This is an effective meditation for overcoming one’s love for and attachment to one’s own body. The Essential Elements are ultimate natural phenomenon which carry their own characteristic marks.

The Elements

1. The Earth Element

The Earth Element is solidity categorized as Earth Element. Nineteen parts of human body [twenty if brain marrow is included], are categorized as Earth Element. These start with head hair, body hair, and continue to excrement, as detailed earlier.

2. The Water Element

The water element is fluidity. Twelve parts of human body are categorized as Water Element. These range from bile to urine.

3. The Fire Element

The Fire Element is temperature. Four parts of the Human Organism are Fire Element: (1) The fire which makes the body warm, (2) The fire which causes the body to degenerate, (3) The fire which makes the body uneasy and (4) The fire which digests food.

4. The Wind Element

The Wind Element is motion blowing through the body. It is categorized in six parts: (1) The wind which rises, (2) The wind which goes down, (3) The wind in the stomach, (4) The wind in the intestines, (5) The wind which goes to all the organs and (6) The Breath going in and out.

The Contemplation

According to the Mahasatipatthana Sutta:

Monks, A skillful butcher or his assistant who slaughters a cow, will split the meat into various parts and sell it at a four-way intersection. Similarly, monks contemplate this body as just its elements. The body is just Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind.

When the butcher feeds a cow, leads it to the slaughter house, ties it there, kills it, sees it killed or sees it dying, he does not yet have the feeling that the cow has disappeared. Only when he butchers it into different parts and sits selling the meat does he get the feeling that the cow has disappeared. The feeling becomes just the feeling of meat.

He does not think, “I am selling a cow, these people who buy the meat are taking the cow away.” He thinks “I am selling meat, these people are taking meat away.” Similarly, a monk will still feel human as long as he contemplates the body as a whole. But when he contemplates the body as just elements and piece by piece, the feeling that a being is a person disappears and his mind becomes rational, neutral and stable because this body is just elements.

First, the meditator contemplates his own body as just elements. Then, he or she contemplates the bodies of others as just elements. Finally, the meditator contemplates all living things both internally and externally as just elements. The meditator comes to realize that all living things are just elements, Earth, Water, Fire and Wind, without any unseen soul or    organism. The meditator contemplates all beings as just elements in this way in order to abandon clinging to self, other persons, or other beings.