Why the Zhi Needs the Zzzzz’s: A Stream on Sleep and the Circle of Life
In Chinese, Wu is translated as a number of words. A few relevant to this series include: Five (wǔ), as in five spirits or elements, shaman (wū), and dance (wǔ), which is also symbolic m the context of the five elements/spirits.
In this series, I’ll write about the context of healing through Chinese medicine and what it means to be supporting the continuity of humanity and helping people maintain or return to their sense of being human. That’s quite a feat living in today’s sped up and fragmented world, though I hope to offer inspiration and maybe some clarity when you think about health, healing, medicine, humanity, and what you’re doing here.
Trigger warning: This post delves into the topic of death and its connection to sleep and sleeplessness. Please proceed (or refrain) at your discretion and according to your own needs.
The bedroom is ancestral
From the western astrological tradition, the 4th house is the place in the chart that symbolizes our origins, as in our family, childhood experiences, and our motherland. It is the most yin point in the chart. Astrologers often call this the place of the womb and the tomb as its terrestrial position is the furthest point of descent for the sun, below the earth; thus this is also often known as the midnight point. That is, it symbolizes our beginning and end, before birth and our re-entry to the same state at the end of life.* The human activity or state of being most aligned with this place is sleep. The place that follows, the 5th, is known as the place of children, and for these reasons, we can see what it is that makes the bedroom an ancestral place.
Liu Ming taught that having an ancestral altar in the bedroom offers a great deal of support in healing, recovery, and regeneration as the bedroom is “where we pretend to be dead” and where we reproduce. Feng shui would also suggest not to keep too much clutter under the bed and to create a balance of yin and yang in the bedroom with shape, color, and space. The modern medicine perspective might link this healing/sleep axis to the release of growth hormone at night, but it doesn’t acknowledge the significance of dreaming, which is important to healthy sleep from Chinese medicine’s perspective. Instead, modern medicine has mostly shrugged it off and lumped it in with psychology, rather than seeing it as fundamental to integration of healthy physiology between day and night. (Side note: I love psychology, but also find it to be a sort of byproduct of modern medicine’s fragmentation of mind, body, spirit... the exact opposite reason why Chinese medicine and somatic experiencing are such complete approaches to healing.)
In recognizing the Zhi spirit’s (Kidney) need for routine and its regulation/storage of the yuan Qi (ancestral Qi) we see the connection between sleep and death. One is simply a practice of the other. That’s a big statement. Sit with that for a minute.
It’s why you’ll hear sleep deprived mothers confess and complain that they feel so tired they could die. I remember during my 12th house profection year (from the sect light), after the birth of my son, struggling immensely with sleep deprivation and what I’d now call a depression. I longed for a tiny death each night. Naturally, in cultures that don’t offer ample support during the first years postpartum—like they do in Norway, Finland, Iceland, and traditionally in China and throughout Asia, for instance—this phase of sleep deprivation comes with parenthood.
If prolonged, however, (especially coupled with insufficient nutrition) it can lead to Kidney yin deficiency which often presents as insomnia, palpitations and/or anxiety, dryness of skin, hair, eyes, and body fluids, back pain, knee pain, hair loss, and night sweating. There’s a hyper vigilance that can accompany this that mothers might experience as fear of the unknown— more specifically fear for their children, but also fear of losing themselves as they molt and shed their maiden skin and move through the fourth trimester and beyond. Part of this is a natural instinctual response, but often it is also veers into overwhelm of the nervous system. The window of tolerance narrows and the sense of threats feels bigger or more vast.
Motherhood is certainly a full circle experience and going through that rite of passage makes one more aware of the truth that we’re all heading in the same direction. Sleep deprivation widens the gap of the unknown by immersing mothers in confusion and disorientating the shen (the five spirits). At some point, there needs to be restoration of sleep and healthy adaptations in order for mothers to preserve their Blood, Qi, and yin. During that time of poor sleep, one of the best treatments for a mother is supplementation through nutritive diet and herbs that engender blood/yin and move Qi, like soupy meals, congee, bone broths, papaya, and black sesame seeds.
On the other hand, it’s excessively common for people in the US to be sleep deprived. It’s one of the reasons I think people from rural China or those situated in a Taoist or Buddhist practice might come to our country and nervously sweat that they want to leave because this country is full of ghosts (Liu Ming)... (the fact that this country was also built on the backs of enslaved peoples who were treated as subhuman doesn’t escape me).
The folly of being too busy hustling to sleep
To think, “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” is good enough is to be poorly mistaken, because if at the time of transition there is not enough Qi, you won’t be able to pass. There is no such thing as catching up on sleep later. Lost sleep is an act of borrowing Qi from the future. And contrary to the linear concept of death being a sudden flat line, humans need Qi to pass over. When a person transitions successfully, it is because there was more Qi on the other side for them. But without that, when someone’s condition is being artificially sustained with drugs or with oxygen (for instance), it creates the possibility of a person becoming a ghost. (Liu Ming)
Depleted of true (Zhen) Qi, their Shen (heart) might be unable to govern and to direct the other 4 shen at death leading to confusion and lack of movement or transformation. This is also why it’s important to have funerals and rituals for our ancestors— guiding them with sound, music, singing/chanting demonstrates the connection between the Zhi (Kidney) and the auditory sense, and it’s the last thing to go from the body—to help them pass and to liberate them because when they are stuck, so are we.
When we liberate our ancestors, we liberate ourselves. (Liu Ming)
If we are to make the mistake of thinking sleep is a waste of time when we’re not doing anything meaningful, productive, or “real” we set ourselves up to become depleted, uninspired, and never truly awake or asleep, but like a ghost (gui). We do spend at least 1/3 of our lives asleep (if we’re healthy), after all. What must we be doing with all that time lying down, still, eyes closed, breath and heart slowed, almost to the point of appearing deceased? Hopefully spending some of that time dreaming, for one!
Next week, we’ll dive into the Hun and its connection to sleep, dream, and inspiration as a way to bid farewell to spring (the Hun and Liver’s associative season) when the Qi Node transitions to Summer Begins.
Edit: As of January 24, 2022 this entry and following entries that were part of the series called “Wu Woo Wednesday” are being left with the title following the designated category of “WWW” posts. This has been done in response to and out of respect for the word Wu and its meaning as “shaman” in the Chinese language. This post script is here to create accountability rather than to erase a poor choice and to show respect for the culture, people, medicine, and ancestors of East Asia.
Comments:
*This is not to be confused with the setting of a person’s child labor, just before a baby enters the world (that is the 12th house preceding the ascendant which is the point that spirit and body matter meet at the first breath).
Recognition:
Vocabulary and articulation of Zhi, dreams, and feng shui, have been facilitated by Liu Ming and his Healing Apprenticeship for whose insight I’m endlessly thankful for.