Whether you’re looking back on the previous 12 months with fondness or forlornness, the new year is a great time to reflect on your experience to gain insight and direction for the territory ahead.
5 Element meditation is a powerful tool for honoring the past while gaining insight and guidance for moving your life force in positive directions.
5 Element Meditation
This reflective and contemplative meditation will help you balance your energy to nature’s cycles, the four directions–east,west, north and south–and earth’s elements, illuminating the path of your best direction in the coming year.
Stand in a quiet space, indoors or outdoors, imagining you are in the center of the cosmos. Take three cleansing breaths. When you are ready, begin your meditation as follows:
East. Turn first to face the east, the place from where the sun rises and represents dawning, new beginnings, and giving birth to new ideas. Its element is wood and its season is spring.
Reflection: What seeds did I sow last year that I want to have bloom in the springtime of the coming year?
South. Next, turn to face the south, the place of the brightest light in the noontime sky when the sun at its highest point. South represents manifestation, fullness and growth. Its element is fire and its season is summer.
Reflection: By summer solstice, what will be growing, strengthening, expanding within me?
West. Now turn to face the west, the place where the sun sets and the last rays of daylight transition into darkness. West represents transformation and unification. Its element is metal and its season is fall.
Reflection: Contemplate what in your life is passing out of your sphere of influence or control. What cycles or projects are coming to completion?
North. Finally, turn once again to face north, the home of the North Star. The North Star represents guidance and wisdom. Its element is water and its season is winter.
Reflection: Consider what beliefs, habits or relationships have remain unchanged. Ask yourself, What possibilities have I not recognized? See what is frozen in your mind and what, like snow melting on a mountain top, must thaw in order to flow like a river.
Center. Return your focus to where you are standing, at the center of your imaginary circle. Center represents the earth, roots, history and nurturing. Its season is late summer. Center also represents the still, unchanging point or the zero point in the universe from which infinite potential always exists.
Reflection: In the cycle of life, through the four directions and four seasons, reflect on what you avoided in the past year and what fears you successfully faced.
You can repeat this circuit through the four directions as you meditate on the 5 Elements: Wood, Fire, Metal, Water, and Earth.
Let each breath carry you around this wheel and through every cycle. Exhale completely as you turn in each direction. Inhale deeply when you arrive at your new destination.
You can use this process in your daily life when you are puzzling over a question or complex situation.
By focusing on the many elements that interact with your life, you can gain clarity and balance. Viewing the world from a 5-Element perspective gives you multi-dimensional vantage points and a higher vision of your innate human potential.
Happy New Year!