Enter the Dragon
Dragons are sky beings
Look up at the sky and you may see clouds taking the shape of magnificent beasts that look like dragons. Photo of the clouds in the sky in Red Rock Canyon in Las Vegas, Nevada by Josie Weaver.
Happy Spring Festival!
February 10, 2024 is the beginning of the Spring festival, also known as Chinese New Year. Festivities go on for two weeks to honor ancestors, spend time with family, and welcome the spring. In the weeks (or days) before the Spring Festival, you are encouraged to declutter and clean your house, prepare food, and contemplate the year to come. January’s resolutions now give way to acting on a daring vision for the year.
Enter the Mythical Dragon
Per the Chinese Zodiac, this year is the year of the Wood Dragon, also known as the Green Dragon. Of all the 12 animals in the Chinese Zodiac, the Dragon is the only animal that you may never see in real life. The animals of the Chinese Zodiac are rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. Dragons are mythical creatures, and so this means dragons basically live in the imagination. When you take time during a spring day and gaze up at the sky full of clouds, some clouds may have shapes that look like earthly animals. Some clouds may resemble heavenly beasts, like dragons, that eat other clouds and play like gods up in the sky. Being mythical creatures that dwell in the sky, dragons fly overhead and bestow blessings on the earth in the form of weather and water phenomena. In Chinese culture, dragons symbolize good luck, strength, benevolence, and power. In modern-day China, a dragon image is often used to symbolize China itself.
The Wood Dragon Elemental Energy
Combined with the nourishing Wood element of the Chinese Five Elements, the Wood Dragon brings evolution, improvement, and abundance. In Five Element theory, the wood element represents energy that grows and reaches out into new territory. Wood energy is about creative power and expansion. Wood energy can also express as intuition and spiritual energy, which can sometimes have emotional expressions such as deep knowing and revelation. At the extremes, when wood energy is unbalanced, there can be depression (not enough wood creativity) or anger, uptightness and stubbornness (not enough wood flexibility), or feelings of overwhelm can arise from being driven, rigid and inflexible. Wood energy can be nurtured with patience, time, good food, water, fresh air, and physical movement that feels like play.
Enjoying life is a sign of good health!
Noble and Heroic Wood Dragon
Dragons in general are associated with majestic, noble, and heroic energy, and so the nurturing Wood Dragons are champions of compassion, supporting humanity, and making dreams into reality. The Wood Dragon can bring you the beautiful feeling that life is for you and with you. There is enjoyment, but also responsibility and hard work, to meet the opportunities presented in a dragon year. The Year of the Wood Dragon can be a great time for getting married, starting a family, or starting or restarting a business. These are noble endeavors that make you part of a larger community and encourage you to share your gifts and talents with others. Expressing these things is positive, and you might even feel adventurous, optimistic, and ambitious as you reach out to others and pursue these things.
Be Patient and Kind
So, the keys for the Wood Dragon Year are to believe in yourself and your visions of goodness in the world while also cultivating open-mindedness, adaptability, and flexibility. Not everyone may agree with you, but the self-confidence and maturity you develop in a Wood Dragon year will come from being patient and kind. The Wood Dragon year is a great year to build a solid foundation for your future as a noble being who lives well, loves well, and shares value with others and the world.
Magnificent wishes for a year of endless blessings!
See you next week.
-Josie