Metal and the Season

Five ElementsElement: Metal 金

Metal governs autumn, from 立秋 in early August to 立冬 in early November. It is the season of the cut: the harvest is taken, the year starts closing, and the phase's instruction is to finish rather than to begin.

金 Jīn · autumn · west

The five relations of Metal: what feeds it, what it feeds, what restrains it and what it restrains. — Metal at the centre of its own relations — Season. Correspondences follow the classical classification.

At a glance

Metal governs autumn — from 立秋 in August to 立冬 in November, the season for finishing and letting go.

In the classical correspondence tables Metal governs autumn and the west, the lung and large intestine, the nose, and the pungent taste.

Metal and autumn

Autumn's logic is the reverse of spring's in every respect. Spring starts things that have no evidence; autumn decides what is worth keeping and lets the rest go. The classical advice is to be decisive, to complete what was started, and to accept the contraction — the season's failure mode is holding on to what should be released.

The three months are 申, 酉 and 戌. 申 is the first autumn month and carries strong Metal with hidden Water; 酉 is the peak, pure Metal and the most exact point in the year; 戌 is the transition month, technically Earth, where the season hands over. A chart born in 酉 reads sharper than one born three weeks later.

For a person, the correspondence is about finishing. Metal-heavy charts tend to be most themselves when something is being completed and least comfortable in the long middle of a project — which is why the same person can be excellent at delivery and restless during the part where nothing is decided yet.

What the season asks of you

To decide, and to let go of what does not survive the decision. The classical instruction for autumn is that the year's account is settled now, and that keeping everything is a failure of the season.

The month boundaries

申 from 立秋, 酉 from 白露, 戌 from 寒露 — each around the 7th to 8th of the month. A birth within a day of a boundary is why practitioners ask for the hour.

The season in correspondences

Season

autumn

Season (Chinese)

秋

Climate

dryness

Numbers

4 and 9

How much weight this carries

The seasons are the original evidence for the whole scheme — the cycle was read off the year before it was ever applied to a person. That is also its limit: a season is a phase everyone passes through, while a chart is a particular arrangement of phases.