How to use the five elements to eliminate overwhelming stress
You may have noticed that I haven’t been producing much content these past few days. It haunts me, really, because my greatest hope is that this blog will develop into a great community for the exploration of Chinese medicine. It is a labor of love and I’ve worked hard and hope that everyone has enjoyed the results so far.
But there’s more to my life than blogging. Shocking, I know. During the summer, when the external demands on my time were small, it was very easy to produce lots of high quality content. I believe that this is still quite possible - despite the rather heavy load of work school and the resumption of my various non-academic school duties (student government, etc) bring me. So, what’s the hold up?
No matter how well prepared you are for a change, it inevitably shakes you. In this particular case, the intense workload has begun to produce a condition of overwhelm that has made me quite numb. I know I’m not the only one - my fellow classmates have experienced something similar. So, instead of freaking out I’ve decided to take charge of the situation and find a solution to this crippling sensation. Here’s five things - one for each of the elemental phases - I’m doing to rectify my balance.
1. Fire - Laugh and have fun with the people you love
Fire has a lot to do with our ability to experience joy and ease, as well as our connections with other human beings. In overwhelming situations, we often let all of this perish. When I’m stressed, I find myself frowning more, getting angry with those close to me and neglecting my need to just relax and have a good time. It’s vital for me to remember that while the work I’m doing is very important, it’s even more important that I stay balanced and connected to my friends and family.
To this end: take your significant other out on a surprise date, watch a comedy (like Kung Fu Hustle!), invite your friends over for a potluck meal, dance to your favorite song in the living room, take your dog on the longest walk ever, laugh every time a new piece of work rolls in, call your mom and tell her that you love her.
2. Earth - Nourish your body
Possibly the most important thing you can do in a period of increased stress is to take care of your physical body. Particularly when a lot of your work is mental, you can quickly burn away any resistance to disease you may have had along with disordering your emotional states. DO NOT NEGLECT REGULAR MEALS OF A NOURISHING NATURE. For me, this is the first thing to go. I eat on the run, I stop paying attention to what I eat, sometimes I simply forget to eat altogether. So bad.
To this end: sit down right now and plan out a whole week’s worth of meals then go buy the ingredients, if you have extra time cook a bunch of meals ahead of time and freeze them, make extra certain to eat your meals at regular times and sitting down, splurge a little and buy your favorite foods so you’ll be more inclined to enjoy eating. Also - drink a lot of Pu-Erh.
3. Metal - Cut out unnecessary activity and get organized
Metal is all about cutting things away, paring down, getting ready for the time of difficulty in the Winter. It’s so easy to add things to your plate most of the time, and so difficult to clear them. Use the easy availability of Metal energy here in the autumn to take a calculating look at your list of “to-do’s.” If you can delegate something to someone else, do it. If you can drop something, drop it. If you can delay something until a later time, do that. When you have the list of “have to’s” get them organized. When are your deadlines? When will you have time to work on it? Prioritize! There are of course a hundred ways to deal with these big issues - I use Getting Things Done
4. Water - Cultivate, cultivate, cultivate
Right behind eating well, the second thing to go when I get overwhelmed is my self-cultivation. I think it is utterly vital to force yourself to take care of your spiritual health in stressful situations. I would even suggest doing this if it means losing sleep. I know, crazy. Deepening into the water element will allow you access stores of energy and inspiration you didn’t know you had. It will also help replenish your depleted stores and help you to remember why you’re doing all this crazy stuff in the first place.
To this end, I: throw the Yijing daily, spend half an hour or so in the morning drinking tea outside and contemplating, step up my meditation practice, do a little QiGong every day and focus on the subtle things around me like the calls of birds and the rustle of leaves. Do whatever works for you, but for the love of God, do it. I promise you it will help.
5. Wood - Get out in nature
This doesn’t necessarily relate to the Wood elemental phase on a metaphorical level, but it does on a more basic level. Even though it’s autumn where I am, the evidence of Wood energy is everywhere. In Oregon, things never stop growing. Refreshing myself with the boundless energy of nature helps remind me that while I may feel pretty depleted, there’s a whole world out there just conspiring to fill me full of hope, purpose and drive.
To this end: go for a walk at twilight or dawn, go for a hike in your nearest natural area, hang out by the river, play frisbee in the park, lie on the ground with your bare feet contacting the Earth and just….
breathe.
Got it?
Eric
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Tags: Blogging, erics-habits, habits, Home remedies, lifestyle-counseling, nutrition, overwhelm, stress, studentsRelated posts
5 Simple Chinese Medicine based ways to improve your vegan (or not) diet
As you may know from my prior post about veganism and Chinese medicine, I have been vegan for several years. In that time, I’ve done a lot of tweaking of my diet trying to maintain balance and healthfulness. In the post referenced above, I list a few ways that a person could alter their diet to conform to general Chinese medicine principles. I thought I would include a more specific list of things that I do that I believe help me to improve my diet by making it more warming, less damaging to the Spleen/Stomach and more balanced within the five elements.
1. Tempeh not Tofu
Getting protein as a vegan or vegetarian isn’t as difficult as many people seem to believe. I think people are beginning to see beyond the protein hysteria and this is creating a friendlier environment for more folks to make this kind of a dietary change. However, from a Chinese medicine perspective the reliance on tofu as a protein substitute is not necessarily a good thing. Soybeans in general are a cooling food, and the addition of mineral compounds (it used to be Shi Gao, the notorious super cold herb!) in processing make tofu particularly cooling. In large amounts, this cold can negatively impact digestive fire - causing indigestion and poor absorption of the essence of food.
Most Western sources note that soy as present in fermented products like natto and tempeh is a more healthful choice. I believe that a similar realization can be had through Chinese medicine principles. I don’t have any specific information on whether the fermentation process warms soybeans, but I imagine that it does. If we think about the process of fermentation, it involves the hard work of microorganisms. I imagine that the energy that these creatures put into the soybean must warm it somewhat. Regardless, I find much less digestive upset when I consume tempeh. That being said, I do still consume tofu and products made out of it - I just use them in moderation.
Read more
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Book review: Healing with Whole Foods by Paul Pitchford
I’ve been hoping to do book reviews for a while, but the idea of delving into an entire new content type has been daunting. I’m going to do my best! I’ll be using elements of book reviews that I have found to be helpful and hopefully the result will be helpful. Please let me know if there is any information you found to be useless, or if there was something you would have liked to see included that isn’t here. Thanks!
We had this book assigned to us during our first year of Classical Chinese medicine training at NCNM. The first year of our program is designed to get you “thinking ancient Chinese” and can be a bit overwhelming for many of us. One thing I found myself yearning for, however, was solid information about the theory and practice of Chinese medicine! It sounds paradoxical, I know, but learning the nuts and bolts of the clinical medicine simply isn’t the aim of that first year. The saving grace during this time, for me, was Paul Pitchford’s Healing With Whole Foods
Chinese Medicine Theory in Healing With Whole Foods
The first part of the book is devoted to elaboration of the basic principles of Chinese medicine: Yin-Yang, Heat-Cold, Interior-Exterior, Excess-Deficiency, Qi and the Six Qi/Six Conformations. While I feel that Pitchford could have made more references to classical texts and sometimes oversimplifies certain concepts (ala TCM) the explanations are straight forward and useful to people new to this system of healing. Later in the book, he provides some excellent summaries of the five elements, relating each element to the flavors in specific foods. He also uses these five element sections to discuss specific health concerns - for example, discussing water fluoridation in the Water section. Near the end of the book he provides Chinese medicine explanations for some common Western diseases and provides specific dietary information for each of them.
This was one of the best parts of the book for me in my first year. It’s hard to find a simple, yet rich, explanation of the five elements or any of the other basic theoretical elements of Chinese medicine. While there are other books that attempt this, I think Pitchford does the best job in the least amount of space. This along with the other great benefits of the book make it one of the best values for basic information on the medicine available.
Western Nutritional Information, especially for vegans and vegetarians
As you read the book, you will find that Pitchford has a strong bias to vegetarian and vegan diets. Some people find this off-putting, but I don’t find that he is overly preachy in his endorsement of the lifestyle. He does recommend some animal products, discussing their relative benefits and drawbacks. This combined with the ample information on grains, vegetables and fruits that is helpful for everyone regardless of their animal product consumption status makes his dietary advice relevant to all people. That being said, Pitchford provides some excellent advice for vegans concerning protein and B-12 with ample references to reputable Western scientific sources. Read more
Tags: books, chinese-medicine, dietary-therapy, five phases, food, lifestyle-counseling, nutrition, seasonal-living, veganismRelated posts
7 Keys to a balanced vegan diet in line with Chinese medicine philosophy
* I would like to apologize for the loss of my promised Classical Text post yesterday. I wrote a pretty decent exegesis of Chapter 39 of the Neijing which my computer promptly ate. I will try to reproduce it this evening. Now on to the post of the day. Tuesdays are Food + Drink day here at Deepest Health.
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In my years interacting with the Chinese medicine community, only one thing has really irritated me about it. You may guess by the title that it has something to do with veganism. Many professors and students I have interacted with have claimed that being vegan is not healthy, not balanced, or otherwise out of step with Chinese medical philosophy. One student went so far as to claim that I would absolutely not be able to maintain a vegan diet as I progressed through the program! I have not found this to be the case, and in fact, my appreciation for veganism has simply grown the more I’ve learned about the human body and Chinese medicine principles. Before continuing, I want to make clear that I am not a militant vegan - I do not interfere in the personal business of others. Further, I am not prepared to claim that veganism is the right diet for everyone. However, I do believe it is a more humane choice, on balance, and I do believe that for the average American it may represent the best shot at creating an optimal diet.
I have never been able to extract many coherent arguments from folks who are opposed to the diet I have thrived on for 8 years (and that my daughter has thrived on nearly all her life) but below is my attempt to articulate and then refute what points I have managed to round up.
1. Make sure to include warming foods: I have heard the argument that vegan diets are too cooling. This is because the majority of fruits, vegetables and grains of are a cool or cold nature, thus a diet consisting of many fruits, vegetables and grains will naturally be on the cool side. Because the Stomach requires a warm/hot environment, dumping a bunch of cold on top of it is not likely to result in good digestion. Poor digestion will eventually harm the whole body. So, don’t abandon veganism - just warm up your diet!
Here’s a partial list of my favorite warm foods: mustard greens, members of the onion family (garlic, onion, chive), parsnips, winter squash, cherries, oyster mushrooms and chestnuts! The onion family is probably the easiest and most useful group, because they can be added to almost anything!
2. Cook your food: Even if foods are cold, cooking methods can increase their warmth. I don’t want to step on any raw foodist toes, and I know that many people have had great results with that diet. But, given the conversations I’ve had with mentors and colleagues, from a Chinese medicine perspective the inclusion of cooked food in the diet is essential for the long-term health of the Spleen/Stomach. Stir frying, baking and slow cooking will all impart a Stomach-sparing warmth to your food that can help bring balance to a vegan diet.
3. Use the five elements to create balance: One way that I have been working to maintain my balance is by using the five elements to balance the colors and flavors in my diet. I wrote a post on the subject that may be of use to you - “See how easily you can use 5 element theory to eat optimally.”
4. Alter your diet with the seasons: For people who live in relatively isolated locations, following a vegan diet can be difficult. This difficult has caused some vegans to find a few meals they can easily create and stick with those. While this is an admirable survival method in a difficult situation, it can do little more than help you to merely survive. To experience the full benefit of a vegan diet, in line with Chinese medicine principles, you must adapt your diet to the seasons. This means eating relatively less and lighter in the spring, relatively more and heavier in the winter. It means finding in-season fruits and vegetables and enjoying them. It may mean growing a garden or visiting a local farmer’s market if you are lucky enough to have one nearby. Allowing nature to guide your eating habits is a great way to stay in balance.
5. Avoid processed foods: In situations as described in #4, sometimes people end up eating a lot of processed foods. This includes the obvious ones like dehydrated mashed potatoes and white pasta, but also those that are less obvious like tofu and soymilk. While processed soy and wheat products make getting the essential nutrients so much easier, they should not be relied upon too heavily. Get back to basics - whole grains like brown rice and quinoa combined (at the same meal or not) with legumes like black beans is a time honored way to fulfill many of your body systems. These whole foods, the fresher the better, are much more likely to contain good Qi, which will nourish your body much better. Processed, de-vitalized foods - while sometimes chemically identical to whole foods (due to addition of synthetic nutrients) they are not identical energetically.
6. Use Qigong and nature study to appreciate the energy of animals: One objection I have heard is that a vegan diet fails to absorb the important energy of animals, which is for whatever reason important to human health. While I don’t understand this argument, if you can call it an argument, I will point out that there are other - perhaps superior - ways to absorb the essence of something. Using Qigong
or various meditation and energy work methods, one can easily interact with the energy of anything, animal or not. This gentle and non-obtrusive interaction when done from a place of respect can definitely help you to feel the vitality of the animal and incorporate it into your energy body.
7. Western tips: Pay attention to B-12, protein: A list of this kind wouldn’t be complete without the requisite nod to the helpful reductionism of Western science. Using the tips above will help you to create a quite balanced diet, but as a check and balance, be sure to investigate where you are obtaining B-12 and protein. The B-12 debate rages on, but it is my understanding that the only significant natural sources are animal related. I consume Red Star Nutritional yeast, which is fortified with B-12 and I also take a sublingual B-12
Disagree with what I’ve said here? Agree and want to let me know it? Post in the comments and get the discussion going!
Eric
Tags: dietary-therapy, erics-habits, five phases, food, habits, nutrition, veganismRelated posts
What is Chinese Medicine? — Lifestyle counseling and dietary therapy
Every modality that falls under the umbrella of “natural medicine,” as Chinese medicine does, promotes nutrition and other lifestyle factors as a cornerstone of health. Although practitioners place differential emphasis on modalities within their profession, any Chinese medicine doc worth her salt is going to be able to provide you with dietary and exercise recommendations for your condition. The breadth and depth of the recommendations you get are, of course, going to be based on the doctor’s interest in that type of therapy as well as the strength of their training. At NCNM, we take a three term long course concerning nutrition and dietetics. Additionally, our Chinese herbs professors frequently refer to diet, since foods are the original (and often best) herbs. Our medicinary is making efforts to stock more commonly recommended dietary therapies, such as congee - a kind of rice porridge excellent for regenerating the Spleen/Stomach function. Other schools have varying emphases on nutrition and dietetics, as well as other aspects of lifestyle counseling.
Chinese Dietary Therapy
Chinese Dietary therapy is based on the same principles as the rest of the medicine. Foods and herbs are discussed with very similar language. Most frequently discussed are the properties of flavor and nature. I briefly discussed these elements in my article, What is Chinese medicine: Herbal medicine. The basics are relatively easy to understand. Flavor is an aspect of the herb that does include the experience we have when we put the herb in our mouth (common understanding of the word “flavor”) but also includes some aspects of the action of the herb. For instance, pungent flavored herbs/foods will likely have a “spicy” quality but they will also act like other pungent herbs in their dispersing nature. Aside from pungent, flavor can be sweet, sour, bland, salty and bitter. Nature refers to the temperature-like quality of the herb/food. This ranges from hot to cold, with several gradations in between. Nature is a very simple way to understand the yin yang aspect of food. Nature is a more ethereal quality, but has clear consequences. Very hot herbs are intensely moving and support the Yang of the body. Very cold herbs are intensely congealing and support the Yin of the body.
In general, your instincts about foods are going to correspond to the Chinese properties of foods/herbs. What would you think watermelon would be classified as - cold or hot? If you said cold, you’re right. That’s why it’s such a great food for beating the negative effects of summer’s intense heat! What flavor would you expect watermelon to have - see the quick list above to remind yourself. If you said sweet, you’re right! It’s really quite simple in most cases. Some are a little counter intuitive, but the experience of thousands of years of Chinese medicine practitioners have led them to classify the foods in this way. When we take this information seriously, we have great results.
Tags: Acupuncture, chinese-herb, chinese-herbs, dietary-therapy, flavors, food, habits, nutrition, Personal Development, seasonal-living
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