Five Element Coaching
Have you ever thought – ‘It wasn’t supposed to be like this?’ Are you feeling stuck, overwhelmed or lost and not sure where to go next.
Fed up of saying ‘yes’ where you want to scream ‘No!’ Still struggling to let go of past losses? Are you exhausted and imagine going off grid to escape life? Do you feel that you’re constantly in your own way in life? Do you need help slowing down, connecting with your feelings to create a life you love?
Life really doesn’t have to be this hard. The bravest thing anyone can do is look at their current life with clarity and say this isn’t what I want so I’m going to change it. And fortune favors the brave.
‘Our biggest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be?’ And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others’
Marianne Williamson
My Expertise
I have been working and living with the elements for over 25 years.; they are the core parts of a profound and poetic system of medicine that I have been practicing since 2000. After many years of practice, including teaching, I have devised my own method using the elements to help people through life and achieve their potential. Call it acupuncture without the needles. The Chinese symbol for happiness is destiny – being on your path in life - and that’s what want to help you do.
We all house each element inside us and to engage with each one is a beautiful way to look at aspects of our life, and find out where the snakes and where the ladders are. If we learn to live in harmony with natural cycles (instead of fighting them), we strengthen our ties to them and we have better physical, mental and spiritual health.
“As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The Wood Element
The Wood element is all about decision making, plans and visions. And indeed, how you make those decisions and plans that benefit you. When I think of the Wood Element, I think of a shoot coming up between a pavement – that plant is going to find it’s way through to the sun no matter what. It is a powerful moving force like a tree reaching in all directions; upward and outward, defying gravity (because everyone deserves to fly!). That is the energy of Wood and Spring, to find your way through to a new beginning.
The Wood element is full of imagination, hope and possibilities and brings our dreams and life goals into awareness and fruition, but plans need reflection and considered with calmness so we can manifest the life we want with balance and certainty. It takes courage to move forward with confidence and take risks if necessary. We need perspective and clarity to get on our path and find our way home. We need to remember to dream because we all have the power to regenerate what we think we’ve lost.
Is your life lacking an overall plan? Do you know what drives you and what dreams you have? To get to where want to go in life, we need to know where we want to go. That’s the hard part but once you’ve worked that out, then the path really opens up for you. If you don’t know where you’re going, then every distraction looks like an opportunity!
Let me help you release and utilise your Wood energy and move forward with a clear, confident and accountable plan where you build the life you want.
The Fire Element
When Summer comes around, we are ready to kick back, relax and open our hearts to engage with our joy. This season is characterised by the dynamic and passionate Fire Element.
Whereas Wood, the element of Spring is there to give us hope and a clear vision in life. The energy of the Fire element is about activating those plans and realising that vision. Summer provides the energy to promote excitement, communication, connection, warmth and love. In your minds eye, imagine the warmth of the sun shining through the trees, the flame from a candle or a cosy fire.
The Fire Element has an entire energetic system devoted to the Heart Protector that guards the Heart. It provides protection from insult and injury on an emotional and spiritual level. If we have been disappointed or hurt, we can shut down in an attempt of self-preservation. Often it’s here that we are stuck in the face of old pain with something we have long been unable to resolve, either because we’re set in our ways or unable to cope with the release of that hurt. It takes huge courage to get out of the rut and dance in the joyous flow of life, having absorbed the good and learned lessons from every situation we have faced. It’s vital to have compassion towards ourselves, to allow us to connect so that our fire energy can sparkle freely.
Our journey on this planet is not a solitary one and once we’ve found our own passions and self love then we can spread it around! It is time to let laughter back in to our soul and be playful as love is the current that connects us to each other.
Have you forgotten how to play? Do you feel safe enough to play? To love? Do you find it hard to look after your own Heart Protector and say no? Do you have strong boundaries or are you a people please? Are you finding your relationships tiring? Often we’re so busy battling through life that we’ve forgotten our passions. It’s time to find out who you are and how you want to express yourself in your life.
Let me help you stoke and build your Fire energy so you can open your life up to be joyfully fulfilled. When your heart is touched by kindness, you discover it’s huge, vast and limitless with warmth and space.
The Earth Element
As we move into late summer, it’s the time of the Earth element and of harvest, sustenance, support and understanding. At this time of year, as with any harvest, we are reaping what we have worked so hard to produce and we are asking ourselves the question on every level – is there enough? The Earth element has to give to themselves before they can give out to others; looking after ourselves gives us grounding and balance. This in turn allows us to stand on our own two feet feeling secure in knowing that we are ok and we have enough. This element represents feminine energy and the mother within us all that nurture and support our true essence. Mother Earth. When we are grounded, we are open, perceptive and willing to participate in the world around us .An imbalance in the Earth element leads to a fear of scarcity, the fear that there will not be enough food, money or love. Excessive and sometimes obsessive worry results along with exhaustion and overwhelm. Trusting that one has enough, or is enough, is essential to our sense of stability and security. When we stop fearing scarcity, we are grounded and able to support ourselves as well as those around us.
We need to feed and regulate our energy as this promotes a sense and self and fosters a clear mind set. From here, we find our way home here to our true centre, we feel strong and steady to enable smooth transitions and accommodate changes in our lives.
Do you feel nourished by life? By your job, your relationships, your inner life? Overeating or undereating is an compensatory mechanism for feeling undernourished. Are you pushing yourself too hard or catering too much to the needs of others? Do have life experiences that are undigested and unprocessed burdening you with a heavy load? Are you going round and round in circles, unable to get off the merry go round to move your life forward?
Let me help you ask for own needs to be met and be nourished by life. Imagine roots growing down and feeling increasingly planted and rooted in Mother Earth. From here you will always have enough and be enough.
The Metal Element
The Metal element is associated with the season of Autumn and at that time of year nature is letting go and endings. Many people believe that this element is about grief and to a certain extent it is but I like the idea that grief is love with nowhere to go. That makes the Metal element about connection, to ourselves, others, animals, a plan, an idea or even a lifestyle. Throughout time, we have created rituals to honour our endings but somehow, especially in Western society, we have lost this important practice.
When our Metal energy is in balance, it’s easy to be inspired by life. In Chinese medicine, the organs associated with this element are the Lungs and Large Intestine facilitating the cycle of taking in and letting go. It’s when this cycle gets stuck, when we hold onto shame, guilt and unworthiness that we need help by releasing any clinging to the past or longing for the future. To access those diamonds that live within us, we need to align to our sense of meaning and purpose in our lives. By trusting our instincts and letting go of all that blocks our path, we can inspire our spirits and reconnect to a richer quality of life.
Are you holding onto sorrows and losses that are keeping you stuck and stopping you being connected to your life here and now? Do you feel your griefs aren’t worthy enough? That you just need to pull yourself together? Or indeed, it’s such a huge loss, you don’t know how to move forward? We need to honour our pain. Acknowledge it. See it. Then find a way to incorporate it into our hearts, minds and spirits.
I will help you do this. Together we will find a way through to the next chapter by bravely and courageously letting go of what doesn’t serve you anymore to make way for a life of integrity.
The Water Element
Winter is a transformational time in Five element theory even though seemingly nothing is happening. In nature, all the energy is going on under the ground at this time of year and we are hibernating ready to burst into Spring with a new remit for our existence. The emotion associated with the Water element is fear; fear of getting through the season and through life. Water is also associated with our will and our wisdom, both inherent and earnt.
The Water element is related to the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system, our fight or flight mechanism. Shock and trauma can slam doors shut keeping us from the life we seek; we go on spiritual quests to find our essence not realising its’ spiritual presence in ourselves.
Water can be relentless leading to burnout; we need slow, steady movements with grace. Consistency, strength and determination are the answer for powering through whilst all the time listening to our inner voice and wisdom
Those resources that we need to push on through the Winter is reflected in our lives as we walk our path. But what resources do we have? What have we not utlised yet? Where are we being drained? We need to listen to our own inner wisdom to move forward by creating quiet and stillness in our bodies and minds.
Are you stuck in fear? Do you need help moving through it to the other side? To feel the fear and do it anyway? Do you need help looking at your resources and where you’re spending them? And indeed where you’d like to spend them?
Let me help you access your inherent wisdom by releasing fear and tension alongside courage and resilience so you can soften the relentless drive or paralysing fear to allow a fresh perspective to open up.