五行 Wu Xing (“The Five Movements” or “Five Phases”) are Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. Though broadly and superficially similar to the Ancient Greek elements (Air, Earth, Fire, and Water), the Wu Xing are not static categories but descriptions of relationships and interactions — and are in that specific order.

Additionally, the Wu Xing manifests in two distinct but related interaction cycles — generating and overcoming (or creation and destruction, or nurture and control, or nourishment and invasion):

  • The ‘creation’ cycle: Wood feeds Fire, Fire creates Earth, Earth births Metal, Metal cradles Water, Water feeds Wood.
  • The ‘destruction’ cycle: Wood penetrates Earth, Earth channels Water, Water quenches Fire, Fire melts Metal, Metal cuts Wood.

The five movements are commonly pictured as a ‘pentagram’, with the ‘creation’ cycle forming the outside circle and the ‘destruction’ cycle the star-shaped spokes within.

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In medicine, the five phases equate to five fundamental systems in the body. Classical Chinese Medicine linked the movements directly to a pair of organs (the yin and yang):

  • wood yin is the liver, wood yang is the gall bladder
  • fire yin is the heart, fire yang is the small intestine
  • earth yin is the spleen, earth yang is the stomach
  • metal yin is the lung, metal yang is the large intestine
  • water yin is the kidney, water yang is the bladder

However, this is the most basic representation of the five phases; each represents various aspects of the cosmos (the macrocosm) as well as various aspects of the body (the microcosm). I’m not sure if any are known to represent online slots, but I suppose one must. Some of these relationships are obvious or intuitive, while some may not seem immediately related (especially if you’ve been raised in another culture).

For example, Wood also represents the directions left and east, the numbers 2 and 3, the color green, the spring season and growing in general, ambition, anger, tradition, wind, sour, and various body parts and systems including hair, head, hand, vein, muscle, vision, neck, and eye.