This past winter has given us a stunning example of stagnation in the weather — that big high-pressure system that sat over us for months preventing any precipitation! When things don’t move, whether they are fluids, emotions, toxins, or the weather — that’s stagnation in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), and stagnation always causes problems!
Stagnation is a very big concept in TCM , but to understand it we need to look at its opposite which is movement. Chinese medicine pays enormous attention to how things move both in nature and in the body (they are quite literally the same thing in TCM), and the quality and quantity of that movement. We know that the human body was designed for movement, not only muscles and bones, but the movement of blood, interstitial fluids, food through the digestive system, the breath, nerve impulses, etc. The list goes on and on. Everywhere you look in the body you will find movement on multiple levels, unless of course . . . you find stagnation.
When movement is appropriate we feel good. Food gets processed and delivered, toxins get removed, our emotions stay balanced, tissue gets nourished with blood and oxygen, our mind is open and alert. Movement that is too fast might result in tremors, hyperactivity, lack of concentration, diarrhea, insomnia, mania. Slow it down and we get constipation, weight gain, depression, brain fog, menstrual cramps, bloating, swelling, lethargy. Stop it altogether and we get pain. That pain may be physical, but it can also be emotional. We have all known someone (perhaps our self) who hung on to feelings of grief, anger, betrayal, etc. far past the point of usefulness. The pain can also be mental anguish or rigidity. We all run the other way when someone begins to proselytize about their ideology. Why? Because their mental qi is stagnant! TCM sees all these pains as being interconnected.
A little boy once visited the mountains with his parents. Together they drank the delicious, clear water from a mountain stream. The little boy was so delighted by this water that he filled his canteen to take home with him. At home, he took just a little sip every day so it would last a long time. Imagine his distress when, after a couple of weeks, that water became stale and stagnant.
So it is. If we’re going to keep our streams of qi and blood fresh and delightful, we must keep them moving. At the physical level, exercise obviously plays an important role. The heart drives the blood and muscle contraction moves the lymph. Eating habits contribute: When we eat too much food it cannot be processed optimally by the digestion which results in stagnation and weight gain. Emotionally, we must learn to “get over it”, “move on”, or “let it go”. Notice how every one of those common colloquial statements implies movement! Healing mental stagnation requires openness to new ideas, new input, the possibility of being mistaken or limited in our thinking.
Some stagnations are large and require medical assistance or intervention. Injury and trauma are classic causes of stagnation (again, this can both be physical and/or emotional). Acupuncture is famous for its ability to reduce pain, precisely because the needles move the qi. Moving qi cannot stagnate so physical pain levels go down and the emotions feel refreshed.
You may have a habit you wish to get rid of — habits like smoking, drinking, excessive television, or negative thinking will definitely stagnate your qi, although most “good” habits will move it! Many New Year’s Resolutions are actually a recognition that we need to move stagnant qi.
We all have at least a little stagnation lurking somewhere in our body-mind-spirit. The red flag that gets our attention is simply discomfort in some way. We feel sluggish, stiff in the body, stuck. We’re aware of suffering, whether physically or emotionally. Something isn’t moving the way it should.
What to do? I often tell clients, “If something’s gonna change, something’s gotta change”. What are you willing to change? How are you going to get your qi moving? If the answer is “nothing”, then you’re going to have to live with the discomfort of your stagnation. But often we’re uncomfortable enough to make a change — go for that walk, wake up early enough to pack a healthy lunch, make that dreaded phone call or email, make a concerted effort to change our mental/emotional habits, register for a class, find a new job, and so on.
Back to that painful high-pressure system that sat on us for months and ruined our ski season: Suddenly Californians couldn’t get through the day without talking about the weather. Newspapers began running daily articles about the drought. Every city and town held meetings to discuss water usage and conservation. Jerry Brown declared an emergency. All over the state, we became hyper-aware of water issues, water usage, water conservation that wasn’t happening, tragedies that will happen if we don’t change our ways and fast. We realized how wasteful and unconscious we have been about our most precious resource and vowed to change. Californians started conserving water. We went to City Council meetings. We began designing our drip systems for the yard. We looked into low-flush toilets. We turned off the tap when brushing our teeth. We let the yellow mellow. We had conversations like, “So honey, how could I use the laundry water to keep my peonies alive?” In other words, we began taking actions which moved qi on a statewide level.
It started raining. Now there is much on a global scale that went into that change, but it is a statement of fact in Chinese medicine that movement and change break stagnation. It is also a statement of fact that the same laws of nature operate inside of our bodies (Body! Mind! Spirit!) as outside. So I’m just sayin’.
May we all move freely, consciously and lealthfully into a beautiful wet spring!
Yours for clean, clear and moving qi,
Lynn Lloyd, L.Ac.