THE FIVE ELEMENTS, PART II

FIRE

For many indigenous people, Fire is the original element of origin — the element that was present at the beginning.  Its primary nature is combustion, warmth, vision and feeling-passion.  On the wheel of life its position is south — the underworld — and its color is red.  Those with fire as their primary element are believed to have ‘open channels’ to our ancestors and they also have powerful visions of the future [they make great Shamans].  For all of us, fire enables us to act, to emote, and to intuit.  Fire-people are restless, demonstrate powerful emotions, and have electrifying dreams.  Because of their intensity, people of fire often find themselves on the fringe; they cannot quite fit in and others cannot understand why they are not able to be like everybody else.

One reason it is difficult for others to understand the fire-person is because the fire-person lives in the future and finds the ‘average’ person too slow on the uptake.  His or her behavior is seen by the other four elements as impatient, hyperactive, intolerant of the norm, and even ‘out of control.’  A fire-person finds it near impossible to be idle; to slow down, to relax, to reflect or meditate.  On the other hand, the fire-person can use their ‘fire’ to warm those around him/her; they can be a gentle flame that warms relationships; they can be a ‘fire’ that nurtures and does not destroy.

If a fire-person — or in our case a culture — forgets its crucial relationship with the other elements then a fire is fed that becomes a destructive force.  When this separation occurs the fire-person and the fire-culture perceives everything in terms of fire.  Fire becomes for the person and the culture equated with power, speed, destructive hierarchy and becomes the most important ‘value.’  The person and the culture become a person and a culture in high combustion.  When a person or a culture is burning in this manner it is near impossible for either to sit still, be patient, think clearly — they become obsessively focused.

Consider, gentle reader, that our culture (in the United States) is a culture on fire; we are like a fire-ball moving at high speed — we are, in fact, deeply fascinated with speed.  On the surface this speed shows up as high horsepower while deep within the culture it is orchestrated by combustion.  This deep burning from within is symptomatic of a kind of crisis that drives the culture to be driven by and consumed by the fire.  As recent ‘big fires’ remind us, fire is dangerous when it is out of control; it destroys all in its path and leaves a wilderness where there was nature.

For the people who live in a culture that is on fire — that is obsessed with fire — the world is ‘red.’  These people rush foolishly and obsessively forward with a consumer’s mentality [take all that you can take and eat all that you can eat]; they pollute more than nurture and they are willing to destroy anything that gets in their way.

A fire-culture promotes consumerism and cultivates scarcity and hence a scarcity mentality-culture is created.  A culture on fire is fascinated with violence — violence becomes highly marketable and at the same time stimulates the fiery nature of the culture.  I have been criticized these past few years for suggesting that we are a culture that loves violence — a few weeks ago a fellow said that if I didn’t change my thinking that he would beat me up!  A fire-culture is a war-culture.  This war-culture sees solutions in terms of fire and conflicts as fire and that fire can be destroyed with fire [our view that we can use fire to stem the use of fire in Syria is a good example].

A fire-culture requires a great deal of water in order to heal.  So, next we will explore ‘Water.’