The stomach meridian deals with affairs of both physiological and psychological nourishment. Imbalance in the stomach meridian quickly affects other organs because they depend on nourishment gained through the digestion of food for energy.
With the inability to maintain normal energy levels through food consumption both body and mind find it difficult dealing with physiological processes (muscle strength, immune system deficiency), and psychological processes (personal relationships).
Due to constant low energy levels one may find the world just to complicated with so many problems and difficulties. They may experience eating disorders, disordered body image, become hyper-sensitive, restless, and easily startled by noise.
Stomach Meridian imbalances are indicated when one is overly involved with the affairs of the head, over intellectualizing, analyzing and constantly trying to figure out things neglecting his own personal bodily needs.
When there is trouble in a personal relationship, to avoid pain and feeling, one suppresses breathing and indulges in affairs of the head and loses ones own sense of self. Parents may fuse with their children and try to live their lives or are overly concerned about their well being. Their children become their main source of self esteme and much anxiety is created by failure to maintain healthy boundaries.
Stomach Meridian imbalance breeds a arena of conflict between the body and mind, throught and feelings. That is if one is even aware of their true feelings and how they feel towards someone or something. They often hesitate in trusting how and if they feel and their intuitions.
Analyzing and intellectualizing and talking about feeling is not feeling, and is often an escape from having true heart felt experience of feeling. Being open to feel may bring up issues of vulnerability and issues of past
rejections and abandonment. As a defense mechanism of feeling pain we suppress breathing, tighten our diaphragm, tense our abdomen and solar plexus and indulge in affairs of the head to escape and live out our lives through dreams of fantasies, projecting our view of reality onto the world, and not seeing or feeling it the way it truely is.
Being down to earth and practical in the affairs of life are the main characteristics of a balanced earth element that maintain the spleen and pancreas meridian. This allows us the opportunity to ground into reality, ideas and concepts that are formulated during transitions through different levels of awareness. Conscious movement through the elements, earth to heaven, heaven back to earth, that maintains balance and create the cyclic flow of prana, and maintains life in an evolutionary direction.
When one is grounded they are practical, in touch with their feelings and emotions, they know who they are as an individual and they know what they want. There is a strong sense of individuality and sense of purpose. They radiate vitality and sensuality and don't get their energies bound and depleted in mental gymnastics, constantly trying to understand and figure things out. Even things like what it is like to feel or love some one. A well grounded individual both lives life and loves life, and dosen't just talk and analize it.
An imbalance Earth element is indicated when one is unable to stand ones own ground, is constantly seeking approval or looking for support from the outside because they are unable to nourish oneself from within. One may
constantly seem to be reinforcing the concept, "I Need" within his awareness. Seeking sympathy or emotional nourishment one may fall into a dependent relationship where another individual takes on the burden and responsibility
for keeping the relationship grounded. They often don't realize what they need, is not someone to take care of them but someone to help them get grounded and centered and get balanced in their reality, so they may become a whole
self realized, self actualized individuality.
Spending time up in the head may develop momentary potential for deep insight into things for a short period of time but lack the ability to consentrate and operate on subtle levels for extended periods of time. Spending too much time away from the body weakens the body. The head may
get energized but may leave the body depleted physically and emotionally. One can lose the ability to concentrate, synthyize and maintain long term memory. While away from the body one may feel they have the solutions to everyones problems, and if they don't they feel responsible to find answers for them.
Imbalance causes one not to accept people the way they are but feel they have to change them to meet his/her own standards. This being less of a threat in their own atmoshperic spaces of personal belief.
Balancing the earth meridian may help quiet down the hyperactive movement of the mind from one concern to another. For concern can arise from sympathetic relationships. Being ungrounded, we may fail to recognize personal boundaries, which may cause over involvement in
the affairs of loved ones. We can be so concerned about their needs that our own needs are not getting met. We may even wish to take on their problems and try to fix them. Overconcern can be smothering to others and not allow them the space to express themselves freely and openly find solutions in their lives that work for them.
If this meridian is hypoactive we may experience, lack of concentration, forgetfulness, absent- mindedness, indifferent, alienation, and difficulty giving and receiving sympathy. Imbalance may correlate with physical and mental fatigue, muscular weakness, lack of tone, poor appetite, and digestion and abdominal tautness. One may feel the need to sleep, and even if he does, does not arise feeling rested. One may feel tired in the morning or all day long.
Being tired and lacking energy he/she gives the appearance of being unsympathetic, indifferent and uncaring about others and unconcerned about their well being. This indifference gets people frustrated with not being able to connect with others, not being able to reach out and touch them.
This seeming emotional numbness can be a defense against relating or expressing our true feelings, holding back, possible due to fear, that wild man a part of our nature that wants to express our selves freely and openly.
Balancing this meridian brings more assertiveness in fulfilling your own personal goals, and ambitions, and not just to be the reflector of someones elses image, and fail to be dynamic, so not to damage the ego of another. Being
in your power, grounded and down to earth, allows you clarity of your own goals and ambitions while one who indulges in more airy realms, may find his realm to get a bit disordered by his impracticality and absent mindedness.
As the absent minded professor who is so involved in the affairs of the head, not being present and aware of the people and the environment around him.
Lacking dynamism and energy to make change, one escapes from his self imposed prison of bordom through his/her flights of dreams and fantasy, further weakening the body mind connection.
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