Solar Term for the month of March 2023, month of Wood Rabbit Yi Mao in the year of Water Rabbit Gui Mao.

Solar Terms for the month of Gui Chou / Water Ox in the year of Ren Yin / Water Tiger

Happy New Year 2023 to all readers of this blog. 

While New Year's Day has been celebrated at the stroke of midnight on December 31st 2022, the Lunar New Year celebrated by Chinese people all around the world is yet to come. 

We are in the final month - Lunar Month 12th, month of Gui Chou / Water Ox in the Chinese Luni-Solar calendar. Traditional Chinese Lunar New Year will be celebrated on 22 January 2023, while Spring Begins / Li Chun starts on 4 February 2023. 

YouTube video in Chinese on Tai Sui for 2023

南懷瑾首次承認！我當年也“犯太歲”，但我用這個方法化解了！2023年前一定要知道！

It is that time of the year when the talk of "Tai Sui" 太岁 heats up in traditional broadcast media and social media here in Singapore. As the year comes to an end and a new year comes in January, it is common for people to feel a sense of anticipation and anxiety over what is to come in the new year. 

The Chinese luni-solar calendar do not use numerals like in the international Gregorian calendar, but assign Tian Gan Di Zi 天干地支 to each year, resulting in a pair of "element" and "zodiac sign" for each year. For example 2022 is the year of the (Yang) Water Tiger and 2023 will be the year of the (Yin) Water Rabbit. This results in relationships between the signs, for example Tiger zodiac sign clashes with the Monkey sign while Rooster clashes with the Rabbit. In 2022, those born in the Monkey years are said to be in a clash with reigning sign of the Tiger in 2022. There are a few types of clashing relationships among the Di Zi / zodiac signs, and they are grouped together as “犯太岁", if the birth year's (本命年）zodiac sign is in a clashing relationship with the reigning year sign (太岁). 

This may seem a bit interesting to people who only use the western Gregorian international calendar as it seems strange to say 12 clash with 6, 1 clash with 7, 2 clash with 8, etc. As mentioned above, the Chinese luni-solar calendar uses a different type of representation for the calendar components; using the Five Elements of the Five Elements Theory. All five elements are in a produce and control relationship. A totally different system from the western Gregorian calendar that uses Indian-Arabic numbers system.

The title of the video is a bit of a "click-bait", but the actual content is good, and narrates about how the late great 南懷瑾 handles a year when he is said to be “犯太岁". The YouTube video above talks about the concept of time and space, and how the time component is equally important as the space component. 

Chinese Lunar New Year Dates for 2023 - Year of the Water Rabbit

春节 2023 / Spring Festival celebrations are coming soon next month in January 2023. The traditional Chinese Lunar New Year Spring Festival has 15 days of celebration. In multiracial and multicultural Singapore, it is allocated 2 days of public holidays. On mainland China, it is an important homecoming event as most people head back to their hometown （家乡）from working in the big main cities or overseas.

The first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year falls on 22 January 2023, which is a Sunday and so the following weekday is allocated a public holiday. Monday itself is also a public holiday and so Tuesday is allocated a public holiday, making it a long holiday weekend of 4 days here in Singapore.  

The eve of Chinese New Year is in itself an eventful day, as it is the final day of "Spring Cleaning", and the final touches are made to prepare the home and office premises to welcome the new year. The dinner on the eve of the new year has special cultural significance in the Chinese festive calendar as it is called the "Reunion Dinner", where once a year all family members are gathered to have a sumptous meal together. 

In Chinese tradition, words withe auspicious meanings are used during this festive period and so many items are embellished with auspicious names in well-wishes. For example, as it is the year of the Rabbit, the Rabbit is embellished with the word "Gold" and so it is the year of the Gold Rabbit. The Jade Rabbit is another cultural symbol with its own mythology story. It is said to reside on the moon making immortality elixirs, and keeps company with Chang-Er who flew to the moon. You will find both Gold Rabbit and Jade Rabbit being used for the coming Chinese Lunar New Year. 

玉兔呈祥

金兔报喜

Although "Gold" is one of the elements of the Five Elements Theory (representing Metal), the word Gold when used for auspicious meanings refers to money and wealth, luxury, grandeur, etc. The actual element accompanying the year of the Rabbit is Water. It is the year of Gui Mao or Water (Yin) Rabbit. The colour represented by Water in the Five Elements Theory is black. Black, although a convenient colour to wear for clothing, is not considered an auspicious colour culturally and so it is used minimally. 

水 (water)，木 (wood)

In the 60 Jia Zi sequence used in the Chinese luni-solar calendar, the combination of Gui Mao / Yin Water Rabbit is 40th pair or 60 pairs starting with Jia Zi / Yang Wood Rat. 

Rabbit itself contains the element of Yin Wood. The two elements for the year are Water and Wood.

Tiger Tail Rabbit Head 兔头虎尾

Solar Term for the beginning of the Water Rabbit year is on 4th of February 2023. Up until 4th of February, it is still the Water Tiger year as the changeover date is the Solar Term of Spring Begins / Li Chun (立春). For those born between the Lunar New Year and Spring Begins / Li Chun, they are said to be "Tiger Tail Rabbit Head". In my consultations for Ba Zi Birth Charts, we use the Spring Begins Solar Term for the year pillar. 

Solar Terms for the month of Ren Zi / (Yang) Water Rat / November in the year of Ren Yin / (Yang) Water Tiger 2022.

7th of December, Wednesday is the changeover day, from Hai / Pig month to the month of Zi / Rat. In the Chinese luni-solar calendar, there are 2 months to go before the next year of Gui Mao / (Yin) Water Rat starts. In the international calendar, it is the last month for the year 2022. The social mood of people is focussed on the festive year end period celebrating Christmas Day and New Years Day. 

In 2022 Singapore went from COVID-related pandemic lockdown restrictions to the country fully opening up. Quite a change in circumstances. Singapore citizens are free to travel abroad again, depending on their destination countries' restriction. Air fares for the Christmas festive period in late December and for the Chinese Lunar New Year period in January are already at their highs. 

An important date in the Chinese festive calendar is Winter Solstice or Dōng Zhì that falls on 22 December 2022. Besides being the mid-month Solar Term marker, it also marks a Yin/Yang transition, as Yin reaches its maximum, Yang is born. 

Solar Terms for the month of Geng Xu Metal Dog (October) in the year of Ren Yin Water Tiger (2022).

When looking at the 24 Solar Terms of the Chinese calendar, it will be helpful if you distinguish between the Five Elements Qi of the Solar Terms in the calendar, and the Qi of the Five Elements of actual physical nature in real life. It is only at the geographical location around the Northern latitude marker of the Tropic of Cancer that we see a close sychronicity between the calendar and the weather. 

Elsewhere on the earth globe, like at the Equator where Singapore is located, we only experience a tropical weather system with just 2 types of seasons - "Hot" and "Hot and Wet", locally influenced by tropical monsoons. In contrast, the temperate countries experience the 4 seasons. 

The Five Elements Theory is applied to the Chinese calendar system and also to nature, and it is important to not mix up the two and infer that both have to, or will be the same. 

Metal Dog month starts: 8th of October, 2022 from 15:22 hours

Mid Point of the month: 23rd of October, 2022 from 18:35 hours

Elements of the Metal Dog month: Metal, Earth, Fire

Elements of the Water Tiger year: Water, Wood, Earth, Fire

Solar Terms for the month of Wu Shen / Earth Monkey (August) in the year of Ren Yin / Water Tiger 2022

The calendar "Autumn" season started on the 7th of August, 2022 at 20:28 hours. The solar term to mark the beginning of the month is "Autumn Begins" or Li Qiu. 

In this particular month of the Chinese Luni-solar calendar, there are clashes of elements on both the Tian Gan (Heavenly Stems) and Di Zi (Earthly Branches) levels, between the month and the year:

Year Heavenly Stem / Tian Gan : Water

Month Heavenly Stem / Tian Gan : Earth

Water X Earth (clashing relationship)

Year Earthly Branch / Di Zi : Tiger / Yin

Month Earthly Branch / Di Zi : Monkey / Shen

Tiger x Monkey (clashing relationship)

Solar Terms for the month of Gui Mao, Yin Water / Rabbit 癸卯 in the year of Ren Yin, Yang Water / Tiger 壬寅

We have already moved into the second month of the year of the Water Tiger, Ren Yin 2022 in the Chinese luni-solar calendar on 5 March 2022. 

The beginning of the month is marked by the Solar Term "Jin Ze" or translated as "Awaken Insects" that started at 22:43 hours on the 5th of March, 2022. 

In the Chinese luni-solar calendar, the 60 sexagenary pairs sequence alternate on a Yin - Yang - Yin - Yang basis, and so while February was a Yang Water Tiger month, March is a Yin Water Rabbit month. April will be Yang month again, and so on and so forth. 

The elements of the month are Water (癸 Gui / Yin Water) and Wood (卯 Mao / Rabbit).

You may be wondering why the name Jin Ze / Awaken Insects was used to name this second month. The ancient Chinese observed the natural phenomena in their surrounding environment. It was observed that insects were beginning to awaken from their winter hibernation, and hence gave this name to the second month. It is useful to note that it is not the other way around, as in, the observed phenomena of insects awakening from hibernation and hence it is the second Solar Term month. China covers a huge geographical area with varied weather systems according to the latitude. The months are calculated on the solar path of the earth's orbit around the sun (via Gnomon stick sun shadow recording) and then names assigned (and not via observed seasonal phenomena). To further explain, Gregorian calendar months are named after Roman gods, leaders, festivals, and numbers. It does not mean that if you don't have Roman gods, leaders and festivals then the calendar is not applicable.  

Spring Equinox falls on 20 March 2022. Due to the tilt of planet Earth's axis, the various geographical zones on the surface of the planet experience seasonal changes, caused by the changing amount of sun light and heat received. On the day of the Equinox, planet Earth gets approximately equal 12 hours of day and night. Also the sun rises exactly at cardinal due East direction (90 degrees) and sets at cardinal due West direction (270 degrees). 

In Ba Zi birth chart analysis, we use the Day Master element (the Tian Gan representing the day of your birth) and compare it with the year's and the month's elements to get what we call the 10 Spirits / 十神 / shi shen. From the 10 Spirits, we can decipher the signals and information from the universe according to one's Ba Zi chart for the annual and monthly dimensions. You can go deeper into the day and the si-chen (2 hour block) but usually the annual and 10-year pillars are cover sufficient grounds already in a Ba Zi birth chart appointment.  

Book your Ba Zi appointment today. 

 

Five Tigers - 5 Elements Tigers 壬寅，甲寅，丙寅，戊寅，庚寅

Five Tigers - 5 Elements Tigers 壬寅，甲寅，丙寅，戊寅，庚寅

The popularity of the annual Zodiac sign predictions reaches its height during the Chinese Lunar New Year period. They are simplified readings to cater to the masses as the whole population is grouped into twelve Zodiac signs; which means that hundreds of millions share the same reading per sign. Too general to be precise, and so it is infotainment. In modern days, the annual Zodiac sign readings serve a largely commercial purpose as many capitalist business entities use the predictions as marketing and promotional events for news and publicity. Temples and religious organisations use them as annual fund raisers. Historically these readings were done by scholars working at temple fairs as a side income while waiting to take the Imperial Examinations in the ancient cities of China. 

The annual Zodiac signs predictions are simplified to twelve, which is already quite lengthy to write and talk about. To bridge the gap to the actual 60 Jia Zi pairs of the sexagenary cycle, it is good to learn about the additional Five Elements. 

Simply put, take 12 (Zodiac signs) multiply by 5 (elements) and you get 60 pairs.

For example, the year of 2022 is not just the year of the Tiger, but the year of the Water Tiger. The next year of the Tiger in 2034 will be the year of the Wood Tiger, in 2046 will be the year of the Fire Tiger, in 2058 the year of the Earth Tiger and in 2070 the year of the Metal Tiger. It loops back to Water Tiger again in 2082, and so on and so forth. 

In the illustration above designed by myself,  I use shapes and colours to help you see the elements:

Water drop shape = Water element

Tall rectangle shape = Wood element

Triangle shape = Fire element

Square shape = Earth element

Circle shape = Metal element

For colours, yellow, green and red are easy to apply to design but Water's black and Metal's white are replaced with blue and grey so that they don't disappear into white and black screen backgrounds on the computer and mobile devices, and on paper.  

Also, the 地支 / Di Zi for Tiger is 寅, pronounced yín, second sound intonation and not the same as 阴 yīn, first sound, light or rising intonation.  

And so, baby steps, learn a little more than just your annual Zodiac sign. The actual Ba Zi birth chart readings are based on the Five Elements Theory, and personalised to the day and hour of birth. So before you start lamenting about how the past year was bad for you because you have self read an annual horoscope booklet based only on your annual sign, please get yourself a Ba Zi birth reading. Sometimes it is just your own mind making the classic "cognitive bias" used by marketers. (Google search "marketing bias" or "cognitive bias" to read up about it).

15 February 2022 Yuan Xiao Jie - 15th day of the Chinese Lunar New Year Spring Festival

From preparations for the Chinese Lunar New Year, to the final 15th day of the festival celebrations, at least 3 to 4 weeks of a Chinese person's calendar is dedicated to this festive event. Although the public holidays declared is only 2 days here in Singapore, there are many other customs and traditional practices that take place before and during this festival. It is an important event in the Chinese calendar. 

The meaning of the word 元宵 comes from 元 as in the first (month) and 宵(night). The timing of this event moves to the evening as it is the 15th day of the first lunar month, and that means it is a full moon night. And being practical and appropriate for the night time darkness, lanterns are used to light up the night. In English, this day is also called the Lantern Festival. One of the traditional games is finding answers to riddles attached to the many lanterns. 

This is our very own Chinese "Full Moon Party". 

It also marks the end of the festivities for the Lunar New Year.