More habits- Confucius’s Healthy Eating Wisdom

You are here. You might as well read the post 8 habits- Confucius’s Healthy Eating Wisdom. Well, Confucius has more than 8 eating habits in his life. I have found few more in his writing to share with you.

One is concerning the food used for sacrifice in addition to leftovers. After a public sacrifice, he never kept the portion of meat he received over night. The meat he used for private sacrifices at home he never kept for more than three days;

This is difficult for many of us to do because we think we’re saving money by eating our leftovers. The fact is that it could actually cost us more money to see a doctor or go to the hospital if we had food poison. As for myself, I usually cook a meal with only the portion that I will eat that day. When I have leftovers from eating out, I refrigerated it immediately, and try to eat it by the following day. I don’t eat leftovers over 2 days and I don’t eat raw leftovers such as salad.

Another habit of Confucius was to always say grace before he ate, even for the most simplest of food. A famous Chinese poem says, “Working under the heat of the sun, sweat on the ground, who knows who has contributed to the rice in your plate, each piece is contribution and hard work.” Make sure to order wisely when in a restaurant. Don’t order too much at first. You can always order more if you are still hungry or have desert later.

Confucius also remarked, “A wise and good man, in matters of food, should never seek to indulge his appetite; in lodging, he should not be too solicitous of comfort. He should be diligent in business and careful in speech. He should seek for the company of men of virtue and learning, in order to profit by their lessons and example. In this way he may become a man of real culture.” This is some presidential speech; it’s inspiring but takes effort to do. It gives us thoughts that we shouldn’t only worry about our stomach but also the lives of others.

May his wisdom be with you.

Copyright By Huan's Tai Chi

5 Keys: Reveal the Chinese Longevity Mystery

“有采女问道于彭祖，少得道，知养性，年一百七十岁，视如十五”
Translation: "A young girl inquired Peng Zu on Dao. Peng Zu found Dao when he was very young and understood how to adjust his body to stay young. He looked like 15 years old when he was in fact 170."

Peng Zu (彭祖) lived in Wuyi Mountain. He is a legendary long-living figure in China. He has supposedly lived since Yin Dynasty( 1400 B.C.). He lived more than 170 years old.

It’s a very rare case in the past since people didn’t have the modern medicine and comfortable living condition to protect their body to live long. One thing that Peng Zu mentioned about a lot in his writing is The Five Organ Talk. Liver (肝), Heart (心), Spleen (脾), Lung (肺), and Kidney (肾) are the five major organs that Chinese people really care about. Peng Zu believed that each organ can help others and each organ can reduce strength of others. Only when you adjust them well, then your body will become healthy.

In Peng Zu’s writing, he mentioned
1. Liver helps the heart but hurts the Spleen.
2. Spleen helps the Lung but hurts the Kidney.
3. Kidney helps the Liver but hurts the Heart.
4. Heart helps the Spleen but hurts the Lung,
5. Lung helps the Kidney but hurts the Liver.

He has also mentioned about the keys to adjust them. These keys are the five tastes, sweet, salty, sour, and bitter and piquant.
These five tastes could affect the five organs dramatically; they can either help or hurt the five organs.

1. Sweet goes to Spleen.
If you eat too many sweets, it will benefit your spleen, but a very strong spleen will hurt your kidney. Weak kidney will cause sore waist, and knees, so older people are not recommend to eat too much sweets.

2. Sour goes to Liver.
Sour hurts the spleen. Too much sour in food can cause digesting problem which cause diarrhea.

3. Piquant goes to Lung.
Too much piquant hurts the liver which can cause dizziness.

4. Salty goes to Kidney.
If you have short breath or chest pain which caused by a weak heart, don’t eat salty food, because salty goes to kidney and hurts the heart.

5. Bitter goes to Heart.
If you have taken too much bitter food, it will hurt your lung, which means it will cause coughing. If you are coughing, don’t eat bitter food.

On the other hand, the five tastes can help you. For example: when a woman is pregnant, she doesn’t have enough blood in her liver. She need eat a lot of sour food to help her liver. Balance your intake of five different tastes, and then you can have a much healthier life.

P.S. I am not a Chinese doctor, but I did some research to put together this post for people who are interested. It’s for your reference only and something to put in mind to balance your daily life when eating.

Copyrighted Huan's Tai Chi 2010

Chinese Diet continued: Shall we skip breakfest?

I got a lot of hits on the Diet article I posted weeks ago; I guess a lot of people are interested to know more about Chinese Diet. Talking about amount of food to take for each meal, the eastern culture differs from western Culture. In western culture, dinner is the most important. The best food should be served during dinner and we eat a lot of food at dinner time. Some people also skip breakfast to lose weight.

Unlike this, Chinese people think all three meals are important. Their eating habit is based on “Full breakfast, good lunch and small dinner.” Morning is a time that a person is very hungry since you don’t eat during sleep and you need a lot of energy for work for whole day. Chinese think that you need to eat a lot food to start the day (I still obey the 80% rule on mine- see last article). For lunch, Chinese think it’s the most important meal. They want have good lunch food to balance the breakfast and dinner. Chinese don’t eat a lot of food for dinner. I obey the rule of don’t eat any food/snack during 3 hours before your bedtime. We believe that eating a lot of food will adding work for your stomach, your stomach should rest at night just like the rest of your body do. Overeating on dinner will seed stomach problem for future.

Talking about choices of food, many Chinese think "Two legs are better than four legs, one leg is better than two legs ( or without legs is better than two legs)" Basically, two legs means chicken or other birds, they are white meat which is better than red meat like cow or goat( four legs). One leg means fungus such as mushroom and without legs means fish. These comments are not totally true, because every integrant has it’s helpful side. I personally think all the foods are import to your body but I do think taking more veggies, less meat and eating bit more white meat and less red meat is the way to go.

Please feel free to comment on this, offer your suggestions and share with your friends and family. I will be happy to share more with you on type, choices, and way of making healthy food if you think these tips are helpful to you.

Copyrighted by Huan's Tai Chi '09