As we all try to negotiate the hussle of modern life, I know personally there has always been a little voice in my heart asking why, what is beneath and around all this striving and playing the game?  I can’t help feeling that what we are searching for is ourselves and a spiritual path that makes sense to our deepest cells of intuition.

In direct opposition to our modern culture where we look outward for validation and guidance and we care for our appearance in order to be accepted, in Taoism the exact opposite is true.  We look inside ourselves and we strive for a greater understanding of ourselves in order to understand the world and our place in it; the outer world is only known in relation to our inner point of view.

Self cultivation is the basis for knowing the Tao… Acupuncture, and the healing it enables, is a perfect place to begin this journey.  It is only by being in harmony with ourselves that our body can heal itself, which this is the basis of acupuncture.  The needles connect to our spirit opening up pathways to access our own well of understanding, knowing and healing.  When we truly connected to our spirit we are truly connected to the Tao…

However, as we all know, today living mostly in cities, leading work driven lives with numerous responsibilities and pressures from all sides; friends, family, work, this is nearly impossible. We don’t have a culture of changing our lives in order to live more appropriately within the demands of a season – in the Winter our jobs still start and finish at the same time as the rest of the year and we might cut our social life down a little but in the main we tend to live a consistently busy life and all this can strain our kidneys leading to tiredness, thinning hair and nails, lack of drive and motivation and even mild depression

Apart from these obvious drains on our Kidneys we have another new robber of kidney energy; social media and smart phones.  While this obsession might seem quite innocent on the surface it is draining our kidneys with every adrenaline hit a post or a like, email, text, whats app message etc gives us.  Not only does this act as a constant drain on our Kidney energy in the form of overstimulation it also denies us any moments of peace to stare out the window and daydream accessing our deep innate wisdom that resides in our Kidneys.  We need that to nourish our spirit and have ideas and dreams that we can covert to reality in the Spring!

With this in mind here are a few tips as we near the end of the winter to boost your kidneys so you have enough energy to jump into Spring and start giving birth to all those projects you have been dreaming of during the winter!

Tips:

• Cut your social media use to specific times in the morning and evening so as to avoid mindless browsing
• Keep your phone in your pocket when on the bus using the time to daydream looking out the window – give your brain a rest!
• Eat warm foods; soups, stews and cut out ice and cold raw foods
• Make some black sesame tea – recipe here
• Look to include red and blue foods; blueberries, blackberries, beetroot etc
• BOOK IN FOR SOME ACUPUNCTURE!!!

There are many things that are good for the Kindneys health which you can read here, but a simply way to boost them is by drinking Black Sesame Tea:

• 1 cup black sesame seeds
• 2 soft dates – pitted
• 3 cups water
1 cup homemade almond milk or almond-sesame milk (see recipe below)

1. Boil the sesame seeds and dates in some water for 30 minutes

2. Add some homemade almond milk and continue to boil

3. Optional you can strain the liquid removing the sesame seeds and dates or you can whizz them all up together to make a thicker, frothy drink

4. Add honey to taste if the dates aren’t sweet enough for you

After an equally un-relaxing Christmas and countless messages from obscure sources urging me to calm down, I am finally acting and consciously listening to my knowledge of Chinese Medicine and meditation in terms of honoring the tides of the seasons, which prompted me to write this post as I know I am not alone in getting caught up in the whirlwind that surrounds us.

Winter especially calls for us to turn our attention inwards, to nurture ourselves and to face the darkness rather than keeping on searching out the light, i.e distraction of being busy. I always feel its no coincidence many people suffer from melancholy at this time of year; we are running away from ourselves and from the true energy of the season – we are running against the tide, which is never easy or comfortable. Its easy and common to fear turning inwards to face our deepest selves and our potential darkness, so we continue to accept invitations to socialize and are attracted towards the light of distraction in all its seductive forms to take us from listening to what is going on inside.

True peace and happiness is found when we dare to switch off, create silence and listen to the voices within and create stillness that reflects the inertia and hibernation of winter.

In January we are given the most wonderful opportunity to slow down, to rest, and to listen to our inner intuition, however, this in itself takes discipline. Just as nature has frozen in time and has stopped we should do the same – surrendering to the seasons is the most powerful way to keep healthy and in touch with the tides that makes most sense to our being.

Take heed and look within, don’t be afraid – nurture yourself with meditation, self-acceptance and silence.

“SILENCE IS THE SOURCE OF GREAT STRENGTH” LAO TZE

My keys to creating peace and happiness in the winter:

Sleep. The power of rest should never be underestimated but least of all now – we need to recuperate from the previous year and create fertile ground, i.e. stillness of mind for the germination of new ideas that will grow in the spring.

Eat warm nurturing foods: Gone are the crisp salads and cold juices of the summer, keep warm with nourishing soups and stews so that the digestive system has to do as little work as possible.

Meditate: sit for 10-20 minutes in the morning and in the evening to give your whole system, body, mind and spirit an intended break, creating space and stillness from where true power comes.

Evenings in with candles and books: My all time favorite thing has to be lighting a candle and settling down to read a good book! Treat your evenings this January as mini retreats – turn off all electrical devices and the TV, create a clean and tidy space, light a candle and settle down with a book, relishing in the silence and peace. This can’t help but to restore, inspire and calm…