The Routes and Actions of Foods
The flavour ascribes a food to a particular element. A food is also said to enter particular channel pathways, directing its effect towards particular organs. Almonds, for example, enter the Lung channel and walnuts enter the Kidney channel.
Some foods also have a specific therapeutic action. A food may either tonify a particular bodily substance or function (yin, yang, qi, blood) or it may reduce the influence of a pathological condition (qi stagnation, blood stasis, dampness, heat or cold). Almonds, for example, counteract phlegm, walnuts tonify yang.
When we combine the channel route with the therapeutic action of foods we get a specific description of its therapeutic effect. Using the above examples we find that almonds remove phlegm from the Lung and walnuts tonify the Kidney yang. This knowledge helps us choose foods to include in our diet which are tailor-made for our personal energetic needs.
Putting Principles into Practice
The treatment of deficiency
When we say that someone is deficient, we mean that they lack certain substances, functions or qualities. We can describe people as deficient in yin, yang, blood or qi. As practitioners we look for a way to guide them back to sufficiency and one part of this may be suggesting changes in diet.
The yang deficient person
Someone who is deficient in yang lacks the catalytic spark, the cellular chemistry of combustion. When our fire is weak, we become cold and slow, and physical processes become sluggish. Hypothyroidism, for example, is a generalised condition of yang deficiency where the metabolic rate slows down and stimulating drugs such as thyroxine are used to restore balance.
In daily life it is activity which generates yang, quickening the metabolic processes into action. Appropriate exercise is therefore always encouraged. We apply the same principle to food: to stimulate the yang we use foods which are activity generators. And just as yang deficiency is treated with heat, as in the use of moxa, yang strengthening foods are also warming in nature. To help the heat penetrate more deeply we also use slower cooking methods such as baking, roasting or casseroles.
The advice to a yang deficient person therefore is: move more, keep warm, reduce cold foods and exposure to cold, increase warm foods and use some of the warmer pungent spices. Chestnut casserole, baked trout, roast lamb or warming chai (Indian spiced tea) are typical recommendations, and food can be flavoured with such spices as ginger, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg or cardamom or herbs such as basil, rosemary and thyme.
The yin deficient person
With yin deficiency, rest is the key to recovery and replenishment. The deep level of depletion present in yin deficiency is restored by practices which take us deeply into ourselves such as some meditation practices and good quality rest. In working with yin deficiency we reduce stimulation and encourage calm. In daily life this means giving ourselves quiet space and stillness, nourishing the subtle and reflective aspects of our being.
This is supported by a diet which nourishes us deeply, especially the subtle mineral base of the body. Yin strengthening foods are generally cool, calming and moistening and they penetrate like water to the deepest level. Sweet, salty and sour flavours are most useful, whereas the drying bitter or stimulating pungent flavours are usually reduced. Yin tonics include many fruits, seeds, sea plants and dairy foods. A yin nourishing meal might be a fruit salad, scrambled eggs on toast or fish soup. Seaweeds, kelp and algae are useful complements to this diet and pork or rabbit are useful meats.
The advice to a yin deficient person therefore is: reduce stimulation and increase restful practices, reduce stimulating foods and increase calming foods, subtly nourishing foods and more lubricating foods.
The qi deficient person
Qi is derived from food and air, and from the subtle forces around us. In addressing qi deficiency we need to look at how our qi is being inhibited from fully expressing itself.
The inhibition of our qi’s expression can have many causes: emotional, environmental (e.g. geopathic or industrially induced stress) or due to lack of oxygen from poor breathing. Food also plays a part: lifeless foods, especially microwaved, do not provide the vitality needed for vibrant living. The subtle qi present most strongly in fresh and organic produce is necessary to support the quality of qi in our bodies.
Dietarily, qi deficiency is addressed by the use of vibrantly alive food. At a more physical level qi deficiency may simply describe a lack of energy and complex carbohydrates are used to release energy slowly into the system. The principle of resonance is also used with foods of specific shapes or colours being used to strengthen the qi of particular organs. Pumpkins, for example, are used to strengthen the Spleen, Kidney beans the Kidneys. Animal organs are also considered to strengthen the related human organs.
Fresh air and exercise are good recipes, and such foods as pumpkin, lentils or chicken soup are effective qi tonics. Oat porridge is a great strengthener too as are date and oat flapjacks, indeed oats, chicken and dates are some of the best known qi tonics, especially when supplemented by herbs such as ginseng or royal jelly. Supplementation, however, is only recommended in the short term and the return to abundant energy needs to be supported by breathwork, exercise and exploration of why our qi is depleted.
The blood deficient person
The quality of our blood is a measure of the available nourishment circulating in our bodies anid its manufacture is dependent on the strength of our Spleen. Blood is transported upward to the upper jiao where after being acted on by the Lung it is vitalised by the Heart. Blood deficiency is readily treated by diet, especially when supported by exercise to increase Lung function.
It takes about 120 days for us to fully renew our blood, so much can be achieved in a few months. A diet rich in fresh vegetables is essential, especially green leafy vegetables and chlorophyll-rich foods, whose benefits are increased by being combined with grains. Most meat, beans and high protein foods will also greatly strengthen the blood.
Beyond this we can simply advise a person to eat well and widely as all food is ultimately converted into blood or qi. Blood is particularly weakened by sugar and its quality lowered by heavily salted, de-natured or fatty foods. Poached egg on a dish of spinach, beetroot soup, braised liver, nettle tea are all simple recipes for a blood-nourishing diet.
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Excess conditions
Stagnation
Stagnant conditions need movement. This may be emotional, physical or creative. When it comes to food, the recommendation is to reduce conditions which encourage stagnation such as overeating, too much complex food or poorly combined food and to maintain simplicity and lightness in the diet. The pungent flavour is used to give a little extra movement.
Cold and heat
Cold and heat are treated by their opposites. Cold conditions are improved by warming foods and vice-versa. When a pathogenic factor is involved and the condition is acute, then the pungent flavour is used to drive the invader out of the body. For example, the cooling pungent elderflower is used for a hot pathogen and the warming pungent ginger for a cold one.
Dampness and phlegm
Dampness results from the failure to warm or transform moisture in the body. It is nearly always associated with a weak Spleen, often with weak Kidneys and sometimes with a weak Lung. Dampness can lodge in a specific part of the body or affect the whole body.
Some people are more prone to dampness than others. A tendency towards dampness can be aggravated by living in damp conditions or by a sedentary lifestyle. It needs the transformative power of the body’s yang to stop damp accumulating. Eating in ways which inhibit our Spleen function or which injure the yang will increase our tendency towards dampness. Dampness may also be caused by pathogens lodged in the body which have not been properly expelled, or by the use of suppressant drugs such as steroids or antibiotics.
Dampness is treated by strengthening the Spleen and may also need tonification of the Kidneys, the Lung and the yang. Dampness is often the result of overeating or overnutrition. It may also result from jarnn-dng the digestive system with poorly combined foods. We also need to avoid too much raw, cold, sweet or rich food and the overconsumption of fluid.
Some foods are particularly dampening. They include dairy products (sheep and goat products are less dampening), pork and rich meat, roasted peanuts, concentrated juices especially orange and tomato, wheat, bread, yeast, beer, bananas, sugar and sweeteners, and saturated fats. Some foods, on the other hand, have properties which help to resolve dampness. Many of these are bitter flavoured or diuretic and include: aduki bean, barley, celery, seaweed, rye and garlic.
The presence of excess phlegm demands the reduction of phlegm-forming foods and the use of phlegm-resolving foods such as garlic, radish or barley. Retention of body fluid (e.g. oedema) is helped by water-removing (diuretic) foods such as aduki bean, celery and seaweed.
The transformation of chronic dampness takes some persistence, combining the use of damp-resolving food with avoidance of damp-forming foods. When the body is weak, as in chronic fatigue syndrome, tonification may be a more important principle than the reduction of dampness, as until dampness can be transformed by the Spleen and the body’s yang, it will continue to accumulate easily.
Barley and cabbage are used to reduce damp-heat in the Liver, dandelion root coffee is an excellent transformer of lower burner dampness and jasmine tea will help a cold and damp Spleen.
Finally, it is my view that all dietary change should be gradual and actively engage the client with their healing process. There is generally no need to look to exotic foods to generate healing: the diet appropriate for each of us is largely available here, where we live. It is more harmonious with the spirit of energetic medicine to make use of our local resources and the creative resources of the human spirit. It is also an approach more in harmony with the needs of our planet.
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