Sanguine: Western Energetics

SANGUINE: BLOOD

Traditional text often say that a sanguine personality is the temperament that everybody wants to be. They’re outgoing, optimistic, extroverted, a can-do positive kind of person. Sanguine is the blood humour, the air element, and are characterised by hot and wet energetics.

When in balance a Sanguine is cheerful and exudes enthusiasm. They have thick luscious hair, an acorn shaped head and an elegant swan-like neck, as written in the older text. They tend to be very optimistic, pleasant, spontaneous, they enjoy dinner parties, or parties in general, and they’re known as a stable extrovert. They have this child-like sense of enthusiasm about them.

Sanguines volunteer for jobs because of this boundless enthusiasm they have. They tend to take on too much and get overwhelmed quite easily. They find it hard to say no as they like to help people. They are naturally engaging story tellers, but when they’re out of balance, they get a little bit egotistical and they demand the room give them attention, even if they have told the story before!

Sanguines often have a sense of community and a sense of belonging, bringing groups together. Sanguines are here for a good time and like their fine foods and fine wine and to feel special. Because they tend to eat a lot of these fine foods, fine wines and all sorts of masterchef style creations, they can suffer from toxicity and congestion in their blood. Traditionally, they called it dirty blood, where the blood would become congested and full of toxins unable to be excreted, therefore impacting the health of the whole body and optimal functioning of the cells. The blood humour is a very important fluid to help to bring nutrients and oxygen to areas and remove toxins, we then look towards traditional herbal actions such as alteratives and depuratives, the blood cleansers.

Today, natural health may too often focus on which part of the liver is required to enhance detoxification, when in some situations, we really should take a few steps back and look at the blood. Does the person present with fatigue, do they present with signs of toxicity such as fatigue, pallor and impaired functioning of hormonal feedback mechanisms? When was the last time you put somebody on a good detoxification program that was focused on the blood instead of primarily on the liver? Sanguines do very well on an occasional good old green leafy juice detox.

When I was studying, back in the grass roots education of the early 90's, holistic detoxification of the blood was a very important aspect of most treatments and it’s interesting to see that over the past twenty years that it’s not utilised as much as it used to be. I think the resurgence in popularity of celery juicing is a prime example of the inherent need to clean the blood. If you can clean the blood you basically clean the whole body.

One of the main benefits of understanding humoral theory is to improve patient management and therefore outcomes. When you’re treating a sanguine type person, know they are motivated by optimism and enthusiasm. They like to feel like the treatment plan that you’re giving them is going to be somewhat fun.

Want to learn more? Join the Western Energetics course and get a practical clinical understanding.