WHAT IS JING?

[Kasuku]

what hes talking about it not jing persay but just yin jing that u get when eating food - anyone can eat alot of food and feel heat in the belly, which contributes to wei qi to fight external pathogens.

 

however it is nothing to do with true jing, true water, that originates in the kidneys and comes from the emptiness - i know this from experience...

[soaring crane]

what hes talking about it not jing persay but just yin jing that u get when eating food -

 

Hi - I'm wondering who you're replying to. Who's talking about Gu Qi?

[Kasuku]

Hi - I'm wondering who you're replying to. Who's talking about Gu Qi?

well the first post said spleen and stomach is related to jing and immune system... mudryah

[thelerner]

What is Jing?

 

Hmnn, all I know is this.

It don't mean a thing,

If it don't got no Jing.

[ChiDragon]

What is Jing?

 

Hmnn, all I know is this.

It don't mean a thing,

If it don't got no Jing.

 

Let's say Jing is the essence which composes the body. Without it, we ain't nobody.

[Taomeow]

Taomeow, how do you think is jing directly connected with sexual function?

 

Intimately.

 

But human sexuality is not limited to jing aspects, and jing is not limited to sexual functions.

 

The primary function of sex is reproduction,

the secondary function of sex is redirection (of other drives that didn't find their expression under modern social conditions -- e.g. closeness to other beings, exchange of physical and emotional states with other beings, sharing, giving and receiving pleasure, "marking the territory," claiming and ownership, belonging and possessing, acceptance and guidance, and also healing);

the tertiary function of sex is neurotic trauma processing with sadistic, masochistic, or otherwise warfare-like expressions (internal or external or both -- this is an unhealthy scenario but it is the prevalent sexual mode of our time, which proves that sex can be used this way and is in fact a preferred medium of "dumping" for many. Much like legs can be used for stepping on people's throats or arms can be used for pulling triggers, though it wouldn't occur to a student of physiology that this is their primary biological designation).

 

Jing is involved in sexual functions of the primary and secondary type, since reproduction is contingent on its ability to store and transmit memory (of how to put together a human being),

and redirection, on its inherent features of the Wood phase of wuxing, "life on earth," which make it mobile and give it a tendency to propagate in all directions. (Pre-heaven jing is Water- like, post-heaven propagation of jing is like that of Water's wuxing Child phase, which is Wood. No erection-related pun intended, though it seems unavoidable. )

Edited December 6, 2013 by Taomeow

[Taomeow]

I was wondering about the adrenal 'structures'. Given their proximity to the kidneys (they're attached), do they develop concurrently? Or perhaps even appear first? Their name means 'near the kidneys' and some of their functions can be compared to kidney function in TCM. They're responsible for electrolyte balance in the body, for example, and that is the most basic function of all, it's part of the 'constitution', a very Jing function. And they have that sexual function as well ...

 

Were those glands actually recognized specifically in the development of the Chinese systems? The other glands specifically?

 

 

They are indeed physically close, but functionally different. Much of the endocrine system in classical TCM falls under the wuxing category of Fire, along with the heart (and, interestingly, the small intestine, which of course needs Fire to "cook" what we eat.) Adrenals are one of the fiery organs (think adrenaline!) and are in charge of processing stress -- by providing the "fuel" to burn -- well, jing, what else -- in the form of stress-mediating hormones, chiefly cortisol, catecholamines, epinephrine and norepinephrine. They facilitate functioning under conditions of stress but at the cost of depleting the health basis of the organism, jing.

 

The Water-Fire interactions of Kidneys and adrenal glands are pretty complex, and far as I've been able to discern, when one has a say in whether to add stress to one's life (not always the case, obviously), it's way better to let the Kidneys set the pace and the adrenals (and the heart) to follow, rather than vice versa. Not a good idea to force the Kidneys (via lifestyle choices) to try matching the activities of the adrenals, because the only way they can do it is by throwing jing into the fire. (Incidentally, this is why high-performance elite athletes, usually people who start out in life with an abundance of jing, are not long-lived.)

[Walker]

Chinese saying: Daojia has three most important things: Jing/Qi/Shen 精、气、神 . In these three ones, everything starts from Jing精. But what is Jing精 ?

For some reasons, the writers always dont tell you the truth about their experiences directly, they like to use many obscure words to cover their simple truth about Jing 精. That makes their followers into a misterious and confused understandings about Jing精.

 

 

 

 

No ground for blame on this approach ! This is one of human beings culture !

 

 

But not all the writers like to cover them in their books .

 

 

More than two thousand years before, Chinese famous medicinal book 《Huang Di Nei Jin》has told us what Jing精 is by the clear and simple and understandable words.

 

 

In 《 Huang Di Nei Jin. Suwen. Ping Re Bing Lun 》it tells us like this:

 

When the virus attacks the cover of our body, our body immune system ( Zheng qi 正气) always fights with the virus by sweating 出汗. Where is our sweat ( Jing 精) from? It comes from our stomach and spleen. If your immune system正气 can sweat when the virus attacks your cover, then, you lost your fever, and can have food, you win(精胜! Your Jing 精 win! If can not have food, and hot still, your Jing 精 lost !

 

 

And so, if you want to get enough Jing精, you must have a good stomach and spleen first. No them, no Jing 精 will be produced!

 

 

And now, you understand what you should do for in your martial arts or Qi gong trainings !

 

That is: Always keep your stomach and spleen into a good condition first ! ( Chinese saying ! Please understand it in Chinese culture ! )

 

 

Hope my this understanding can help you to understand Taojias culture deeper!

Mercy mercy mercy.

 

1. The Huangdi Neijing goes into elaborate and confusing depth about jing that few in China can clearly explain. Sadly, this article only adds to confusion, first by seeming to imply that sweat is jing (clearly the notions of somebody who has not actually read the Neijing, much less a modern TCM textbook) and secondly by neglecting to mention the vast wealth of actual knowledge about jing in this text.

 

2. The body does not always respond to external pathogenic qi with sweating--in fact, the very reason that it often fails to is the basis for the existence of arguably the most famous prescription in Chinese medicine. You brother would know this if he had read the first section of the, oh, mildly important Shanghan Lun before waxing pedantic.

 

3. Saying that the spleen-stomach is the origin of jing is 胡说八道, _especially_ if this topic is,meant to pertain to Daoist cultivation.

 

4. Implying that the Neijing talks of viruses is grevious 胡说八道--utter nonsense. Likewise, 正气≠immune system.

 

Readers are wise to be cautious about taking the original post's notions on board.

[Walker]

Modern research in Chinese medicine equates the function of the adrenal glands to the function of Kidney Yang.

 

The notion that we can find 1-to-1 relationships between concepts from classical Chinese thought and modern anatomy and physiology is very, very seductive. Especially for great numbers of modern Chinese scholars whose mentalities are still colored by 150 years of shock and awe in the face of Western techno-might on the one hand and the Cultural Revolution on the other. Unfortunately, despite the seductiveness of thinking that the ancient Chinese and modern scientists are all talking about the same thing, just using different vocabularies, close examination reveals that this is a 狐狸精 you don't want to hop into bed with.

 

Why do people continue at this fool's errand when it has failed to produce good doctors and good theories?

 

Blind admiration for the technological behemoth that subjugated China as well as near-severance of their own traditions means that few Chinese think in a way that in any way, shape, or form that resembles that of the ancients. Even inside of Chinese TCM academia probably fewer than 5% of scholars and scholar-practitioners study, understand, and use classical Chinese thought. Those who do are not empowered to lead the zeitgeist and thus are really only able to preach to the choir and those of us who, or our own accord, wish to join the choir. Despite what Fox Television (another 狐狸精 I assiduously avoid) might have you believe, no, there are not many people in the glee club.

 

There is a further problem deflating Johnson's assertion: academic honesty and integrity are not very highly valued in the PRC and apparently have not been since the early 1980s, right about when cash became king. Very long, complicated, and saddening story short: lots and lots and lots of published research in China is complete and utter bullshit. This problem exists everywhere, but it is running rampant and riot in the PRC.

 

If you think I am just making this stuff up, you can check the works of Heiner Fruehauf, Andrew Nugent-Head, Jeffrey Yuen and many others, and you will find confirmation coming from various hoary 前辈.

 

That out of the way, let's look at the adrenal glands.

 

The most well-known product of the adrenals is, of course, adrenaline (epinephrine). Vastly simplified, adrenaline gives you the fight or flight response by causing blood vessels to constrict in the skin and the internal organs whilst relaxing blood vessels in your muscles.

 

With the help of Wikipedia, let us take a look at the list of symptoms of the fight-or-flight response with the reality of kidney yang function in parentheses:

 

• Acceleration of heart and lung action (kidney yang is not closely associated with heart or lung function; heart function is related to heart yang, whereas lung action is more a question of lung qi; while the kidneys do play an important part in breathing, they should make breathing slow and deep, which is the exact opposite of what happens when you're in fight-or-flight)
• Paling or flushing, or alternating between both (pale skin is actually a sign of weak kidney yang; flushing is often a question of excess heat/fire or yin deficiency fire, not kidney yang)
• Inhibition of stomach and upper-intestinal action to the point where digestion slows down or stops (kidney yang has a close relationship with digestion, by providing fire from the mingmen to the spleen; when this fire is deficient, the result is various types of loose stool/diahrrea; constipation and indigestion are mechanisms essentially distinct from Chinese medicine kidney function)
• General effect on the sphincters of the body (I can't comment on this)
• Constriction of blood vessels in many parts of the body (constriction of blood vessels at the surface of the body will cause the temperature of the extremities to drop, yielding, for example, cold hands and feet; however, cold hands and feet are precisely a sign of deficient kidney yang!)
• Liberation of metabolic energy sources (particularly fat and glycogen) for muscular action (Can't comment)
• Dilation of blood vessels for muscles (Can't comment)
• Inhibition of the lacrimal gland (responsible for tear production) and salivation (the ability to salivate is actually, quite to the contrary, related to kidneys having sufficient yin and yang to deliver this moisture from the lower jiao to the upper jiao; tears and crying are most closely tied to liver and lung function)
• Dilation of pupil (mydriasis) (No comment)
• Relaxation of bladder (If what is meant here is an increase in urination, well, that's a sign of insufficient kidney yang)
• Inhibition of erection (classic symptom of weak kidney yang!)
• Auditory exclusion (loss of hearing) (classic symptom of weak kidneys!)
• Tunnel vision (loss of peripheral vision) (Can't comment)
• Disinhibition of spinal reflexes (Can't comment)
• Shaking (Usually a condition of wind or perhaps insufficient 阴津 in the tissues, not generally tied to kidneys except fo r the fact that Chinese medicine kidneys and liver share the same origin--乙癸同源)

If you believe what I wrote, then you see that the reality seems to actually be quite the opposite of what Jerry Alan Johnson apparently said--it seems that the adrenal glands being called into action to release adrenaline causes symptoms that contraindicate healthy kidney yang.

 

If we look at another important hormone produced the by adrenal glands, cortisol, we get a long list of effects that, basically, don't seem to have much to do with kidney yang. However, there are two that are very germane, again, because they seem to disprove Johnson's claim:

 

• Shuts down the reproductive system (precisely a sign that your kidneys are in major, major trouble, unless you have achieved this feat through Daoist alchemy, in which case your kidneys are extremely healthy but they are involved in the transformations required to produce an immortal instead of the transformations required to produce offspring)

• It has been shown that cortisol inhibits memory retrieval of already stored information (without doubt, in Chinese medicine memory loss raises a red flag: poor kidney health; the relationship of kidney yang in particular to memory is that yang is required to bring kidney jing up the du meridian into the brain)

I believe that there is more than enough information here to suggest that the statement attributed to Jerry Alan Johnson is, at best, extraordinarily over-simplistic.

 

The great shame is that this kind of thinking is what Chinese medicine education has been more or less reduced to. Result? Fewer than 10% of TCM program graduates in China actually become doctors. The education borders on being useless for all but a few with profound intelligence, luck, doggedness, and affinity.