The Five Elements: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, Water

What each of the five looks like in a person

Wood　Growth, reaching, pushing outward. Wood people have ideas and want to act on them, and do not take well to being held down.

Fire　Warmth, brightness, everything turned outward. Fire people carry a room with them, and their moods are just as visible.

Earth　Bearing weight, steadiness, practicality. Earth people are dependable and slow to warm, and not easily moved once settled.

Metal　Restraint, sharpness, principle. Metal people are exacting and hold a high standard; they are harder inside than they look.

Water　Flow, seeping through, adapting. Water people are quick and adjust to anything, and are not easy to read.

The elements and the body

In traditional Chinese medicine each element is paired with a group of organs. Whichever element runs weak is usually where the body complains first:

Wood → liver, gallbladder; eyes, tendons
Fire → heart, small intestine; blood vessels
Earth → spleen, stomach; muscles, digestion
Metal → lungs, large intestine; skin, airways
Water → kidneys, bladder; bones, ears

This is a tendency recorded in the tradition, not a diagnosis. Anyone who looks after themselves properly is entitled to look nothing like this table.

Generating and controlling

Generating (相生): Wood feeds Fire, Fire makes Earth, Earth yields Metal, Metal carries Water, Water grows Wood.

Controlling (相克): Wood breaks Earth, Earth dams Water, Water puts out Fire, Fire melts Metal, Metal cuts Wood.

Put two people in that: where one generates the other, the one giving tends to give more and more, and in time it stops being noticed. Where one controls the other, the one being controlled gives way without deciding to, and gets quieter. Two of the same element is a mirror — quick to understand each other, and blind in the same places.

Knowing which of those you are in means that during an argument you are less likely to jump to “we are not compatible”.

Common questions

If my chart is short of an element, should I add it?

Not necessarily. Bazi reads the balance of the whole chart — what is missing does not automatically need supplying, and having a lot of something is not automatically good. What actually needs supporting is the favourable element (喜用神), and that can only be decided once you know whether the Day Master is strong or weak.

Do numbers have elements too?

They do. The mapping this site uses for numerology is: 1 and 6 are Metal, 2 and 7 are Water, 3 and 8 are Fire, 4 and 9 are Wood, 5 is Earth. Note that this is not the He Tu sequence used in feng shui for choosing floors (where 1 and 6 are Water). They are two different systems for two different purposes, and mixing them gives you nonsense.