Yin and Yang - (foods, tcm medicines, meridians, enhancement, refinement, etc)

[froggie]

Greatest blessings everyone,

 

 

I would like to ask for your help in my inquiry of understanding yin and yang energies,

 

meridians, and so on, more deeply.

 

Per example:

 

 

- Which meridians are yin and which are yang, and possibly: which are both and what is the

 

yin part and which is the yang part. (etc.)

 

 

- Which foods are yin and which are yang and which are both (and how), and which foods (and

 

other things) promote yin energy in the body and which promote yang energy in the body, and

 

which add both and balanced state

 

 

- How does one refine the yin energies in one's ("physical") body and how does one refine

 

yang energies in one's ("physical"). (for example: foods, treatment of food and water (an

 

overlooked part in my opinion) and so on etcetera)

 

 

- Which books (and other media) for example can you recommend on this? (in particular in

 

regard to the upper 3 questions, if you could, please)

 

 

 

I may come up with more of these questions to add as the thread continues.

 

 

 

 

My honest thanks - innergy

[froggie]

if nothing else... i would at the least appreciate a book recommendation about it that covers it

[mYTHmAKER]

if nothing else... i would at the least appreciate a book recommendation about it that covers it

 

You can get a lot of information by doing a few googles

[froggie]

I have done many googles, i have browsed through many books and reviews and indexes of books at amazon.com, eventually i will find what i am looking for, one way or another, probably, but i would also like to use this forum. I said i'd apreciate your help as well, didn't i?

my own searches did not bring me much closer to my specialised questions yet.

i hope this is not the standard answer, to 'do a google', when you want to ask something.

i want to talk about it with people with the same interests and sometimes give and take tips.

but thank you nevertheless for the ''check'', anyway.

 

 

You can get a lot of information by doing a few googles

Edited April 7, 2008 by froggie

[松永道]

Sounds like you want to learn Chinese medicine.

 

For starters, "The Web that has No Weaver" is a pretty good overview. Though it doesn't cover foods. For foods an herbs there are plenty of books available, the ones I use are in Chinese, but I got my Mom, "Healing with the Herbs of Life" which looked like the best herbal and diet book available for lay readers. As for your third question you're looking for "waidan" herbal concoctions for the alchemical process. I'm not sure there are good books on this and without a good base in Chinese medicine you could well hurt yourself.

 

Bill Bodri's "How to Clean Your Arteries and Detox Your Body for the Road of Spiritual Cultivation" may be a place to start, though I haven't read it so can't give a review.

[froggie]

Song Yongdao,

 

Much appreciated.

I have over 15 years of experience with western herbal medicine, an interest in eastern medicine but no very deep knowledge of that so far.

My friend is learning Chinese (Mandarin, i believe), and i think i will start learning it soon also.

Thank you.

Edited April 7, 2008 by froggie

[Taomeow]

And for foods, try Chinese Food Cures by Henry C. Lu.

 

The best way to understand yin and yang is via direct observation/meditation/contemplation of the behavior of entities and energies around you and within you. You basically do it by making a habit out of discerning whether anything you perceive is yin or yang compared to something else. NB, NB, NB! -- yin and yang are not absolutes, whatever is "yin" is merely "more yin" than something else, and this something else is then "more yang" to that "more yin" thing or event or process or quality, etc.. If you keep this in mind, the world turns into a fun study of yin-yang interactions of assorted phenomena.

 

I just remembered... There was a question someone blew on Jeopardy: which one is the heaviest, a gallon of water, a gallon of crude oil, or a gallon of olive oil? I knew the answer right away because of this yin-yang picture I immediately formed of their interactions. Which one is going to float on top, on the surface, if you mix them? The one that's more yang. And when you have equal amounts of something yin and something yang, whatever is yin is heavier. So I said "water" and the contestant said "crude oil" and I said "bleep!" and so did the bleep-making thingie they use for such occasions.

 

You will often google up all manner of lists comparing yin to yang, but they are likely to omit the time aspect, which is crucial for understanding them, and the "how it feels compared to something else of a similar function" aspect -- here's some examples:

 

comfortable things are more yin (a pair of your favorite old sneakers is more yin now that it has adapted itself thoroughly to your foot; a recliner is more yin than an office chair; a path in the woods is more yin than the highway);

new, recent things are more yang (a man of twenty-seven is much more yang than he will be at seventy; the latest movie is more yang than it will be a year from now -- then it will be sitting quietly on the shelf at Blockbuster's, now it's flying off the shelf, moving fast, going here and there and everywhere; a culture that is 200 years old is way more yang than a culture that is 2000 years old);

things that have a future are more yang, things that have a past are more yin, and things that are "right now" are one or the other depending on whether they ignore what went before (these are yang) or what lies ahead (these are yin).

[Fire Dragon]

Hello

 

So for me with a yang defiency it should be better to think about what is ahead of me than to think about the past to achive more yang energy?

 

Dreamed about how to act socialy to gain or loose energy just a few minutes ago.

 

Not a good idea to go Freudian psychoanalysis then!

 

 

F D

[松永道]

 

So for me with a yang defiency it should be better to think about what is ahead of me than to think about the past to achive more yang energy?

 

 

Better to do less thinking and more doing. Doing is yang. Pondering is yin.

[Taomeow]

Better to do less thinking and more doing. Doing is yang. Pondering is yin.

 

In the human body, whatever happens in the head is more yang than whatever happens elsewhere in the body: yang is the topmost, the lightest (thought), it ascends, and the brain is yang compared to, say, the liver, and within the brain, the lower brain is yin compared to the neocortex, and the neocortex is the source of ultimate human yang, "higher thought." The neocortex does the pondering. Pondering is yang, meditation is yin; doing is yang, getting things done is yin. "Doing nothing, accomplishing everything" is the Great Yin, "taiyin"; "doing everything, accomplishing nothing" is the Great Yang, "taiyang."

 

Thinking "there's something to accomplish" is yang, feeling accomplished is yin.

[mYTHmAKER]

Hello

 

So for me with a yang defiency it should be better to think about what is ahead of me than to think about the past to achive more yang energy?

 

F D

 

For me to stay in the present is to be balanced

[Fire Dragon]

 

You will often google up all manner of lists comparing yin to yang, but they are likely to omit the time aspect, which is crucial for understanding them, and the "how it feels compared to something else of a similar function" aspect -- here's some examples:

 

comfortable things are more yin (a pair of your favorite old sneakers is more yin now that it has adapted itself thoroughly to your foot; a recliner is more yin than an office chair; a path in the woods is more yin than the highway);

new, recent things are more yang (a man of twenty-seven is much more yang than he will be at seventy; the latest movie is more yang than it will be a year from now -- then it will be sitting quietly on the shelf at Blockbuster's, now it's flying off the shelf, moving fast, going here and there and everywhere; a culture that is 200 years old is way more yang than a culture that is 2000 years old);

things that have a future are more yang, things that have a past are more yin, and things that are "right now" are one or the other depending on whether they ignore what went before (these are yang) or what lies ahead (these are yin).

 

 

 

But what about a young girl, she is definitely more yin than and old woman? So the girls are time bandits, not following the law of yin and yang?

[Taomeow]

But what about a young girl, she is definitely more yin than and old woman? So the girls are time bandits, not following the law of yin and yang?

A young girl is more yang than an old woman. She is not as yang as a young man, but she is more yang than an older version of herself. And when she was a child, she was even more yang. Growth is yang; yin is settled. Activity, motion, changeability are all yang compared to set-in-one's-ways ways, slowing down, gaining "heng" (stability, predictability, being oneself for a length of time without changing much, or abruptly, or drastically).

 

Then again there's recurrent "waves" of more yin/more yang in one's life. You grow, change, take on new things (yang), then you settle down (yin), then you get restless (midlife crisis? just a wave of yang -- in both sexes), then you seek peace and quiet again (yin), then you suddenly feel like someone new with retirement, start traveling, seeking adventures (yang), then you slow down for good (yin)... These recurrent waves are fairly healthy, but if one's health is out of balance, over- or under-manifestation of either yin or yang can occur at any age, of course.

[Fire Dragon]

Hello Taomeow

 

Nice answer thx

[Taomeow]

 

Here's a little illustration of yang ascending... don't forget to turn the speakers on...

 

http://funlist.funpic.hu/?page=archive&amp...5&did=11270

[Fire Dragon]

lol

[Andrei]

Edited April 14, 2008 by steam

[Gerard]

Read all the info offered in the links provided.

 

OTH, Five Elements Theory is simply a form of symbolism that really means the following:

 

The interactions between Yin and Yang follow five basic phases or movements of energy:

 

1. Fire represents energy rising.

 

2. Water represents energy sinking.

 

3. Wood represents energy expanding.

 

4. Metal represents energy solidifying.

 

5. Earth represents energy that is stable or centered.

Edited April 14, 2008 by durkhrod chogori