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Traditional Chinese medicine is a type of holistic and natural medicinal system that has been in use for over two thousand years. It is designed to stimulate the healing mechanisms of the body, and can bring many health benefits to you both physically and psychologically.
Here are the top five health benefits of traditional Chinese medicine:
1. It Can Reduce Inflammation
Reducing inflammation in your body is extremely important because inflammation serves as the root cause of a wide variety of different diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, and even cancer.
Traditional Chinese medicine can help to reduce inflammation and the consequences associated with it through a number of different means, including herbal treatments, acupuncture, and acupressure.
In the process, Chinese medicine can also help you to stop any lifestyle habits that are harmful to your body and make inflammation worse, such as eating too much, smoking cigarettes, or drinking too much alcohol.
2. It Can Improve Your Muscle Strength and Flexibility
When we want to improve strength and flexibility in our muscles, we commonly turn to strength training exercises. That’s great, but traditional Chinese medicine is another way you can improve your muscles as well.
In fact, practicing tai chi regularly provides you with an important aerobic workout, and practicing it for just three months can improve your balance, help you maintain or even enhance your flexibility and agility, and boost the overall strength in your muscles.
3. It Protects and Improves Your Cognitive Health
Protecting your physical health should be a top priority for you, but equally if not more important is to protect your mental health, and yet again traditional Chinese medicine is great for this.
Chinese herbs don’t just help reduce inflammation, they can also help to relieve stress in the process. This is because Chinese herbs can effectively regulate the hormones that protect your brain, which also serves to control the immune response of your body. Using Chinese herbs decreases the risk of you developing dementia later in life as well.
4. It Has Very Few Side Effects
Most medications and stimulants designed to help the body often come with a number of bad side effects, but fortunately, this is not the case with Chinese medicine. In fact, the few side effects that do come with Chinese medicine are practically harmless.
5. It Can Improve The Quality Of Your Sleep
Last but not least, traditional Chinese medicine can help to improve the overall quality of your sleep. The typical adult needs an average of eight hours of high quality sleep each night, and getting this sleep helps improve blood circulation, calm anxiety, and improve your cognitive strength.
Traditional Chinese Medicine Schools Online
The Health Benefits Of Chinese Medicine
All in all, these are the top five health benefits of traditional Chinese medicine for your body. Hopefully this article has helped convince you that Chinese medicine is something you should explore if you have been suffering from major ailments as of late.
Basic concept
The Five Phases refer to Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water. Those five substances are what ancient Chinese believed made up everything in the universe.In Chinese Medicine the Five Phases theory (sometimes also called the 'Five Elements' theory) is used to analyze the make-up of the body's organs and meridians as well as their relationships.
The Five-Phase theory in Chinese Medicine
In Chinese Medicine the Five Phases theory is used to explain relationships between organs in our bodies based on what element characterizes them. At the core of the theory is the fact that the five elements affect each others in a 'nourishing' or 'suppressive' way. For instance Water is 'nourishing' to Wood but 'suppressive' to Fire. As such at the core of the theory there is the idea that organs in our bodies are in a constant state of change and interdependence, with elements constantly getting nourished or suppressed by each others. The five elements are in constant search of a harmonic balance.
The body's Zang-Fu organs are categorized by element based on what substance they're closest to. For example the Spleen's main role is seen as taking the nutrients from food and distributing them to other organs. This is seen as similar to the nourishing role the soil plays with plants and the Spleen is therefore attributed to the Earth element. Similarly the Liver is attributed to Wood and the Heart to Fire. The Lungs make air 'heavy' so it descends into the body; as such it is Metal. The Kidney's role is to regulate water and it is therefore attributed to Water.
Each organ has a corresponding 'orifice' it 'opens' into and those orifices are also categorized as the elements of their associated organ. For instance it is believed in Chinese medicine that the Liver 'opens' into the eyes. The eyes are therefore classified as Wood, just like the Liver. Similarly the Lungs open into the nose and it is as such categorized as Metal just like the Lungs.
Most importantly the Five Phases theory explains the relationships between organs. For instance the Kidney (Water) nourishes the Liver (Wood) which itself nourishes the Heart (Fire). On the other hand the Kidney (Water) suppresses the Heart (Fire) which itself suppresses the Lungs (Metal).
The Five-Phases theory on diseases and treatments
The Five-Phases theory is particularly useful in Chinese Medicine to explain how diseases spread in the body. For instance a disease affecting the Kidney (Water) will have more propensity to spread to the Heart (Fire). The inverse is true as well: since the Spleen (Earth) is suppressed by the Liver (Wood), a disease seen as affecting the Heart might also be present in the Liver.
Under the Five-Phases theory, one of the first priorities for treatment will be to prevent the transmission of the disease. For instance if a Liver (Wood) disease is diagnosed, the Spleen (Earth) will be treated in advance to prevent the disease from spreading. Also, as with everything in Chinese medicine, treatment is about restoring balance. If an element is weak versus the others (like a deficient Kidney - Water), the main purpose of the treatment will be to nourish it so it regains its normal level.
Interestingly the Five Phases theory also applies to the field of psychiatry. For instance grief is considered a Metal emotion and Anger a Wood emotion. This is why grief wins over anger: Metal suppresses Wood. Similarly a patient's emotional state can be reflective of a defective organ. As such someone who is very anxious (perhaps with issues of insomnia) might have a deficient Spleen since anxiety is an Earth emotion and the Spleen is the Earth organ.
Chinese medicinal herbs are also often classified by element. Such classification is often based on their taste and each main taste is assigned an element:
- Fire (Heart): Bitter
- Wood (Liver): Sour
- Earth (Spleen): Sweet
- Metal (Lungs): Spicy
- Water (Kidney): Salty
In that logic a patient with a deficient Spleen might want to favor sweet food or sweet Chinese medicinal herbs. Interestingly Chinese Medicine believes that the body often tells us through cravings that we might have a deficient organ. For instance if one finds themselves craving spicy food, it might be indicative of deficient Lungs!
As with everything in Chinese medicine the goal is balance. Unless one has a deficiency of some kind it is very important to eat a diet made of all the tastes so all the elements and their corresponding organs get nourished properly.
Sources:
Ted J. Kaptchuk (1983). The Web That Has No Weaver: Understanding Chinese Medicine. Chicago, Il., U.S.A.: Congdon & Weed.
5 Roots Of Traditional Chinese Medicine Fort Collins
Ko, Robert. Health Concepts in Chinese Medicine [PDF documents and videos]. Retrieved from The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology on Coursera: https://www.coursera.org/learn/health-concepts-chinese-medicine
Wu Xing. (n.d.). In Wikipedia. Retrieved April 17, 2018, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_Xing
五行. (n.d.). In A+医学百科. Retrieved April 17, 2018, from http://www.a-hospital.com/w/%E4%BA%94%E8%A1%8C