Many of us, here on the East Coast, are experiencing another big snowfall as I write this. Where I live, we already have almost 5 inches on the ground, and it’s still snowing hard! Remember those spring-like days of just a few days ago? Well, that wasn’t just spring-LIKE – that was spring, showing itself!
For the Chinese, Spring arrives in early February, usually coinciding with the Chinese New Year. It is not a date on the calendar, but an energy that emerges, gradually and subtely, deep beneath the snow, the hardened ground, unseen at first. It is a movement, not a fixed date. It is about light, and stirrings, reaching upward, emerging. The little vines and seedlings are beginning to creep and crawl under the ground, rising toward the surface. Here, in the west, we say it’s spring when we actually see the first daffodils, crocuses, or forsythia buds.
Within our own bodies, stretching our tendons and muscles and imaginations, the beginnings of new plans, and new ideas all are the expression of spring energy bubbling to the surface. In fact, as the movement of spring begins inside each one of us, just like it is beginning beneath the snow and frozen ground, some of us experience what is referred to as “spring fever.” An acupuncture point on the bottom of the foot (ouch! ahh!), which is a spring point within the winter pathway, is named, “Bubbling Spring.”
Spring fever usually means some itchiness to get outside, to experience the warmth of the sun again. For some of us, feelings of irritability, impatience, grouchiness, headaches, aching and painful muscles flare up. Many of my patients at this time of year, come in complaining of feeling these things. I explain to them that this is spring expressing itself within them, and is, to some degree, perfectly normal. A little adjustment with an acupuncture needle, in Bubbling Spring or another well-chosen point, will flip the re-set button.
Look for the signs of spring in nature and in your own body. They are everywhere. The light has changed just a bit, the air has a different feel, the birds are singing a new song, and, closely studied, the buds are beginning to form. I have already heard reports locally of daffodil and forsythia sightings…and it’s not even February!
Think of the famous YinYang symbol. 
If the white area is spring/summer and the black is Fall/Winter, notice how there is a little bit of one inside the other. So, inside the dark/winter side is a little smidge of the light/spring. It is always there, even if sometimes we can’t see it. As the small white circle grows and grows, it eventually takes over and becomes it’s opposite. Yin and Yang is always moving – from one to the other, ever changing, ever evolving. Just like us, just like life. Isn’t nature wonderful?!
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