The Rising Yin

Hello. This is qi gong Master Mikel Steenrod with Water
Mountain.
Today’s talk is going to be about the spring and the spring equinox, the
environmental chi, how things are changing
in your surroundings
right now.
The equinox is an astronomical event that serves as a marker; It’s not a
switch.
And viewing it as being a switch for the chi is
very common, but it’s also incorrect.
As we approach
the astronomical event of the equinox,
we can see that there will be a change within the environment. That exact
change varies
according to your geographic position on the earth.
And that can be the physical features of it, the latitude and longitude,
the plant concentration,
the animal concentration,
how many humans are about.
But there is a standardized background change that occurs sometime within the
spring transitional season.
So winter provides us with this relatively
stable Yin, as stable as it’s going to get within your region.
And then as we enter into or approach
the spring, there is a sudden rise of the Yin.
And then at some point during the spring season, it will shift and start
moving towards the yang, in preparation for summer.
Now, what does that mean for you?
Well, as the Yin builds within the environment,
it’s typical to become, for example,
more easily fatigued,
simply waking up feeling tired, as if you need to sleep more.
And these are all opportunities for your body to build more Yin
and facilitate its transition
to the yang of
the summer as it pops up.
Now how that expresses, again, varies by your local area.
In the area I’m in, this is approximately nine days out from the equinox.
The area that I’m in, the spring
Yin rise started occurring last week.
On top of that, there are also obvious sides of the yang:
very little snow remaining,
sunny weather,
fifty degree temperatures.
And that creates a kind of confusion for your body, because it now it has to
generate these two disparate balances.
that is unusual
in the overall history of
my current area, which is Flagstaff,. Arizona.
And so you would want to look at how in your area
the weather is positioned, because that will usually give you your
top, the portion of the chi which is most apparent to you, and then
your underlying
flow, the base.
So we have the top, and we have the base-
is probably starting to shift towards. Yin.
But again, that varies by your locality.
And if you’ve been there for a while, you should know roughly what that base
is like, because that will not change
rapidly.
It can change, but not quickly,
because it’s dependent
not only on the astronomical time, but also the terrain,
presence of water, or absence of water, plant life, animal life, all of those
particular things.
Transitions are more easily facilitated
if the parts of your qi system
that are built for transition are active.
So primarily your Gates, which are regulating
connections to the environment,
and your burners, which serve roughly as thermostats.
And if you want to
examine that more closely, I have both inexpensive and free resources available
on the various water mountain websites.
I suggest you examine those
and see what appeals to you.
Making it through the transition,
if you don’t possess qi gong,
you can facilitate that simply by resting more during your rest phases.
So if you feel tired, rest, allow your body to take advantage of that yin rise
and accumulate.
And this is also the time where it’s going to reorient more towards the
outward activity,
towards the yang.
And during, while that yang starts to build in your environment,
you would want to, during your active times,
increase your activity level.
So you don’t want to keep it the same.
Your rest periods-allow to be restful.. If you’re tired, rest.
When you’re active and you’re starting to feel anxious, as if you need to get
out, that spring fever
that is in our common vernacular,
that spring fever is there, and you feel like you need to start moving
around and do more.
By all means, move around and do more.
Follow the natural pattern.
Remember, things like qi gong allow our adaptability to be enhanced.
We respond more quickly to changes within the environment,
and we also
respond to larger changes in the environment.
So speed and breadth of the response increases,
and the amount of return you get back from the time that you’ve put into qi
gong is dramatically
higher than the simple process.
So if you are resting at an appropriate time and active when the time comes,
that will provide you with a reasonable transition.
However, it is also much more time consuming, correct?
So
the advantage of following a more formalized approach, a qi gong approach,
is that the amount of time that you need to put in in order to transition
is much smaller than the amount of time you would need in order to
do it by common, everyday activities.
But that, of course, is entirely up to you.
If you have any questions, i’ll feel free to drop them below in the
comments.
I will get back to you.
And I hope your transition this spring is smooth
as it can be.
Some people have a real tough time with the spring transition.
Some people breeze through it.
I’m hope you’re one of the people that breeze through it.
And if you have difficulty,
try to follow
the…at least everyday activities
that will assist you.
Thank you very much.