Late Summer: The Fifth Season

Late Summer is the fifth season in Traditional Chinese Medicine. While it is a short season, it is, in many ways, the most important, as it represents the transition from the expansive yang energy of spring and summer to the quieter yin energy of fall and winter. This is the point at which all seasons converge. As Paul Pitchford writes in Healing with Whole Foods, Late Summer represents “the instant where the pendulum reverses its swing.”

The late summer season is associated with Earth, the mother of the elements. There is an emphasis put on nurturing, nourishing, and most of all, grounding. The earth represents a balance of yang and yin, an even energy flow.

This is a time of stability, where we have the opportunity to slow down, look around, and appreciate the feeling of abundance and contentment. The feeling of “home” is especially important.

This season is the point of clarity between Summer and Fall, when we can stop and look around us and figure out what we need to do to prepare for winter.

In our lives, we see this reflected socially. This is the late harvest time when the earth offers up a wealth of nutritious food, which we gather to enjoy and also preserve for the coming cold months when fresh food is not as plentiful.

This is also when children get ready to head back to school at the beginning of September.

Grounding and centering during this period are key. We must protect the immune system for autumn by preparing our bodies and minds.

Repost: The MUST-Have Talk Before Labor

Deb of the Prenatal Yoga Center keeps a blog about pregnancy-related issues. Below is an excerpt of the July 31st entry entitled, "The MUST-Have Talk Before Labor," in which she discusses something rarely considered when preparing for the birth of a child.

Recently I was at a couple’s apartment doing a private childbirth education class. We went through quite a bit of information that covered everything from pain management techniques to understanding the different stages of labor to how the mom’s partner can support her through the variations and complications that might arise during labor and delivery. Near the end of our session, I asked the couple, “How do you work as a couple in highly emotional or uncontrolled situations?” The father-to-be looked at me oddly and said “I think we work well together, but why are you asking?” I think this is one area that is not given much attention, but is really important. I am not trying to say that labor is innately stressful, but it is a departure from normal everyday occurrences, a situation where one part of the couple is going through an intense physical experience.

Read more here.

Late Summer Polenta

As we shift into late summer, the fifth season in Chinese medicine, we can enjoy an abundance of nutritious food the earth offers up. This season is associated with the color yellow, so what better in-season food to enjoy than corn?

One of my favorite takes on this mildly sweet vegetable is polenta, finely ground corn cooked into a thick paste.

To make polenta, all you need is

1 cup polenta
3 cups water
1/8-1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Directions:

*Mix 1/2 cup water with polenta.
*Boil the remainder of the water and gently pour into the polenta. Stir while pouring.
*Bring back to boil.
*Add salt and cover.
*Simmer 30-40 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Variations: Mix vegetables or raisins and nuts into cooking polenta. You can pour it into molds or cut it into squares when it has cooled.

It's Hot Out There!

Hope you're enjoying a beautiful weekend and staying cool! This is definitely one of the hottest weekends we've had in New York this summer.

When the temperatures soar like this, it's important to stay hydrated. Sipping water with lemon or cucumber is a refreshing way to cool off.

Be careful too if you go out in the sun—wear your sunscreen! You might also want to make sure not to leave food out for too long in direct light. Look what happened to these cupcakes!

The Spleen: More Important Than Many Realize

I get many patients who come in for digestive issues and are often surprised to hear that an imbalance involving their spleen is the cause. In Western medicine, the spleen, a so-called "B-List abdominal organ" is rarely discussed. However, a recent study conducted by Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical center shows that the spleen plays a bigger role than suspected.

The spleen serves a reservoir for immune cells called monocytes—consider them little cellular repair workers—which it will release into the bloodstream in the event of a serious trauma to the body to help stop the crisis. This finding came as a huge surprise to researchers, who had previously assumed that the origin of these cells was more likely bone marrow.

This just goes to show that we should never underestimate the value of any part of our body—they are all part of a very important whole, and what goes on in one place, however small or insignificant it may seem, can have a huge impact on our physical, mental, and emotional health.

To read more about the spleen, read this article that ran this past Tuesday in the New York Times Science section, called "Finally, the Spleen Gets Some Respect."