Chapter 5

Flight from Danger,
Life and Death Instincts

In this chapter we explore the Bladder and Kidney channels of qi and their functions in body, heartmind, and spirit. Note that these lines constitute the Shao Yin and Tai Yang aspects of the Water elemental force and are located in the body along the back and the back of the legs. The Kidney also travels up the front of the torso, quite close to the body’s midline.

Bladder Meridian

Foot Tai Yang

The Tai Yang energy of the hand has connected to the Tai Yang energy of the foot, and we find the strong yang energy flowing from the eyes up over the crown of the head and down the back body all the way to the pinky toe. This is energetically the most yang area of the body, the broad back, the most exposed to the world, and also the one part of the body most difficult to look at directly. We can only observe our own Tai Yang from within using our inner eyes and felt sense for life.

Water Element

The yang aspect of the Water element is expressing itself here in this channel. In water we see a strong yet patient presence. Water can be still as a mountain lake or wild and mad as a raging storm. Water is vital and mysterious, soft and powerful, holds all things, and can be deep and unfathomable. Like Fire, it holds us in fascination and mystery for its powerful and essential place in nature.

3 to 5 pm

The period in the afternoon has long been known as a transitional time. The day itself is dwindling, the shadows lengthening, and the night heralded. The Bladder channel sits here and gives us the capacity to nap or take tea or a coffee break. Whatever we choose to do, we are finding the strength to power through the rest of the day.

Key Functions

Drive, purification, autonomic nervous system

Affirmation

I drive myself forward, keeping an eye on my back.

The Bladder channel of Foot Tai Yang is the yang aspect of Water found in the body, and it follows a pathway from the eyes to the feet. On the physical level the bladder is seen as the organ that stores and eliminates the body’s fluid waste. Examining this function, we can see how it is representative of the faculties of flexibility and capacity. When we reflect upon the experience of bladder functioning, we recognize urgency and drive as fundamental aspects.

Few urges are stronger than the one to urinate when necessary. And the capacity to “hold it” until arriving at a proper facility is a skill we learn over time. As infants we pee anywhere, and as we grow up we must learn to manage this function properly. The Bladder channel thus represents any area of our lives where we must manage ourselves and also focus our intention and move forward with strength and power and wisdom. The channel itself runs down the back, and as such represents our past, all that is behind us. It is also our unconscious, aspects of ourselves that are most difficult to view. Try as you might, you cannot see your back by turning your head.

Only with mirrors or the help of friends and inward looking can we get a glimpse of this aspect of our being. The Bladder meridian is pervasive as well, featuring points along it relating to all the body’s functional systems. Traveling as it does along the spine, it relates to all the enervations of the central nervous system and is therefore central in all nervous system functions. More details of its functions are found in the descriptions that follow.

Key Characteristics of the Functional Range of the
Bladder Channel

Physical

The Bladder channel is named after the urinary bladder organ, but its range of function in the physical body goes way beyond the tasks of storing and releasing the body’s liquid waste. That storing and releasing function can serve as a metaphor for what we might call the body’s capacity and deep inner motivations. How much can you hold? How long can you hold it? When you’ve got to do it, you get it done! It’s all pre-wired and happens as a nearly instinctual and primary function, allowing us to go about the business of living.

Here we find ourselves analyzing the Bladder channel’s governance of the autonomic nervous system, all those myriad nervous system functions throughout the brain, spinal cord, and all the interconnected synapses of the sensory and motor neuron system.

The autonomic nervous system is responsible for all the feedback loops and automatic responses as well as the intelligence of all the systems of the body that perform their tasks without the need for conscious intervention, knowledge, or consent.

Within the purview of automated tasks is the entire panoply of human growth and development. Of particular interest to the Bladder channel are the bones, the many small and large rigid tissues of the body comprising the skeletal system. Here we see the formation of structure and again the body’s capacity to maintain integrity in the midst of physical stress and strain as well as the effects of those stresses and strains on the skeletal structure.

Psychological, Emotional

One emotion that certainly reaches our bones is fear and insecurity. Trembling is the powerful expression of fear governed by Bladder channel energies. Knowing how to balance fear with courage and wisdom is a refinement of the tasks the Bladder performs in body, heartmind, and spirit.

Sometimes courage can manifest as being pushy or possessing vaunting ambition. Both are expressions of yang Water energy. Mighty and inexorable, yang Water is a force that can carve canyons in the earth and forcefully make its way through human affairs.

Concomitant with this pushy ambitiousness can arise nervous anxiety. Factors could tip you off to the idea that you may have gone too far, pushed a little too hard, reached beyond your grasp just a bit too much, leaving you waiting for the other shoe to drop as a result.

Simply conjure the image of any maniacal leader in history who overextended his grasp of territory and resources, and you get a picture of how Bladder energy can lead to a rather dramatic collapse.

We are next led to the land of the deep unconscious, Water’s province. In its yang aspect we will find the Bladder energy in governance in its more yin aspect we find the Kidney in charge.

Since the unconscious is by its nature a deep yin aspect of our essence, the influence related to Bladder energy will also be related to the effort that brings deep inner resources to the surface. Instinctual actions fall into this realm, those times when conditions in life can bring forth a primal response that surges from deep within.

And more often than not, these primal responses don’t just come out of nowhere—there’s actually a deep, programmed history involved. In many cases it is quite personal, having to do with your own personal life journey from zygote to fetus in the womb to infant, child, young adult, adult, senior, and ultimately freedom from the body through death.

This history of your life is like the flow of water. In fact, the Cherokee referred to water as “the long human being,” equating humanity’s long history with waters that flow on and on. The Bladder channel is thus the living existence of that long story in your body.

Spiritual

The foundation for the spiritual levels of Bladder channel functions is the ultimate enactment of deep drives and instinctual, primal responses to the world within, through, and around you. The Bladder represents your connection and participation in the great ocean of life itself.

Figure 9: Bladder Meridian—Foot Tai Yang.

1. Bright Eyes	35. Meeting of Yang
2. Silk Bamboo Bone	36. Brings Relief
3. Eyebrow’s Pouring	37. Gate of Abundance
4. Crooked Curve	38. Floating Cleft
5. Fifth Palace	39. Outside the Crook
6. Receiving Light	40. Middle of the Crook
7. Heavenly Connection	41. Attached Branch
8. Declining Connection	42. Door of the Corporeal Soul
9. Jade Pillow	43. Vital Region Transporter
10. Celestial Pillar	44. Hall of the Spirit
11. Great Shuttle	45. Yi Xi
12. Wind Gate	46. Diaphragm Gate
13. Lung Transporter	47. Gate of the Ethereal Soul
14. Pericardium Transporter	48. Yang’s Key Link
15. Heart Transporter	49. Abode of Consciousness
16. Governor Transporter	50. Stomach Granary
17. Diaphragm Transporter	51. Vitals Games
18. Liver Transporter	52. Residence of the Will
19. Gall Bladder Transporter	53. Bladder’s Vitals
20. Spleen Transporter	54. Order’s Limit
21. Stomach Transporter	55. Confluence of Yang
22. Triple Warmer Transporter	56. Support the Sinews
23. Kidney Transporter (Vitality Gate)	57. In the Mountains
24. Sea of Qi Transporter	58. Flying Yang
25. Large Intestine Transporter	59. Instep Yang
26. Origin Gate Transporter	60. Kunlun Mountains
27. Small Intestine Transporter	61. Servant’s Respect
28. Bladder Transporter	62. Extending Vessel
29. Mid Spine Transporter	63. Golden Gate
30. White Ring Transporter	64. Captial Bone
31. Upper Crevice	65. Restraining Bone
32. Second Crevice	66. Foot Connecting Valley
33. Middle Crevice	67. Extreme Yin
34. Lower Crevice

The Bladder Channel Trajectory

Inside the orbital ridge of the eye socket close to the bridge of the nose, the one meridian surfaces as the Bladder energy flow. Bladder 1, Bright Eyes, can be squeezed with thumb and forefinger each on opposite sides of the nose. With your eyes closed, this squeezing will generally create a bright light sensation, giving this point its name. Consider also our reflexive sensitivity to bright light; this point illustrates the interconnection of our eyes with the nervous system governed by the energy of Bladder channel and its partner, Kidney. This point is also the beginning point of the qiao mai, extraordinary vessel, the vessel of our stance. This vessel has much to do with our ability to be present in the here and now. Using our sense of vision and what we see is a powerful tool for maintaining presence.

From Bright Eyes, the Bladder energy takes its course up the forehead and over the top of the head, running in two parallel lines about an inch off centerline. At the base of the skull at the occipital ridge, clearly palpable where the upper trapezius muscle meets the occipital plate of the cranium, is Bladder 10, Celestial Pillar. We can see that the muscles of the back of the neck supporting the skull could be seen as pillars, given the concept of heaven above (the head), earth below.

From the Celestial Pillar, the Bladder meridian splits into two channels on each side, sending four channels of qi flowing down the back of the neck and the back of the body. These channels are referred to as the inner and outer branches of the Bladder meridian. We find Bladder 11 at the top of the back on the inner branch, which travels the more medial path all the way down the spine to the coccyx and continues down the thigh to the back of the knee to Bladder 40, Middle of the Crook. The outer branch starts at point number 41, Attached Branch, which is just lateral to Bladder 12 and streams the more lateral path down the back until it rejoins the inner branch at the back of the knee.

As we consider more deeply the significance of the location of this first section of the Bladder Meridian from 1 to 10 and 11, it is important to consider the relationship between the eyes, the base of the skull, and the neck. On the surface is a muscular relationship between the frontalis and the occipitalis muscles connected to one another by the broad tendonous sheath, the cranial aponeurosis, covering the skull. The occipitalis is in direct relationship with the all the muscles of the neck supporting the head and its rotational ability at the top the body. Deeper still are the eyes that connect to the visual cortex (located at the base of the skull) and the spinal column that begins at the back of the neck and carries the central nervous system from the brain all the way down the spinal cord to the base of the back. Together the muscles of the head, neck, and back can be considered at the service of the eyes and the entire nervous system, directing the sensory orifices found in the head up, down, back, front, and on either side. As we explore the Bladder meridian’s range of functions, we will see again and again how closely connected it is to the necessity of orienting our head and its sensing organs—and indeed the entire body—to the environment surrounding us.

The channel splits into four lines, two on either side of the spine, and traverses the entire length of the back down to the tailbone. Consider how important it is to have a strong back and you’ll discover a very important facet of the Bladder meridian’s function. To have a strong Bladder channel is to have the ability to have a great capacity for meeting life’s challenges.

Here in our back, the Bladder channel represents our unconscious and everything about ourselves we have difficulty looking at: it is our past and whatever motivates or pushes us from behind, providing much of the impetus necessary to move forward in the world.

How does motivation relate to the Bladder channel? It’s simplistic, but consider the urge to urinate: a deep feeling that moves us from the inside, culminating in the realization that when you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go! On a more complex level, consider the many factors of family and culture that push us into the world, constraining us to behave within certain expected patterns. In classic literature, the Bladder channel is seen as the yang energy of the Water element manifesting in the body, and Water is related to our ancestors. Interestingly, the entire history of the genetic code of the human species is called the gene pool—not the “gene tree” or the “gene bonfire.” And just as the power of Water is pervasive in our world, so too does its manifestation in our bodies speak of moving forward, sometimes slow and patient, sometimes fast and furious, but ever onward around that next obstacle toward whatever lies ahead.

From the top of the back to the bottom of the back, along the inner branch of the Bladder meridian are found a specific set of important points knows as the associated points, or transporter points. In Chinese these are called the shu points, in Japanese the yu points. Whatever language you use, the meaning is the same: these points relate to all channels of the body, and they both carry information about those channels and can be used to treat them. The function of carrying information for assessment and treatment is referred to as “transporting,” and so these points are referred to as the transporting points. In other parts of this work you will find a complete list of these points, their locations, and their relationships. For this part in the discussion it is important to point out that every channel in the body can be accessed and treated through points found on the Bladder channel in the back, once more underlining its scope and importance.

From the tailbone and buttocks, the inner and outer branches of the Bladder channel continue down into the legs where they travel through the hamstrings to the back of the knee. The hamstring is an incredible muscle group that is potentially the strongest in the body (after the mandible) if we learn to develop and use it. These muscles propel the gymnast, martial artist, and ballerina through the air. When developed, a person can gain amazing strength and cover great distances. By the same token, weak hamstrings can cause the body myriad troubles, often a major culprit in back pain. A good Hatha yoga teacher will tell you that your back is hurting because your legs are weak. The muscles of the legs were designed to carry the weight of our bodies, the muscles of the back to stabilize us in an upright posture. If we attempt to use the back muscles to carry the weight of our bodies because our leg muscles are too weak to do it for us, our backs are vulnerable to injury and strain.

Finally reunited as one channel at the back of the knee, the Bladder proceeds from 40 down through the calves to Bladder 57, In the Mountains. This point rests right in the middle of the bifurcation of the gastrocnemius, or calf muscle. This powerful muscle facilitates jumping, climbing, running, and all activities of locomotion, and the point gets its name from the appearance of the muscle and its mountainous capacity to bear weight. Consider also hiking in mountainous terrain, as it places exquisite focus on this muscle and its relationship to the changing angles of the ankle when navigating uneven and sloping terrain.

From 57, the channel veers to the outside of the Achilles’ tendon, passes behind the ankle bone and crosses to the foot, tracing the outer edge down to the final Bladder point at the baby toe, Bladder 67, Extreme Yin. A silly association that is nonetheless helpful in remembering the Bladder channel’s completion at this humble point is the popular nursery rhyme in which “this little piggy cries wee, wee, wee, all the way home.” Here the point name underscores an important principle of yin yang understanding, that when the energy of yang has run its course, it becomes yin. The next channel in the sequence, the Kidney channel, is referred to in the classics as Extreme Yin. We can see the energy of the Bladder meridian yielding its position to the next channel in the sequence, its yin partner in the Water element, the Kidney.

Kidney Meridian

Foot Shao Yin

The quality of Foot Shao Yin presents itself here in the body, beginning in the very bottom of the foot and rising up the back of the legs and thighs into the groin. This lesser yin quality is the most extreme yin, the deepest of the body.

Water Element

Representing the yin aspect of Water in the body, the Kidney channel holds the deep, essence of the human gene pool, our genetic lineage, and source of life in the body.

5 to 7 pm

This time of day comes after the afternoon lull, and we find a little perk of energy that carries us into the evening hours. This pick-me-up or second wind time of the day is attributed to the vitality of the kidney function.

Key Functions

Vitality, ancestral essence

Affirmation

I feel the vital life force flowing deep within me.

The Kidney channel of Foot Shao Yin is the yin representative of the Water element in the body. It charts a course from the bottom of the foot to the torso. It is known as the keeper of the ancestral energy and vitality of our being. On the physical level the kidneys purify the blood. A deep organ, their product is the fluid waste of all the bodily systems. Once they are done purifying the blood, they send it back to the lungs clean and ready for re-oxygenation. A main concept in Chinese medicine is that the Lungs bring in the qi or air, and the Kidneys reach up and grasp the qi from the lungs, pulling it down to light the fire of the Vitality Gate, the Ming Men Fire. The Ming Men Fire is the fire of life energy in the body.

The kidneys are known to govern vitality as it is closely related to the hormonal system, particularly the adrenal and corticoid glands. We can see their importance in the body’s functioning dramatically if they should fail: the alternative is dialysis that must be performed daily. Most people in this situation suffer from an extreme sense of loss of vitality.

Another aspect of Kidney vitality as seen through Chinese medicine is its relationship to libido or sex drive. It is said that too much sex can damage the Kidneys, draining the vital essence. Good healthy Kidney function is further assessed through a healthy sex drive. More details of the Kidney function are drawn out in the descriptions that follow.

Key Characteristics of the Functional Range of the
Kidney Channel

Physical

The Kidney channel governs the deepest aspects of our being and is found here in the most yin aspect of being, deep within. On a physical level it is related to the very purification of blood, the fluid of our vitality. Attached to that deep purification action is the Kidney channel function of hormone secretion and regulation as response to stressors.

The adrenal glands and cortisol production are under the direction and concern of the Kidney channel. The channel also governs our “get up and go” energy and fight or flight responses, our nervous system’s interconnected sophisticated mechanisms of stimulus and response and the myriad synaptic feedback loops existing at every level of bodily organization.

And deep to this action of stimulus and response, fight or flight is the very felt sense of self-preservation in the face of danger and peril. In peaceful and quiet times, we turn to procreative activity, where the Kidney channel shows itself as governing the libido, the sexual drive, the procreative impulse—deeply rooted in a primal need to propagate.

Between the self-preservation instinct and the need to procreate is the ever-present task of balance. The inner ear is a fluid mechanism that reads the horizontal plane and keeps us right with it. In the face of all the twists and turns and rising and falling of life, the inner ear is our ship’s keel. When the waters are stormy (or even when they are calm), the art of keeping balance as we shuttle through our world lands within the purview of Kidney channel functions.

In addition to being balanced via the inner ear’s fluid mechanisms is the very sense of proprioception itself, that is, knowing where your body is in space at any given moment. From the bottoms of your feet to the tips of your fingers, from the tailbone to the crown, this whole body sensibility is the Kidney’s realm of functioning.

Psychological, Emotional

What the physical level taught us about our physiology plays out in the psychological and emotional realms: cultivated patience, capacity, understanding, and wisdom. Fears and phobias that arise from the various life situations in which we find ourselves register here, and our response to them can lead to wising up or breaking down. The Kidney channel registers the full range of responses, and its depth of connection to our primal being grants us the capacity to meet the challenges of life and death.

Fight or flight responses are not just physical; they have strong psychological and emotional components as well. The literature on trauma documents thoroughly the often long-standing effects on the nervous system and attitude to life, learned behaviors that arise from the effects of intense experiences. All these intricate actions and reactions to the world around us can be attributed to the quality of Kidney energy.

Indeed, the ancestral energy flowing through us is an expression of these Kidney energies. The postures, positions, and dispositions that arise within us that are a direct reflection of what we inherited from our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents as well as what we will pass on to our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. This is the Kidney energy at work, the long view aspect of our humanity.

Classical Chinese texts break the Kidney function down into Kidney yin, Kidney yang, and Kidney qi. Kidney yin is the past, Kidney yang is the future, and Kidney qi is the present moment. From this, we can see the relationship of time to our human existence. Healthy Kidney channel energy will help us to balance our experiences of the past with our hopes for the future as we live fully in the present moment.

There is little denying that our personal relationship to the passage of time is often deeply wrapped up in our sense of family. Our parents, grandparents, siblings, and children all play a large part in the way we perceive time. As a result, any family-related stress we have can thus impact directly on our Kidney function. Maintaining poise, balance, and flow within family dynamics can be challenging in itself. As I look in the mirror of my family patterns, I ultimately come to see myself more clearly.

The actions of self-knowing, self-realization, and self-discovery are also Kidney channel functions. Here we find the Kidney closely connected to the Heart. As the Heart is governor of your truth and all you hold dear, the Kidney lies beneath it, supporting from below as it were. To get a sense of what that feels like, look to the nature of Fire and Water.

Fire is by its nature bright and warm, bringing things to the light. Water is dark, mysterious, and deep. One could think of Fire as consciousness and all that can be seen, and Water as the great unconscious—whatever is deep, reflective, and beneath the surface. Fire shows us the 10 percent tip of the iceberg, and Water represents the other 90 percent below the surface. Heart as Fire represents everything of which you are conscious and whatever you know about yourself, and Kidney as Water is all those things you have yet to learn about yourself that reveal themselves slowly over time and through experience. A favorite quote of mine that comes from the great Anonymous is “The road to truth is under construction.” In other words, as much as we may know and be conscious of the present moment, there is always another layer waiting to be revealed.

It’s no small wonder that fears and uncertainty can express themselves through deep and inward Kidney energy; it can often manifest in our lives as introversion and isolation.

Spiritual

Here we find ourselves at last at the spiritual manifestations and gifts of the Kidney channel, taking us to root-level issues of security, stability, and our sense of place and belonging in the world. Who we are as a people and how we survive being the fittest or most capable of collaboration—the deep intelligence necessary for our very survival itself—is governed by Kidney channel energy.

Figure 10: Kidney Meridian—Foot Shao Yin.

1. Bubbling Sping	15. Middle Flow
2. Blazing Valley	16. Vitals Transporter
3. Supreme Stream	17. Trade Winds Bend
4. Great Bell	18. Stone Pass
5. Water Spring	19. Yin Metropolis
6. Shining Sea	20. Abdomen Connecting Valley
7. Returning Current	21. Mysterious Gate
8. Exchange Belief	22. Walking Corridor
9. Guest House	23. Spirit Seal
10. Yin Valley	24. Spirit Ruin
11. Pubic Bone	25. Spirit Storehouse
12. Great Luminance	26. Comfortable Chest
13. Qi Cave	27. Transporter (Elegant) Mansion
14. Fourfold Fullness

The Kidney Channel Trajectory

Kidney, the extreme yin channel, takes the baton and begins its turn along the course of the energy matrix. From the pinky toe, the one meridian goes inside to resurface at the bottom of the foot at an auspicious point known as Kidney 1, Bubbling Spring, just inside the edges of the ball of the foot. It is said that the yin energies of the earth enter the body through this point. It is a point that inspires a deep breath upon stimulation and has been used to revive the unconscious and lend support to those in emotional catharsis.

From here the Kidney energy travels up through the instep to the area behind and below the inner ankle bone. It makes a nice circle around and through this area, and those under stress will find pressure applied to these points to be quite sensitive and yet deeply stress reducing. From just behind the inner ankle the meridian moves up through the meeting point of the three yin leg meridians, Spleen 6, discussed prior, and then it travels up the inner aspect of the calf toward the back of the leg. It crosses through the tendons of the medial hamstrings at the inside back of the knee. From there it follows a course deep in the back of the thigh up to the medial border of the ischial tuberosity or sit bones. From the ischial tuberosity it traverses along the ischial and pubic rami to emerge right atop the pubic symphysis, Kidney 11, Pubic Bone, in the front of the body just a half-inch off centerline.

This trajectory through our “private zone” illustrates the Kidney channel’s relationship to our innermost thoughts and feelings of life and death and our truly deep and vulnerable aspects. This area stretches mightily when in a squatting position, and for a woman in labor, dropping into a squatting position—the indigenous birthing position—calls forth a deep strength, as every woman who has delivered this way can attest. In this archetypal posture we can clearly see the great power of the Kidney function in the regulation of hormones and vitality and the preservation of ancestral essence.

From the pubic area the channel continues just a half-inch off the centerline, rising through the abdomen to the solar plexus. The points 12, Great Luminence; 13, Qi Cave; 14, Fourfold Fullness; 15, Middle Flow; 16, Vitals Transporter; 17, Trade Winds Bend; 18, Stone Pass; 19, Yin Metropolis; and 20, Abdomen Connecting Valley all evoke the auspiciousness of this channel and its action in the body. At the solar plexus, the channel enters the rib cage at Kidney 21, Mysterious Gate, a point where the great qi of the abdomen flows into the great qi of the chest to nourish that most myterious of organs, the heart. The channel then widens out into the chest to about two inches from centerline with points between each rib. From 22, Walking Corridor; 23, Spirit Seal; 24, Spirit Ruin; 25, Spirit Storehouse; and 26, Comfortable Chest, we find a set of points directly related to ancestral or spirit energy.

The abdomenal and thoracic points of the Kidney and their evocotive names truly illuminate this energy channel’s deep and powerful nature. Our own colloquial expressions in English such as “playing your cards close to your chest” or “getting something off your chest” are phrases that resonate with the functioning of this important channel. Through stimulation of this area, anything you are holding on to, or that is holding on to you at this level can be released and transformed.

The Kidney energy channel comes to an end just under the inner corner of the collar bone. Kidney 27, Transporter Mansion or Elegant Mansion, is the last stop on the Kidney line. Like the transporting points of the Bladder meridian, Kidney 27 is the transport point of all the transport points. Here the entire energy system of the body can be assessed and treated. Also known as the adrenal pump, stimulation of this point activates the vital energy of the body, heartmind, and spirit.

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