Vitality for Winter Dreaming
Wood Snake, 木蛇, resting
Well, we’ve done it again. A wrap-up of another calendar year and the approach of a new Lunar year ☽.
As we say farewell to the energies of an incredibly purifying Wood Snake year — deep rest and intentional nourishment is crucial as we dream our way into a Fire Horse year (very Yang energy 🐎💨🔥).
This Pulse post will provide simple tips on tending to your precious home (body) during the Winter season (time of rest and dreaming). We’ll examine how winter is the seat of the throne for the Kidneys, why rest is prioritized, and how to artfully craft your meals to ensure your kidneys and life force receive and transmute supportive Qi during the cold months.
Feeling into the energies, I consider early/mid-winter season up until Lunar New Year (February 17, 2026) the tail end (Get it? 🥁) shedding of the Wood Snake year 🐍. A snake experiences an alchemical process prior to, during and after shedding. Vision literally becomes clouded and silky-milky, behavior and energies retreat inward and the entire body utilizes large amounts of water to support its expanded growth in all directions.
After the shed, vision is sharpened 🪡 (because the eyes peel, too - very powerful stuff here, yeah?), sight is heightened, and sensitivity is through the roof (each little scale on the snake individually senses its environment and more after a fresh shed). So — I don’t have to elaborate on how precise and clear this metaphor is, right? All I offer on closing out the Snake year is emphasis on receptivity for evolved perspective to commence Fire Horse year’s demands—feel into that galloping, stampeding Stallion energy (whew!)—we leave molted baggage behind.
How we receive and water our dreams over winter will shape the vision and trajectory of what’s stored in the future.
Hence, I highly suggest you consider these tips I offer to support your physical, emotional and spirit body. Now let’s begin —
The Winter Element and the Kidneys ❄️🫘
Winter says, “I complete all seasons.” Winter is Yin and holds the water element. The kidneys are also a Yin organ and embody the water (through function and appearance). The season of winter is cold, contemplative, retractive, dreamy, slow, and slumbering. Winter sets the stage for rest, dreaming and storage of high-quality energy (which we must reserve now for Fire Horse vibes — I get goosebumps feeling it 🔥🐎☯️).
This means less partying, worrying, late nights and behavioral neglect of your body. The kidneys house your Jing — the vital essence of your body. It is one of the Three Treasures (Jing, Qi, Shen) of health and vitality as known in ancient TCM transmission. All humans are born with a determined amount of Jing at conception and fetal development—shaped by one’s maternal & paternal lineages and karmic influences. Thus, how we conduct ourselves in life contribute to our Jing reserves. Conduct is reflected through food choices, behaviors, sleep consistency/quality, and relationship to oneself through our digestion of our world. If we desire longevity and health, we must make room for kidney TLC. You won’t regret it.
Our post-agricultural industrial lives dictated by imperialism and capitalism is adept at negatively influencing Jing. From a scientific understanding, we see that HPA dysregulation (see this ND’s writing https://drbrighten.com/hpa-axis-adrenal-fatigue-and-dhea/ for more info) obviously is a consequence of not having supportive environments and life containers to effectively process stress, trauma patterns, and stay true to our birthright of true human embodiment.
Jing is known to concentrate in the brain, ova, semen and bone marrow. TCM states that it is also responsible for regulating body fluid metabolism. Thus, there is a correlation of how Qi and the fluid dynamic of Yin and Yang is distributed throughout the body— as you can imagine. Since biological Jing is “set”, we must trust life and Mother Earth to help acquire external Jing through nutrition to support our biological reserves and even enhance it.
Kidney Energetics and Supportive Practices
If we understand ourselves, we can realize that setting firm but compassionately loving structures/habits/boundaries for our Self is crucial to thriving in the modern world. I don’t mean “firm” as rigid or PTSD-inducing. I mean it as the quality of the Self-loving parental figure we must activate for ourSelves. In fact, kidneys love structure and consistency— it’s really cute! Predictable patterns = kidney love language = trust.
Here are examples of what kidneys need and appreciate, especially during Winter:
Warmth (avoid bare skin exposure to cold weather) and keep your kidney areas covered and protected (wear layers and reduce outdoor runs in sports bras, shorts, and T-shirts/tank tops)
Consistent bed and wake schedule
Predictable timing of nutritious meals
Proper chewing (kidneys have a relationship to our teeth and want food to be chewed thoroughly; 30-50 chews/bite)
Thorough chewing allows proper transformation to occur prior to further digestion by our other organs. This releases molecules that other parts of the body cannot do — thus improving bioavailability and breakdown of foods)
Proper chewing helps your entire system calibrate whether enough nutrients have been released — this often means less food needs to be ingested if chewed sufficiently)
Modestly portioned meals
Regular movement (daily, easeful walking)
Sufficient hydration
Restorative practices (Qigong, Taichi, Yin yoga, soft rhythmic movements, beautiful music)
Jing Depleting Factors to Consider:
Unprocessed fear and internalized fears
Iced water, cold beverages
Cold food and raw salads during winter
if you choose to eat raw veggies, be sure to balance out with warm foods. (ie: sauerkraut over soup, microsprouts over warm rice dish) to neutralize cold
Overeating & late meals
Deep fried food
Contamination of food and drinking/bathing water (pesticides, harsh chemicals, leached impurities)
Alcohol and drug use
Caffeine (especially coffee kind)
Heavy metal ingestion and exposures (ingestion of high mercury fish, environmental exposures in living areas, low quality cookware, history of mercury dental fillings, etc)
Excessive processed sugar and food intake these are often societal addictions that perpetuate HPA dysregulation and “keep the grind going” — No, thank you —I’ll pass.)
Nutrition and Food Alchemy 🍛
I opted to categorize nutritional therapy under “supportive practices” here, since I’ve learned through personal and clinical experience that most people don’t have a healthy relationship with food, even if they think they do. And many don’t voice this because we won’t admit it to ourselves. Thus, in my opinion — nourishment and food is a practice (or start out by respecting as a practice to find right relationship)— in this observable paradigm where disconnection to Earth’s gift of sustenance has been forgotten. I don’t shame or blame — rather I honestly point out what life personally taught and revealed to me through the path of medicine.
Practice eventually eases into lifestyle (successfully integrated as your healthy normal).
Our relationship with food reveals our relationship to life (Btw, this can be a juicy Pulse blog later). Choices, cravings, restrictions, overindulgence and such are just doorways and indicators to the potentiality of deeper healing and freedom of embodiment.
Ok! Let’s dive into winter focused, kidney friendly nutrition:
5 Elemental Nutrition through the principles of TCM states that black and dark foods (black sesame, eggplant, black beans, purple potatoes/yam, blueberries, wood ear fungus, purple cabbage, purple/black rice) nourish the kidneys.
Salt is also important (caution if you have any medical conditions such as high blood pressure, endocrine disorders, kidney disease/conditions, etc. Be sure to consult with your medical professional to discuss salt use) — but salt isn’t necessarily the table salt/sea salt that comes to mind.
TCM considers certain foods as inherently “salty” due to the nature of their nutritious, high mineral composition. Examples include: Nettles, sea vegetables, miso, good quality seafoods, and slow-simmered bone broths. Adding these foods in your cooking are highly beneficial and supportive during the winter months. (Think soup, soup, soup!) The salt “qualities” of certain whole foods help to moisten the body’s tissues and constitution, as salt has the energetics of “drawing in water”. The previous season of Autumn is quite drying so supporting fluid balance during Winter is not a bad idea. If you choose to use sea salt in cooking, be honest with yourself and not indulge in excess.
If you’ve worked with a trusted acupuncturist before, you might have heard terms they’ve used such as “blood deficiency, stagnation, excess, etc”. Great news is that nutritional therapy can be applied to balance disharmony in conjunction with acupuncture treatments.
If your acupuncturist has observed through your pulse and/or tongue that your kidneys or other organs are deficient (or not communicating clearly with each other), then adding wholesome, sweet foods into your broths with seaweeds can offer tonification (help strengthen) of the kidneys. Sweet foods include yams, winter squashes, jujube dates, goji berries, hawthorn berries, stewed/steamed fruits, corn, grains, other colorful root vegetables, etc.
Let’s not forget the heart ❤️ —
Folks often experience depressed mood during the darker days. In TCM, bitter foods are known to offer heart medicine and benefits to the small intestine. The entire gut also contains bitter receptors that help stimulate relaxation. Adding a small amount of bitter foods (beets, celery, bitter herbs, radishes, dark leafy greens, dandelion, watercress, and bitter melon, etc, to your cooking help to spark the energy of calm joy in the heart during long, cold/damp/dark days. Drinking green tea in the morning is also another option.
Here are some simple recipes to consider during the winter:
Qi Stagnation: cilantro and orange peel tea
Blood deficiency: adzuki beans with black beans and peanuts
I suggest pressure cooking or you can soak all beans in filtered water overnight with a dash of apple cider vinegar and discard soaking water before cooking with fresh, clean water to eliminate anti-nutrients such as tannins and phytates, and maximize absorbability
I suggest lightly toasting the peanuts in a skillet or oven prior to cooking
Breakfast of Champi-Yins (For Cool Kids)— an original Earthdragon recipe (Enjoy both puns):
Instructions:
Soak desired portion of oats overnight in clean water with dash of apple cider vinegar (drain & discard water in morning)
Cook oats according to desired texture (for those with weaker digestion, you can bump water to oats ratio up 10:1) - I personally love preparing oats with homemade organic soy milk for hormonal and fluid balance benefits
While simmering to perfection, add 1-2 jujube dates (red dates), a drizzle of tahini (a bonus if you have black sesame tahini), small handful of goji berries, up to 1 TBSP fresh diced ginger, diced pear, sprinkle of sea salt (if tolerated) , spoonful of walnut butter (I make my own).
Wrapping it up:
Eating well and aligning with the seasons is not complicated. It is an enjoyable return to what time-tested ancient medicine has always known. In TCM, nutrition is often the first modality used to support the body’s vis (naturopathic term for life force, such as Qi in TCM).
Stay warm this winter, and enjoy the simple pleasures of bundling up, connecting with your homeland, and learning the qualities of the foods that thrive in this season. Form relationships with them.
What you cultivate—your food, behaviors, thoughts, self-respect, and peace—is what you ultimately digest in both life and body. Respecting food is an act of respecting yourself. Each bite you take is a small devotion that builds your blood, your cells, your mind, and your spirit.
May you receive an easeful season of dreams—
Shannen,
your local Earthdragon 🌏🐉
This writing is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for personalized medical advice.
Thank you for visiting Pulse, my Earthdragon Medicine blog. I offer these writings with deep creative care, bringing forward insights that my field of naturopathic medicine has not yet invited into its stratosphere. May you receive tools and perspective shifts that honor your sacred body and support your well-being & Qi.
If this offering resonated with you, you’re welcome to express your appreciation by sending a tribute to @shannen-lee via Venmo over at https://bio.site/earthdragonmedicine
Thank you! 谢谢 🙏🏼
