Mother Nature is made of five elements. Everything we see and touch is made out of these five elements. Even city streets and buses are made of elements.

space, or awareness

air: light

fire: light, speedy

water: heavy, responsive

earth: heavy, slow

That includes everything that goes through our heart and emotions, and mind and thoughts. Those are all part of nature, made of elemental forces.

Space, awareness, 

Air, thoughts,

Fire, creativity and active, action and creativity,

Water, emotions,

Earth, what we see and touch

when we’re among the 10,000 things, we can become confused, and we can start believing we are separate from nature and my ego is more important than your ego. 

When we see everything in terms of those elements, that lie within the 10,000 things, we know where and what we are. Life becomes simple. the solutions become simple.

We also know what we can do. Value all the elements equally, and balance them so they function well. 

Elements are often represented in Tibetan Buddhism as dancing dakinis. Elements always move and dance together; you don’t find them separately. That’s their nature, to move and change.

The recipe expresses the fundamental principles that are easy to learn from the elements.

Not all of us feel these days that we’re part of nature. When we realise we’re made of elements, like everything else, it’s all much easier to see.

I use the Buddhist system of elements I was trained in. They are found, with variations, all across the world.

How could understanding the elements save the world?

Our huge problem at the moment with climate change, plastics and pesticides and other pollution, is that we forget we humans are part of Mother Nature. When we wreck Mother Nature, we wreck our own life. 

Elements is a simple, easy way to understand, in a deep and simple way, how we are part of nature and our life is the same as her and each other. we were not separate from each other, and we’re not separate from nature.

We can balance the way the elements function in our culture as a whole. At present there’s too much fire.

This is the path I took revolutionised my life in a profound way.