12/06/2025
The Metal Element, the Po, and What I’m Moving Through
Lately I’ve been going through something deep, powerful, and honestly a little overwhelming — and I’m finally understanding what it really is.
In Classical Chinese Medicine, we’re in the season of the Metal Element — the element of autumn, grief, letting go, truth, boundaries, purification, refinement, and spiritual clarity.
Metal is the time when the old falls away… and anything that isn’t aligned gets revealed.
And right now, my whole body and spirit are moving through a massive Metal initiation.
Metal rules the Lungs and Large Intestine — the organs of breathing in and letting go.
And inside the Lungs lives something called the Po (魄) — the corporeal soul, the part of our spirit that:
• feels deeply
• reacts instinctively
• carries grief
• holds ancestral pain
• senses truth in the body
• cries, releases, purifies
• helps us let go of what is not ours
• connects us to the physical, primal, intuitive world
The Po is the soul that comes into the body at birth
and returns to the earth when we die.
And when the Po awakens —
you feel EVERYTHING.
That is exactly what has been happening to me.
The crying…
the heartbreak opening…
the sudden clarity about family patterns…
seeing truth I never saw before…
recognizing denial, repression, and generational trauma…
feeling the weight of old roles cracking off my body…
and stepping into who I really am spiritually…
This is all Po activation, and it’s exactly what the Metal Element brings.
The Po’s job is to clear out emotional debris —
not just from today,
but from childhood,
from the ancestors,
from the body,
from the patterns we’ve been carrying for decades.
It says:
“This can’t live inside you anymore.”
And that’s what this season has been for me —
a purification, a shedding, a release.
I’m understanding why I’ve always been the one in my family who feels everything, sees everything, and speaks what no one else will.
I’m understanding why I’ve been the emotional awakener, the truth-teller, the one who refuses to carry what isn’t mine.
I’m understanding why these family dynamics hit so hard this year.
The Metal Element is all about:
✨ releasing old identities
✨ seeing clearly
✨ strengthening boundaries
✨ grieving what was hidden or denied
✨ healing the lungs and breath
✨ reconnecting with Spirit
✨ clarifying your worth
✨ stepping into your soul path
This is also deeply connected to shamanic initiation —
the cracking open, the emotional purge, the ancestral healing, the spiritual awakening, the shift into a new identity.
This is the part of the journey where the old self dies
and the new self begins to rise.
If you’ve been feeling emotional, raw, sensitive, grieving, or suddenly clear about things you tolerated for too long —
you might be moving through a Metal initiation too.
The Po is asking us to:
let go, breathe deeper, see truth, and return to the essence of who we are.
And that is exactly where I’m at.
Letting go of what’s not mine.
Releasing old roles.
Healing ancestral lines.
Strengthening my boundaries.
Honoring my awakening.
And stepping fully into my next chapter.
If you’re feeling this too, you’re not alone.
This season is big, powerful, honest, and transformative.
And we’re moving through it together.
