04 A Case for Illustration

01 The Natural Stance

Dr. Guo Yaning had a patient who, despite having no major health issues, suffered from chronic stomach problems, especially after dinner. Even a bowl of porridge would leave her feeling bloated. She also experienced heart palpitations. Despite hospital checkups, no issues were found.

The patient’s face was unusually red. Dr. Guo diagnosed her with excess fire in her heart and lungs and a bit of coldness in her stomach. The doctor recommended the patient practice the Natural Stance.

The Natural Stance involves standing with the chest pulled in and the back straightened, which differs from her usual posture of standing with the chest and head raised. This typical stance is not beneficial for life cultivation. Herbal medicine advocates the Natural Stance for health reasons.

According to herbal medicine, the human body is a house for the yuanshen (spirit, soul), with two important acupoints in the chest: Shenzang and Shenfeng. Since the chest houses the spirit, it should be protected by tucking it in rather than exposing it by puffing it out. This posture promotes longevity.

Key points for the chest-holding and back-pulling posture include:

• Straighten your back and head.
• Keep the Baihui acupoint at the highest point of the body.
• Imagine a thread lifting your head from the Baihui acupoint.
• Relax your body, pull your head up, slightly buckle your shoulders forward, and shrink your chest back a little.

After adopting this stance, Dr. Guo used a tapping stick to tap her back for two or three minutes. Suddenly, the patient felt her stomach gurgling and then released a long fart. She reported feeling unblocked, with no more bloating and reduced panic. She was amazed by the tapping’s effectiveness.

05 Herbal Medicine Explanation

The patient had insufficient stomach-qi, which couldn’t drive the vital yuanqi downward. According to Huang Yuanqu’s Theory of Operation of Vital Yuanqi Circle, stomach-qi is responsible for the descent of vital yuanqi. When stomach-qi is insufficient, the descending movement is blocked, causing vital yuanqi to gather in the upper body.

Many acupoints on the back can soothe the heart, lungs, and stomach. Tapping these acupoints unblocks the areas, allowing yuanqi to descend, making the patient feel more comfortable. However, this is only a temporary improvement. To truly cure the issue, the patient must strengthen the spleen and stomach and treat gastric ventilation, which takes time.

The patient’s heart discomfort was due to the inability of stomach-qi to descend. Once stomach-qi is unobstructed, the heart feels comfortable. Many cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, hypertension, and arteriosclerosis are affected by coldness and dampness evil-spirits, known as Bi syndrome in traditional herbal medicine. Bi syndrome includes congestion, convulsions, and paralysis.

Coldness causes contraction, leading to pain like a hand pinching the heart, and can cause sweating. These symptoms result from insufficient vital yuanqi. Herbal medicine summarizes this as Zheng-Bu-Ya-Xie, meaning the Positive Cannot Suppress the Negative.

Best Strategy: Support the Positive to Eliminate the Negative

To treat this, the best strategy is Fu-Zheng-Qu-Xie, meaning “Support the Positive to Eliminate the Negative.” This principle is simple yet clever. Initially, all healthy people have the same yuanqi. When affected by coldness and dampness evil-spirits, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases can develop.

If a doctor attributes high blood pressure to hyperactivity of liver-yang and heat, or coronary heart disease to liver-fire, the patient should seek a second opinion.

Symptoms like angina pectoris or myocardial infarction, which involve convulsions and tightness, indicate a cold syndrome.

These diseases’ sequelae involve muscle and bone contraction due to cold contraction. Treatment should address deficiency with fullness and fullness with deficiency. Cold syndrome should be treated with hot medicine, and hot syndrome with cool medicine.

Chinese patent medicines for hypertension, such as Di-long (Earthworm), Huai-mi (Sophora japonica), and Di-huang (Rehmannia glutinosa), are cold and cool medicines. Over-the-counter drugs like Dang-gui-long-hui-wan and Long-dan-xie-gan-wan are cold medicines and should not be taken alone. Long-term use can aggravate cold evil-spirit, worsening the disease.

Although these diseases appear as fire, the underlying issue is blocked yuanqi from the heart to the lungs by cold evil-spirit. The vital yuanqi cannot descend, causing fire to appear above. This fire is not harmful but misplaced yuanqi. Once unobstructed, it becomes kidney-qi, a priceless treasure.

This fire phenomenon is called “water and fire are not in harmony.” The middle is blocked by cold evil-spirit, leading to upper fire and lower coldness, resulting in kidney deficiency. The fundamental problem is to drive away the coldness or reduce the fire.

(To be continued)