Year of the Yin Wood Snake – Yi Si
On February 3, the start of the Solar New Year, we begin the new year’s journey with the Yin Wood Snake – Yi Si 乙巳. Snake is the sixth astrological sign in the Chinese twelve-year cycle and in 2025, the Yin Wood 乙 (flower) Heavenly Stem sits upon the Snake’s Earthly Branch of Yin Fire 丁(candle.) This Wood/Fire combination is considered complementary in the Five Element (Wu Xing) cycle of interdependence, suggesting that 2025 will be a more harmonious year than last, but no less intriguing.
In Chinese Metaphysics, Snake represents the approach of summer season, the western month of May and morning hours of 9-11am when the day begins to warm. If you were born in this season or hour, you also resonate with Snake energy, regardless of birth year.
Considered a harbinger of good fortune and guardian of buried treasure in Chinese legend, the feminine Snake is the Yin to Dragon’s Yang. A keeper of secrets, Snakes are more elusive than other astrological signs and closely linked to all things intellectual, philosophical and spiritual. For this reason, we can expect a more measured pace than that of the Yang Wood Dragon year with a stronger focus on knowledge, inspiration, creativity and research.
Though less flamboyant than her powerful Dragon predecessor, these signs share many traits. But unlike the daring Dragon whose realm was atop the highest mountains and beneath its deepest seas, Snakes dwell close to the land and move silently and purposefully, striking only when the moment is right. Differing from the other Chinese zodiac signs, the earthly snake is reptilian, relies primarily on her sense of smell and taste for information and detects vibrational sounds rather than hears them.
Ever alert and limbless, Snake travels with an undulating crawl, moves quickly when necessary and requires the warmth of her environment to regulate internal temperature. She is introspective and calculating and her subtle approach is far less transparent than that of the Dragon. Due to her association with springtime and ability to shed old skin, Snake years have come to represent transformation, rebirth and new beginnings.
There are five types of Snakes (one for each of the elements) and 2025’s Wood Snake – Yi Si 乙巳 is poetically known as ‘Snake goes into the world – a vision of morning sunlight.’ This is an inquisitive creature open to new worlds and opportunities. The Wood element fuels Fire as they combine, lending brilliance, visibility and the promise of fulfillment. In this scenario, Snake leaves its hole for a journey of exploration that combines historical investigation with the unraveling of mysteries yet to be revealed. Her position close to the earth requires stealth on the journey but the Wood Snake is also a climber of trees where the vistas are far and wide.
Wood is the element that grows and expands in all directions and Yin Wood symbolizes ivy, flowers, branches, bamboo and creeping vines. This is flexible, opportunistic wood, growing freely toward the sun. It is reciprocal energy that expands its reach, suggesting growth and the possibility of a return to diplomacy, missing in the recent past. It relates to intuition cultivated over a long period of time through the accumulation of knowledge, experience and the courage to keep going. These gifts will come in handy as we navigate 2025 since there will be other forces at work this year.
While the chart of the year appears to be harmonious, the clash of pillars (Fire/Water and Earth/Wood) and Snake’s hidden stems of Yang Metal, Fire and Earth suggests deception, fighting and hostilities beneath the surface on the world stage, especially in months when the elements and branches clash.
The last Yin Wood Snake year was 1965, a pivotal year in American history for its high highs and low lows. Lyndon Johnson had just assumed the role of President after John Kennedy’s assassination with the mission of healing old wounds and creating a ‘Great Society.’ His was a progressive, inclusive vision, spawned by widespread civil and human rights abuses and protests regarding inequality in income, health care, immigration and education. As a result of public outcry, many new laws were passed to help stop discrimination and bridge the gap.
The so-called ‘beautification of America’ program began as we turned toward greener, more sustainable environmental policies. And advances in technology, communications and travel brought a broadened world view closer to home. But escalation of the Vietnam War and continued inequality saw a groundswell of uprisings between those who wanted change and those who preferred the status quo. Despite many of these advances being settled by law, current events suggest we will be revisiting them and many others once again this year. Like 1965, it will be a year that ends on a vastly different note than it began.
The Chinese metaphysical Snake is quite selective in her associations with others and for the most part, keeps her own counsel. She has a discerning eye for beauty and evokes grace, tact and elegance. Since the Wood element is closely linked to creativity and Fire to beauty, we are likely to hear more about culture, fashion, music, design and the fine arts moving closer to the center of things in 2025. Quietly powerful and always alert, Snakes are also precise and orderly, preferring to explore opportunities gradually, formulating ideas then revealing and sharing them at just the right moment. For this reason, 2025 is expected to be a year of discovery and evolution. Analysis will be valued over opinion through the careful gathering of information to be dispensed when the time is right.
Snakes are purposeful visionaries with uncanny abilities to see the future, so innovative ideas will continue to be rewarded. Polished and poised, they continuously adapt to their environment and renew themselves by shedding outlived skins to emerge unscathed by the former. We will be encouraged to explore what that means to us and how we might explore different methods of self-preservation and adaptation in 2025.
Chinese Metaphysics assigns the emotion of anger to the Wood element, and we’ll need to manage frustrations with self-care in 2025 to prevent internal unrest, conflict and turbulence. Fire (which represents optimism, enthusiasm, spirituality and economic expansion) has been missing from the chart of the year since 2018 and returns in 2025 to start warming things up. But Fire is also unpredictable and dangerous, and we’ll likely see more explosions, electrical problems and violent clashes related to flickering sparks of Yin Fire that start small then travel quickly. This will be a good year to back away from rapidly spreading blasts of (dis)information and situations before they are vetted. Caution is warranted especially regarding schemes that took flight with the Dragon that may have flown off course.
The I Ching trigram for Yin Wood falls in the Southeast (Snake) compass direction and is known as ‘Wind’ – Xun. It is characterized as the airy energy within Wood since no life grows without air. Used in the process of burning, it is a necessary condition of Fire and lies between them on the Feng Shui compass. Extreme weather events around the world will continue to escalate especially as they relate to fire, wood and water with particular emphasis on drought, storms, wind and burning. Renewed interest in the environment is inevitable as so many around the planet are deeply affected. Countries, industries and individuals are advised against exceeding the scope of their grasp and capacity to expand, innovate and change for the better. Artistic progress, moderation and grace will be reimagined this year under the discriminating rule of the Wood Snake. Her lesson is to practice restraint, seek the truth, trust your intuition then reach out to others.
As always, please let me know if I can help you navigate the coming year.
Wishing you and those you love peace, prosperity, health and the grace of the Wood Snake this year.
Diane
Diane Gallin WIND AND WATER FENG SHUI CONSULTING 727-459-1459
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