At the time of our birth, the prevailing cosmic and telluric energies have an important effect on our personality. It can be said that at the time of birth these energies give us our own individual rhythms that seem to transcend our genetic makeup and upbringing.. Traditional Chinese medicine embraces a fivefold concept known as the Five Element or Five Phase Theory that help explain these rhythms. Traditional Chinese medicine points out that we all tend to be one predominant ‘type’ from among the five elements of Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water, though no one is one hundred percent one type alone. In this article we discuss both the in-balance and out-of-balance (maladapted) Water type personality.
The Mystery of Water
Water, hidden and unseen, is the deepest part of our energetic system. It’s the root of aliveness and vitality in the human body. Water is essential for the maintenance of life. It carries evolutionary memory and powers the activities of the body including healing and regeneration.
Traditional Chinese medicine has assigned a color to each of the elements and Water’s color is black. Appropriately, we begin our life’s journey in the unknown—in water, floating in amniotic fluid—our eyes closed creating black darkness in a womb which, too, is absent of physical light, it, too, mirroring that black darkness. The Water element is the most yin of the five elements.
The Primary Archetype
The archetype that best describes the Water personality in balance is the wise one or philosopher. The wise one strives to bring the dark black mysteries of life into the light. She knows when to be active and when to retreat. She understands the intricacies, paradoxes and enigmas of life and is able to astutely share these insights she has developed in order to help others live more fulfilled lives.
The Water personality is all about searching for meaning. Water runs deep and so do Water type personalities.
“The Sage, the Water element archetype, represents the power of the Water energy to transform fear and doubt to wisdom and trust and to promote acceptance of the unknown and the unknowable as part of life.” —Charles A. Moss, M. D. in Power of the Five Elements: The Chinese Medicine Path to Healthy Aging and Stress Resistance
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This wise Water personality knows he has benefited from all the knowledge and experience he has garnered from generations before him. He loves applying the lessons he has learned from that history. At the same time, it takes all the wisdom Water has developed to maintain his or her equilibrium, grounding and balance in this type.
“The cafés in Paris, the hookah lounges in the Middle East, and the urban coffeehouses in America are filled with them. They love to sit with close friends, ruminating about life, waxing eloquent about all this is right and wrong with the world. They are great conversationalists, and the deeper the conversations, the better.” —Dondi Dahlin in The Five Elements: Understand Yourself and Enhance Your Relationships with the Wisdom of the World's Oldest Personality Type System
Water loves to plumb the depths of life, losing themselves as blissfully in the arts as they do grocery store aisles searching for just the right wine. Water takes life very seriously often not getting the jokes along the way.
Theirs is a slower rhythm. They take their time. They have patience. Hurry is not part of their consciousness. Calm is evident in their manner of speaking and speech, their gait, their breathing and their response to life. They find rituals, symbols and traditions alluringly poignant. You have to be well-read to keep up intellectually with an in-balance Water.
Water type personalities are very people oriented and will readily allow new people into their lives but tend not to initiate these relationships. Water loves to help other people succeed. If Water can help others succeed, then Water has succeeded.
A good listener, Water does not enjoy confrontation and will work to achieve harmony among people however he can.
Water must live a life that is fully aligned with his core values and beliefs. Deeply philosophical and profound, Water tends to see menial tasks as art. In fact, Water types are very artistic themselves. The most creative and artistic people the world has ever seen tend to have strong Water personalities. Their creations are awe-inspiring.
Water type personalities live in their minds. They prefer predictability. They need to make sense of life, but out-of-balance or maladapted Water will have difficulty reconciling a world that looks very warped to them. This causes them to feel depressed as the world looks murkier and quite different from what others perceive.
Two Types of Water
For most people Water is the most challenging of the five element personality types to understand. This is because there are two types of Water: 1) the wise philosopher archetype and 2) the new baby full of wonder, delight and playfulness.
The philosopher spends time reading, journaling, writing, studying, and contemplating life. The philosopher prefers time spent alone. He or she has a keen interest in the past and how it has influenced the present. Even when it comes to meeting a new person, the wise one type of Water wants to know everything about her new acquaintance's history so that she can better understand who is before her.
The second archetype, that of the playful new baby, is the adult who is still quite childlike, bubbly and radiant. This type of Water will follow a crowd or easily make new friends simply because she is curious and finds it fun and interesting. This Water type can be very endearing, delightful and even spontaneous.
Their primary challenge is that they have so many ideas they never follow through on many. They lack motivation to see their ideas through. They need someone to push them along.
Both archetypes of Water, the philosopher and the playful baby both have a yin energy. The influence of the strong yin energy is translated as intense inner focus. Both archetypes of the Water personality tend to be quieter than others, more introverted and more private.
Water-in-balance can be an enormously captivating personality with a zen-like air, but out-of-balance can have inhibitions, low self-esteem, a tendency to overcautiousness with a preoccupation for worry and agitation. False bravado is another of maladapted Water’s personality traits.
The maladapted Water type will tend to feel overwhelmed, agitated through crisis, resigned to what she cannot conquer, isolated and fearful.
She finds a pathway back into balance through tapping in to her innate sense of calm and wisdom where she can once again begin to confidently manage life’s crises. Regaining her balance by diving in to her core essence she will no longer feel alone but instead supported by the universe whether she has people around her or not.
Whether you are in- or out-of-balance as a Water type, embrace your wondrous archetype of wise one, philosopher and playful child. Stand in your essence of life. You are Water.
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Endnotes:
Dahlin, Dondi. The Five Elements: Understand Yourself and Enhance Your Relationships with the Wisdom of the World's Oldest Personality Type System. United States, Penguin Publishing Group, 2016.
Moss, Charles A. Power of the Five Elements: The Chinese Medicine Path to Healthy Aging and Stress Resistance. United States, North Atlantic Books, 2011.