KI-23 Shengfeng - Spirit Seal

A seal is an identity or form: the wax seal pressed onto parchment, a seal of approval. It is a stamp of identity that belongs to that one person alone. The point concerns the spirit, the person's sense of who they are and their personal integrity. It brings together the fragments. It can speak to the person's identity and help them to re-know themselves, and it gives the spirit a seal of approval, reinvigorating and reinforcing the spirit. It claims the unique character a person is born with and gains as life goes on, finishing with the old and stepping up to a new level, into who they are; it seals the work already done. It contacts a person's essential nature when outside forces pile 'shoulds' upon them. The king's seal: for someone who has done the work and needs an inner confirmation of their worth and identity, a spirit stamped with royalty's divine imprint. The truth found in one's Heart is there by Heaven's mandate, so no outside confirmation is needed to justify acting on it. In ancient China a mound of earth was taken from the imperial altar to the altar of each new noble as the sign of the Emperor's authority, and these earth altars had to stay open to the sky to drink in Heaven's Qi; to strip a conquered dynasty of power, its altar was walled and roofed, open only to the north. So too a person who receives only Water's influence from the north, with no activating impulse from the Fire of the south, is cut off from the warmth of a sealed Heart, and their own power fades.

Grants authority to our existence. Just as people once pressed a carved stamp into melted wax to seal and protect a message and show their status, we carry within us no ordinary seal but the Royal Seal of the Emperor, which acknowledges and validates our worth, reinforces the spirit and reminds us of what we are here for and of our core identity, permeating us with enthusiasm and freshness.

• Worsley gives it among his first aid points, for sunstroke.

Location: On the chest in the 4th intercostal space, 2 ACI from the midline, level with REN-17.
Needle depth: 3 fen
Moxa: 5 cones

• When a person cannot see or feel their identity, their true self
• When Water Causative Factors (CFs) feel disconnected and disempowered; this point can gather them so they become more fully themselves
• For repressed joy: being excited was not okay, it was suppressed, and nervousness becomes a way to express excitement
• For anxiety issues; check their permission for joy and excitement in their lives ('it makes others uncomfortable')
• When someone feels responsible for everything instead of just their own territory
• When you are treating someone and they are doing well and you want to preserve it, giving it a stamp so it can continue
• When a person needs to come forth and step forward into their own sovereign kingdom
• When the spirit is sealed off, authority is lacking on every level, and the person has lost touch with who they are and what they are here for
• When people hate themselves: it helps them recognize their own spirit, its unique quality and its worth
• For a split personality, giving a sense of circular containment and staking a claim
• When a project is finished or just beginning and the person still dwells on their own weaknesses and shortcomings; they need approval and reassurance
• When someone is stuck living at a mundane level and the seal needs breaking open to awaken them

• KI-24 Spirit Burial Ground with KI-23: often used together, or KI-23 after KI-24, to help the person know themselves again

• Do not use straight after a possession treatment; that would be far too soon
• Lies level with REN-17
• One of the upper Kidney points (KI-22 to KI-27), used for an extra spirit charge
• Helps restore the exchange between the potential the Kidney Official holds and the mandate coming from one's own Heart and from Heaven's Heart
• Heart Yin directly, and the Heart's Spirit indirectly, depend on Kidney Water for nourishment, which is why several Kidney points in the chest carry 'Spirit' in their names. Feng, to seal, refers to Kidney Water holding in and sealing the Spirit's Yang nature