Organ Massage – The Spleen

Organ Massage:    The Spleen

Brief Introduction:

The spleen is an elastic, spongy organ that stores blood and regulates the inward and outward flow of body substances.  It has the ability to expand and contract as it manages our digestive rhythms, harmonizing rhythms between food intake and the regular rhythm of the blood flow.  It has a high proportion of lymphatic tissue indicating that it plays an important immunological role within the body.  The spleen is considered to connect strongly with cosmic rhythms and has a strong affinity with our outermost planet, Saturn.  Just as Saturn separates the planets from the rest of the cosmos, it is possible to consider that a ‘Saturn sheath’ surrounds the spleen reminding us of our long forgotten spiritual connections.

Knowledge of Metal:

Lead has an affinity with our outermost planet of Saturn and offers protection from a number of harmful earthly substances such as radiation and heat.

Lead is a bright and silvery metal (with a slight shade of blue) in a dry atmosphere; it starts to tarnish upon contact with air.  The characteristic properties of lead include having a high density and although it is soft and pliable it has poor malleability and is easily broken when rolled or stretched (Pelikan, 1973).  Lead is a poor conductor of electricity compared to other metals; it has a high resistance to corrosion and the ability to react with organic chemicals.  Lead has a strong relationship with the warmth processes and expands dynamically when heated and contracts strongly when cooled.  Despite leads affinity to warmth, heat moves slowly through the substance of this metal, it is as if each particle of lead wants to keep the heat for itself rather than sharing it with other particles. Lead is not changed by light; rather it integrates light within the darkness of its own substance thus showing it affinity with the spleen where light is also considered to be integrated into the darkness of the organ.  Lead lacks moisture indicating that leads heavy, dark characteristics have a relationship to death, (Hausckha, 1966).

As Saturn provides a protective outer boundary for the solar system, so lead processes have an important protective role within in the human body especially regarding the core temperature.  In the human body one of leads activities is building bone (Hausckhka, 1966) for it is lead that carries on the process from cartilage building (tin) to the end conclusion of bone mineralization (hardening).  This is necessary for a healthy, active and workable bone structure that carries us through the physical world.  The strange thing is that in the mist of this ‘dead’ bone substance is the bone marrow where red blood cells, new life, are created.  On the one hand we have hardening and death; on the other new life and resurrection, the gift that brings us independent consciousness so we ‘know who we are’, (Pelikan, 1973).

Because lead has an intense relationship to warmth, its substance has the ability to combine with sugar in the body.  In this way lead processes relates to our most spiritual aspect as it supports the ego, the ‘I’ organisation, which lives entirely in states of warmth.  In a healthy state it maintains the balance between the warming and cooling processes in the body.  This member also governs the astral forces so that actions towards our self and within the world demonstrate respect and appropriate social behaviour.  Loss of balance between these warming and cooling processes can result in an imbalance in an ego-directed soul life, sclerosis within the body’s blood vessels, (especially the arteries) and joints or in the brittleness of bone and failing senses as we grow older, (Hausckha, 1966).

Knowledge of Indications:

As a therapeutic substance, lead is pharmaceutically prepared to adjust itself to the intensions of the ego, the “I” organisation and used to enhance these intensions whenever they are too weak, (Pelikan, 1973).  Lead has renewing and transforming qualities and its properties make it a valuable remedy in helping our soul (astral) and spirit (I- organisation) penetrate the physical and etheric elements in such a way that we are able to ‘know who we are’ and assert our true nature within the world.  Thus during our lifetime, our physical body (bony framework) allows us carry our impulses into the world with vitality and passion.  Lead is a valuable remedy when this healthy, dynamic balance is lost as it can stimulate the constitution to return to healthy instincts.  It especially strengthens the ‘I’ organisation in times when we feel we have lost our way in life, (Pelikan, 1973).

During childhood the ‘I’ being and astral forces shape the physical body into instrument that allows the individual to carry these impulses into the world.  If the building up processes (anabolic) within the bone is too active they may reject the forming processes that are necessary for healthy bone development.  Body substances remain too warm and too fluid so the natural bone mineralization is hindered.  In these cases lead is a valuable remedy as it normalizes the building up and forming processes allowing the “I” and astral principles to penetrate the bone and blood elements as they should.  This integration is vital for future physical and spiritual maturity, (Pelikan, 1973).  Lead is also a valuable substance as we age for it acts as a decomposing agent in cases of arthrosclerosis where plaque deposits within the walls of the vascular system.  It allows the ‘I’ organisation to continue governing the astral forces in an integrated way, minimizing the possibility for its destructive hardening forces to take hold (Taruna, 2012).

In issues of morality, lead strengthens the forces of the ‘I’ organisation within the body thus helping us to be aware of our actions within the world.  In this way it can be a counter agent against immoral tendencies towards the self, for example suicidal intentions, or wrong actions towards others or within the societal environment.  In cases of addiction, it strengthens the ‘I’ organisations control over the astral forces cravings of substances; for example alcohol, that would otherwise lead to intoxication rendering the ego (and therefore the individual) powerless.  As a remedy lead also helps to counteract an arrhythmic lifestyle, sleep disturbances, feelings of depression, metabolic weaknesses, and nutritional disturbances, loss of appetite and food allergies, (Taruna, 2012).

Contraindications for Spleen Massage:

• An acute inflammatory condition
• Fever
• Should not be done over an extended period of time for children

Form, Dynamic and pace:

• The spleen is located in the upper left quadrant of the body just below the diaphragm and is protected under the lower left ribs.  The practitioner stands at the side of the bed on the client’s right side at a comfortable angle to the table.  The left hand rests gently underneath the client’s right rib region in a supportive gesture without applying any pressure.  The right hand describes a rhythmical, changing lemniscate.
• Starting at the waistline above the iliac fossa the first loop is performed with full, warm contact over the area of the spleen.  The hand moves with a lifting quality over the skin encompassing the lateral ribs within the movement.  Inwardly we relate wholly to the organ as we do this.  At the upper turn of the lemniscate this lifting quality is relaxed as the hand turns and comes back towards the body making a smaller loop.  The smaller loop is ‘almost contracted into a turning point that is breathing’.  We go far out inwardly as if we want to take new impulses for the Saturn sphere bringing them back to give to the spleen.
• The client should experience a spleen organ massage as a very quiet yet larger movement.  The movement flows from behind the practitioner, through the arm from the shoulder streaming out through the hand in a warm, gentle rhythmical movement.  As the movement streams up toward the outer (Saturn) sphere it gathers new impulses and brings them back for the next lemniscate movement.  After seven repetitions the movement finishes with a gentle lifting of the hand medial to the iliac fossa.