Water represents Interpersonal style

As human individuals, we vary in our natural ways of interacting with others. The Water element is a metaphor representing interpersonal style because water can vary in subtle ways. It can be warm or cold. It's temperature can undergo more radical shifts - from freezing to boiling. Just as interpersonal style may change in different situations, so water changes its shape depending on the vessel that carries it. The shape of an ocean may change little if one looks at it from far away, but if one looks closer, the shape of an ocean is never the same from one moment to the next.

As humans, our relationships with others often seem to follow patterns. Each individual may have particular ways of forming new relationships, developing relationships and ending relationships. Once the cycle is complete it begins again. The Water element follows cycles that are metaphorically similar, with rain falling on hills, forming into streams, running from the river to the sea, and then evaporating to form clouds and rain.

Each of us has interpersonal styles which we are most comfortable with. These are our paths of least resistance. Similarly, water follows the simplest path and finds its own level. Acting outside of our natural styles of interpersonal behaviour requires an investment of our energies, just as energy is required to pump water up hill.

All of the elements, Water, Earth, Air and Fire, interact in dynamic ways. For example, just as our interpersonal behaviours are often the medium for communicating our thinking, so it is that the Water element can act as a carrier for the Earth element. If we look further into this metaphor, we can see that sometimes this happens invisibly (when earth minerals dissolve into a river), just as our thinking is sometimes communicated unconsciously through our interpersonal style. Alternatively, a river may carry earth minerals in a more visible way (as sediment), just as we may sometimes communicate our thinking deliberately through the medium of our interpersonal relationships.