifies the fundamental or true nature of the world —

• Tao both precedes and encompasses all of existence and is an essential, unnamable process of the universe

• Analogies occur between all of existence. The universe, cosmos, earth and humankind are analogically aligned – they are equal in detail and are equal parts of an interconnected whole

• The flow of ‘chi’ (qi) energy, is the essential energy of all living things, actions and existence, and is believed to be the influence that keeps the universal order of Tao balanced

• Nothing is fixed, static or unmoving, as everything is constantly transforming

When we return to the Tao, we return to the interconnected whole and unity within ourselves, and within the natural world.

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Acupressure + Qi Practice

Touch activates the path and intent directs the energy flow. 

As we move more deeply into Spring, we are encompassed in a surge of naturally occurring Wood energy. Given the vibrational transit is from yin to yang energy, the Spring transition is often more palpable than yang to yang or yin to yin transits — and we can leverage acupressure and Qi Gong practices to align with the incoming seasonal frequency. In doing so, we support a more easeful adjustment within the full complex of body-mind-spirit.

Angie Ellen

Meridians, and their acupressure points, have two basic functions: —circulate and distribute energy to organs, glands, the brain, limbs, bones and tissues of the body, and —send warning signals to the brain when an organ is compromised or an area of the body (over which a meridian passes) is injured.

Acupressure points uniquely support their ‘parent’ meridian and consequently, the associated organ. Meridians have a variety of points, including a single Source Point. Each Source Point is a special acupoint that is indicated when a specific meridian or organ appears under-energized, sluggish or stressed, or when we are striving to establish and hold homeostasis or balance (seasonal transitions). Source Points help us reconnect with our Original Qi, the deep reservoir of energy we are born with. Source Points are simple to work with, as they bring just the right amount of energy from deep within the Elemental Official (in this case, Liver and Gallbladder) to strengthen, harmonize and balance the associated meridian and organ.

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Taoism does not identify human will as the root problem. Rather, it asserts that we must place our intention and action on living in harmony with the natural universe. By understanding the Tao, we may gain knowledge of the ourselves, and by understanding ourselves, we may gain knowledge of the Tao.

Given all things (including humankind) are microcosms of the Universe (analogies) — to which all natural laws such as the Five Element Theory, Feng Shui and Yin/Yang philosophy apply — when we support balance and transform blocked energy within our individual systems, we support balance and transformation within the collective, and vice versa.

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“Humans model themselves on earth,

Earth on heaven,

Heaven on the Way,

And the way on that which is naturally so.”

— Laozi (Lao Tzu)