The Tao of Health, Sex, and Longevity: A Modern Practical Guide to the Ancient Way by Daniel P. Reid, Reid, Daniel P. Reid

From the Publisher

Written by a Westerner for the Western mind, here is the first book to explore in light of modern science the balanced and comprehensive system of health care used by Chinese physicians, martial artists, and meditators for over 5,000 years.

Drawing on original Chinese sources and years of personal experience, the author introduces the philosophy of Tao and gives detailed, practical information on:

• diet and nutrition, including sample menus

• food combining, and detoxifying the body

• specific foods and juices as treatments for a wide range of diseases (including such modern Western concerns as hypertension, cancer, infertility, herpes, and AIDS)

• fasting and excretion

• breathing exercises

• physical exercises for long life, total relaxation, and general health

• acupuncture and massage techniques

• Taoist birth control

• sex therapy

• bedroom arts and techniques to ensure complete satisfaction for both partners (considered essential for good health and long life)

• herbal aphrodisiacs and other sexual aids

• meditation — turning essence into energy and energy into spirit

With many helpful charts and clear illustrations, The Tao of Health, Sex and Longevity makes the ancient "Way" easily accessible to those seeking the latest in New Age health care.

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Table of Contents

Read an Excerpt

Diet and Nutrition

Food and drink are relied upon to nurture life. But if one does not know that the natures of substances may be opposed to each other, and one consumes them altogether indiscriminately, the vital organs will be thrown out of harmony and disastrous consequences will soon arise. Therefore, those who wish to nurture their lives must carefully avoid doing such damage to themselves.

[Chia Ming, Essential Knowledge for Eating and Drinking, 1368]

One of the great advantages of learning Tao is that the same basic principles apply to everything from the macrocosmic to the microscopic. In the case of diet, the overriding Taoist principle of balance between Yin and Yang is established by harmonizing the Four Energies and Five Flavors in foods.

The Four Energies in food are hot, warm, cool and cold. These categories define the nature and the intensity of energy released in the human system when food is digested. Hot and warm foods belong to Yang; cool and cold foods belong to Yin. The former are stimulating and generate heat, while the latter are calming and cool the organs.

The Five Flavors are more subtle distinctions based on the Five Elemental Activities: sweet (earth), bitter (fire), sour (wood), pungent (metal) and salty (water). Each of the Five Flavors has a 'natural affinity' (gui-jing) for one of the five 'solid' Yin organs and its Yang counterpart: sweet influences pancreas/stomach; bitter moves to the heart/small intestine; sour has affinity for the liver/gallbladder; pungent affects the lungs/large intestine; and salty associates with the kidneys/bladder.

The therapeuticeffects of the Four Energies and Five Flavors are as follows:

* Cool and cold Yin foods calm the vital organs and are recommended for summer menus, as well as for combating 'hot' Yang diseases such as fever and hypertension. Yin foods include soy beans, bamboo shoots, watermelon, white turnips, cabbage, pears, squash and lemons.

* Warm and hot Yang foods stimulate the vital organs, generate body heat and are recommended for winter consumption, as well as palliatives for 'cold' Yin diseases such as anemia, chills and fatigue. Yang foods include beef, mutton, chicken, alcohol, mango and chilies.

* Sweet 'earth' foods disperse stagnant energy, promote circulation, nourish vital energy and harmonize the stomach. Corn, peas, dates, ginseng and licorice are examples of sweet foods.

* Bitter 'fire' foods such as rhubarb and bitter melon tend to dry the system, balance excess dampness, and purge the bowels.

* Sour 'wood' foods such as olives and pomegranate are astringent, tend to solidify the contents of the digestive tract, stop diarrhea and remedy prolapse of the colon.

* Salty 'water' foods such as kelp soften and moisten tissues and facilitate bowel movements.

* Pungent 'metal' goods such as ginger, garlic and chili neutralize and disperse accumulated toxins in the body.

Taoists balance their diets according to favorable combinations of energies and flavors and strictly avoid combinations that conflict. They also avoid excessive consumption of any single variety of food-energy. For example, frequent excessive consumption of 'hot' fatty Yang foods can cause fevers, heartburn, congestion, chest stagnation and other unpleasant effects of 'heat-energy excess'. As this excess 'evil heat' seeks escape from the body, carbuncles and absesses may develop. Too much pungent food can cause gastro-intestinal distress, upset the stomach and result in hemorrhoids. Even the freshest, most wholesome foods are rendered nutritionally useless if consumed in combinations that interfere with digestion, cause putrefaction and fermentation, block assimilation and cause internal energy conflicts.

Mother Nature's Menu

When formulating personal dietary guidelines, it is helpful first to determine your own basic metabolic type, of which there are three: vegetarian, carnivore and balanced. The vegetarian and carnivorous types each represent about 25 per cent of the general population, with the remaining 50 per cent falling into the balanced category. These human metabolic types stem from the prehistoric switch by some segments of the human species from a fruit and nut based diet to a meat diet.

Vegetarian metabolisms are 'slow oxidizers', which means that they burn sugars and carbohydrates slowly. Because the body must burn sugar in order to provide sufficient energy to digest meat and fat, slow oxidizers have trouble burning sugar fast enough to efficiently digest large quantities of meat, eggs, fish and other concentrated animal proteins. Consequently, large doses of protein foods tend to make vegetarian types feel tired and sluggish after meals. An easy test for metabolic type is to eat a large steak or a whole chicken and see how you feel afterward. If it leaves you feeling 'wiped out', mentally depressed and lethargic, then you probably tend towards a slow-oxidizing vegetarian metabolism, in which case you should restrict protein and fat consumption and favor vegetables, fruits and carbohydrates in your diet. If a large intake of concentrated animal protein leaves you feeling strong, vital and mentally alert, then you probably lean towards a fast-oxidizing carnivorous metabolism.

Since carnivorous metabolisms burn sugar and carbohydrates very rapidly, excess consumption of sugar or starch tends to make them excessively nervous and agitated due to overstimulation of the nervous system. Fast oxidizers derive energy by digesting large quantities of animal fats and proteins, which are sent to the liver for conversion into glycogen. The liver then dispenses the glycogen into the bloodstream in the form of glucose -- the only form of fuel the body can burn -- in gradual measured doses, as needed. That's why fast oxidizers require a steady supply of protein and fat in their diets and should restrict intake of sugars and starches.

Fortunately, most of us have balanced metabolisms that can handle both varieties of food when properly combined. Although our digestive tracts were originally designed by nature for a diet of fruit and vegetables, our digestive systems have evolved the capacity to produce the gastric juices required to digest the meat that became part of the human diet 50,000-100,000 years ago. If large quantities of animal protein don't leave you feeling depleted, and if large doses of sugar and starch don't make you nervous, then you are probably a balanced metabolizer who needs only worry about selecting wholesome foods from both categories and combining them properly for consumption. In the Tao of diet, however, these are just the first steps in regulating diet. Season and climate, for example, must also be considered in order to ensure that the extreme external cold winter is balanced by the extra internal heat of Yang-foods, hot summer weather is complemented by cooling Yin-foods, dry climates are compensated with extra moisturizing foods, and so forth. Foods consumed out of harmony with season and climate can cause all sorts of problems, including skin eruptions, constipation, gas, fatigue and bad breath.

Taoists tend to favor local produce because it is far more likely to be fresh and brimming with the vitality of its own chee. Today, the modern food-processing industry, in conjunction with high-speed transport, has made it possible to eat Florida oranges in Alaska, frozen prawns in the middle of the desert and all sorts of processed packaged 'junk food' any time of day or night, anywhere on earth. As a result, modern diets are completely out of synchrony with the natural prevailing conditions of geography, season and unseen cosmic forces.

Taoists also make a point of eating foods with natural affinities for their weakest organs and related energy systems. Taoist diets aim at strengthening four major systems in the body: digestive, excretory, respiratory and circulatory. When these four functional systems are properly nourished, harmonized and healthy, the health and vitality of the entire organism are assured.

A major goal of Taoist diets is to enhance sexual potency by stimulating sexual glands and strengthening sexual organs. The purpose here is not to increase sexual pleasure -- though that is a definite side benefit -- but rather to increase the body's store of hormones, semen and other forms of 'vital essence' required for optimum vitality and immunity. Sexual essence provides our greatest internal source of chee, and sexual potency is a major indicator of good health.

Since meat forms such a large part of Western diets, a few Taoist guidelines on meat consumption should be helpful. The great Tang physician Sun Ssu-mo and other Taoist dieticians have always warned against the long-range ill effects of eating large quantities of domestic animal meats, such as beef and pork. The only domestic meat they regarded as safe and healthy for the human system was dog, and that was recommended only for its potent warming effects during the intense cold of mid-winter. The reason that domestic animals are such a poor source of human nutrition is that their own diets consist mainly of kitchen slops, garbage and dried straw. Today, the situation is further aggravated by all the synthetic hormones, antibiotics and other drugs routinely fed to livestock.

Taoists have always recommended wild game as the most nutritionally beneficial type of meat for man. Venison is especially good, primarily because deer feed on all sorts of wild nuts, leaves, berries, barks and other herbs which appear in the Chinese pharmocopeia as remedies for man. The benefits of a wild deer's herbal diet are naturally transmitted to your own system when you eat its meat, just as all the chemical drugs injected into livestock today are transferred to your system when you eat a hamburger or fried chicken.

Note, however, that you will gain very little nutritional benefit from even the freshest wild game if you cook it 'to death'. Any meat that is suitable for human consumption should be eaten as rare as possible, preferably raw or at least partly raw. Steak tartare and Carpaccio are good examples of raw beef dishes that are brimming with their own natural enzymes and are delicious as well. Japanese sashimi (raw fish) is even better; indeed sashimi is arguably the most nutritionally potent, enzymerich, naturally digestible form of animal protein on Mother Nature's entire menu, a fact reflected by the longevity of the Japanese people. Taoists always recommend wild fish from seas and rivers over domestic fish raised in stagnant ponds and fed on 'fish chow'.

The same principle applies to chicken. Chinese physicians today still recommend that their patients consume only tu-ji ('earth chickens') and avoid yang-ji ('cultivated chickens'). Earth chickens are those left to roam about fields and forests to forage for themselves, rather than being fed the artificial, denatured diets of domestic fowl.

In order to prevent putrefaction, promote digestion and facilitate rapid elimination of wastes, all meals in which cooked meats form the major element should be supplemented with a dose of active proteolytic ('protein-digesting') enzymes, which are readily available at health and food stores today.

You may assist rather than interfere with Mother Nature's digestive principles by observing the following basic Taoist dietary guidelines:

* Eat sparingly, and you will live a long and healthy life. The basic Taoist measure is to eat till you are 70-80 per cent full. Mother Nature invariably punishes gluttons with all sorts of misery. The human body simply cannot utilize the enormous quantities and complex combinations of food with which civilized, sedentary man tends to gorge himself daily.

* Chew food thoroughly before swallowing it. This applies especially to carbohydrates, which require initial digestion by the alkaline ptyalin enzyme in the saliva of the mouth. Gandhi's advice on this subject rings with the wisdom of Tao: 'Drink your food and chew your beverages', which means that solid foods should be chewed to liquid form before swallowing, and liquids should be swallowed as slowly as solid food.

* Avoid extreme hot and cold temperatures in foods and beverages. Excessively hot soup, for example, irritates the tender lining of the mouth and esophagus, which impairs salivation and peristalsis. One of the worst digestive offenses is to drink ice water or other freezing cold fluids with meals. Such freezing infusions on a stomach full of food freeze shut the tiny ducts which secrete gastric juices in the stomach, thereby halting digestion and permitting putrefaction and fermentation to occur instead. By the time the temperature of the stomach returns to normal, it is too late for proper digestion to commence. In fact, any beverage taken in large quantities together with food dilutes the gastric medium and impairs digestion. Wine and beer, however, are exceptions because they are fermented (i.e. pre-digested) and thus they actually assist digestion when taken in moderate quantities. Even the Bible advises one to 'take a little wine for the stomach's sake'.

The Human Dietary Devolution

Modern man bristles with pride on his 'evolution' from cave man to space traveler and looks upon his primitive past with disdain. When it comes to diet, however, the human species has experienced a severe 'devolution' in eating habits, a devolution sparked by the much ballyhooed advent of civilization, an event that has driven a permanent wedge between man and nature.

For millions of years prior to the tiny drop in the bucket of time which we call 'history', humans and other primates lived entirely on diets of coarse, fibrous foods gathered in nature and consumed raw. Throughout the realm of nature, animals that rely on diets with a high ratio of indigestible fibrous bulk and low concentrations of protein have evolved relatively long digestive tracts, whereas carnivores such as lions and tigers evolved short tracts. The human alimentary canal, which winds its way from mouth to anus with 40 feet of tubing, is one of the longest digestive tracts relative to body weight in all of nature.

Man's dietary devolution took a serious turn for the worse when he 'advanced' to become a hunter of animals and adopted meat as his major dietary staple. This occurred primarily in the northern hemisphere, where flesh became the only viable source of food in winter. Those human populations that switched to meat developed digestive juices and metabolisms capable of extracting nutrients from animal fats and proteins, even though their digestive tracts remained forever fixed in the vegetarian mold. This development is the source of the two basic metabolic types in man, one geared towards a bulky diet of fresh fruits and vegetables, the other to a fiberless diet of flesh.

Agriculture triggered the final stage of human dietary degeneration. When grain became the main staple of the human diet, a new element was introduced into the digestive tract, an element not at all intended by nature as food for man. That culprit is starch. The fact that grains are the only items in the entire human diet that cannot be eaten and digested in the raw state is sufficient proof that these items were not meant for human consumption. Grains became the world's first 'processed foods.'

Evidence indicates that precivilized man knew better than to consume grains as food. It seems that humans first began gathering and later cultivating grains not for food but rather to feed domestic animals and ferment beer. It was only after population pressure made wild plants and animals insufficient to feed the species that man turned to grains for sustenance.

Grains have been the mainstay of the human diet for only 6,000 or 7,000 years, and thus the Taoist sages of ancient China recognized them as relative newcomers to the human diet with deleterious effects on human health and longevity. Throughout the ancient Taoist literature on health and longevity we find the term bi-gu ('avoid grains') cropping up over and over. This agrees completely with the findings of such great contemporary nutritional scientists as Arnold Ehret, Dr Herbert Shelton, Dr Marsh Morrison, Dr Norman Walker and V.E. Irons, whose theories we'll look at in more detail later. The fact that for the past several thousand years the traditional Chinese diet has consisted of 80-90 per cent grains simply reflects the requirements of over-population. Taoists who 'avoid grains' live much healthier and longer lives than the general populace, but at least the traditional Chinese diet combines grains much more harmoniously than modern Western diets.

Thanks to the dietary devolution fostered by civilization, the human diet today, especially in the Western world, consists primarily of refined, denatured, overcooked food indiscriminately combined. Some of the consequences people suffer by eliminating coarse fibrous foods from their diets and relying instead on concentrated animal protein and concentrated refined starches are described here by Dr Robert Jackson:

The removal of this waste matter [fiber] also removes from our foods the natural stimulus to the muscular activity of the bowel wall...This means a slowing up of the intestinal current. Slowing up the intestinal current means the decomposition of the protein contents and a fermentation beyond what is normal of the carbohydrate contents, the former resulting in evolution of very depressing poisons and the latter of irritants to the tube lining...Thus a vicious cycle is set up, leading to a chronic state of body poisoning from the food canal, for slowing up not only adds to the fermentation and decomposition, it also allows more time for the absorption into the blood of the poisonous products produced.

About ten years ago, an interesting study was conducted to compare the average daily bowel movements of people in India and America. The results at first baffled researchers: although the average American consumed over three times as many calories every day as the average Indian, the latter produced daily bowel movements that weighed more than double the American average. India's diet, based primarily on vegetables and whole grains, provides a high ratio of fibrous bulk to propel wastes through the alimentary canal, while the typical American diet, rich in processed calories but poor in natural bulk, moves through the digestive tract so slowly that much of it putrefies and ferments rather than digests, and the resulting toxic wastes are retained for days, or even weeks, resulting in a chronic state of toxemia (a form of autointoxification of the blood caused by the constant presence of toxins in the stomach, colon, liver and other tissues). This condition is responsible for a host of chronic ailments rarely found in primitive societies, including arthritis, constipation, gastritis, fatigue, infertility, impotence and lack of immunity to infectious disease.

Master faster and colonic specialist V.E. Irons describes the modern American dietary disaster as follows:

In many cases, food can stay in a person for months or even years. This food will rot and decay and will get buried in the crevices and folds of the colon...Most people's colons, instead of being fast-moving sewer systems, have become stagnant cesspools.

Trophology: The Science of Food Combining

Compared to Taoist concepts of balance, the Western notion of a 'balanced diet' is simplistic and superficial. Western physicians advise everyone to take 'a little of everything at every meal,' jumbling together such disparate ingredients as meat, milk, starch, fat and sugar. Such indiscriminate consumption of food is no different than pouring a combination of gas, oil, alcohol and sugar into the gas tank of a car. These blends will not burn efficiently, will provide little power and will quickly clog up the engine so badly that the entire system grinds to a halt. The advice given in the quote at the beginning of this chapter, from a book presented to the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty on the occasion of the author's 100th birthday, clearly reflects the fact that the ancient Chinese were well aware of the importance of the science of food combining. This wisdom was once known to the West as well, as evidenced by Moses' strict regulation that meat and milk must never be consumed at the same meal.

In plain English, the Yin and Yang of diet boils down to 'trophology', a term which you and no doubt your doctor have probably never heard before. Modern medical training in the West, especially in America, is notoriously deficient in nutritional science, although there are a few enlightened nutritional scientists in America and Europe today who, despite sneers from their peers in the medical establishment, are making great medical strides through the science of trophology.

The Western scientific equivalent of Yin/Yang balance in food combinations is something we all learned in elementary high school chemistry: acid/alkaline balance, or 'pH'. We all know that if we did add a measure of alkaline to an equal measure of acid, the resulting chemical solution is as neutral as plain water. That's the principle behind reaching for bicarbonate (a strong alkaline) to relieve 'acid indigestion'.

It is an established scientific fact in Western medicine that, in order to initiate efficient digestion of any concentrated animal protein, the stomach must secrete pepsin. But it is also a well-known fact that pepsin can function only in a highly acidic medium, which must be maintained for several hours for complete digestion of proteins. It is an equally well-established fact of science that when we chew a piece of bread or potato or any other carbohydrate/starch, ptyalin and other alkaline juices are immediately secreted into the food by the saliva in the mouth. When swallowed, the alkalized starches require an alkaline medium in the stomach in order to complete their digestion.

Anyone should be able to figure out what therefore happens when you ingest protein and starch together. Acid and alkaline juices are secreted simultaneously in response to the incoming protein and starch, promptly neutralizing one another and leaving a weak, watery solution in the stomach that digests neither protein nor starch properly. Instead, the proteins putrefy and the starches ferment owing to the constant presence of bacteria in the digestive tract.

This putrefaction and fermentation are the primary cause of all sorts of digestive distress, including gas, heartburn, cramps, bloating, constipation, foul stools, bleeding piles, colitis, and so forth. Many so-called 'allergies' are also the direct result of improper food combinations: the bloodstream picks up toxins from the putrefied, fermented mess as it passes slowly through the intestines, and these toxins in turn cause rashes, hives, headaches, nausea and other symptoms commonly branded as 'allergies'. The same foods that cause allergic reactions when improperly combined often have no ill side-effects whatsoever when consumed according to the rules of trophology. The final fact of the matter is this: when you immobilize your stomach and impair digestive functions by consuming foods in indiscriminate combinations, the bacteria in your alimentary canal have a field day. They get all the nutrients and thrive, while you get all the wastes and suffer.

According to a recent survey in America, the average American male today carries about 5 pounds of undigested, putrefied red meat in his gut. Leave 5 pounds of meat in a dark, warm, moist place for a few days and see for yourself the results of putrefaction. The severely septic condition of the human intestinal tract is unique in nature, yet Western physicians take it for granted and even insist that it is harmless to the rest of the system.

In fact, however, in order to protect itself from the chronic toxic irritation of improperly combined meals, the colon secretes large quantities of mucus to entrap toxic particles before they damage the colon's sensitive lining. When this occurs at every meal, every day, every week, throughout the year -- as is quite typical in modern Western diets -- the colon ends up secreting a constant stream of mucus, which accumulates and gets impacted in the folds of the colon. This results in a narrowing of the passage through the colon and a constant seeping of toxins into the bloodstream by osmosis. When the impacting of toxic mucus in the colon reaches a critical pressure, it causes a pocket to balloon outward through the colon lining, causing a condition called diverticulosis. Colitis and cancer are the next stages of colon deterioration caused by these conditions.

Having correlated the Tao of diet with Western scientific terminology, let's take a close look at the practical side of trophology with some concrete examples of food combining. The following categories of food combinations cover most of the 'culinary crimes' against nature committed daily throughout the world today. This list is based mainly on the work of Dr Herbert M. Shelton, one of America's most distinguished nutritional therapists and author of the 'bible' of correct culinary combinations, Food Combining Made Easy:

* Protein and starch. This is the worst possible combination of foods to mix together at a single meal, and yet it is the mainstay of modern Western diets: meat and potatoes, hamburgers and fries, eggs and toast, etc. When one consumes protein and starch together, the alkaline enzyme ptyalin pours into the food as it's chewed in the mouth. When the masticated food reaches the stomach, digestion of starch by alkaline enzymes continues unabated, thereby preventing the digestion of protein by pepsin and other acid secretions. The ever-present bacteria in the stomach are thus permitted to attack the protein and putrefaction commences, rendering nutrients in the protein food largely useless to you and producing toxic wastes and foul gases, including such poisons as indol, skatol, phenol, hydrogen sulphide, phenylpropionic acid, and others.

If that is the case, you may well wonder, then why does the stomach have no trouble handling foods that naturally contain both protein and starch, such as whole grains? As Dr Shelton points out, 'There is a great difference between the digestion of a food, however complex its composition, and the digestion of a mixture of different foods. To a single article of food that is a starch-protein combination, the body can easily adjust its juices, both as to strength and timing, to the digestive requirements of the food. But when two foods are eaten with different, even opposite, digestive needs, this precise adjustment of juices to requirements becomes impossible.'

Rule: Eat concentrated proteins such as meat, fish, eggs and cheese separately from concentrated starches such as bread, potatoes and rice. For example, eat toast or eggs for breakfast, the hamburger patty or the bun for lunch, meat or potatoes for dinner.

* Protein and Protein. Different proteins have different digestive requirements. For example the strongest enzymatic action on milk occurs during the last hour of digestion, whereas on meat it occurs during the first hour and on eggs somewhere in between. It is instructive to recall the ancient dietary law which Moses imposed on his people, forbidding the simultaneous consumption of milk and flesh.

Two similar meats such as beef and lamb, or two types of fish such as salmon and shrimp, are not sufficiently different in nature to cause digestive conflict in the stomach and may thus be consumed together.

Rule: Eat only one major type of protein at a single meal. Avoid combinations such as meat and eggs, meat and milk, fish and cheese. Insure the assimilation of the full range of vital amino acids by varying the types of concentrated proteins taken at different meals.

* Starch and acid. Any acid food taken together with starch suspends secretion of ptyalin, a biochemical fact of life upon which all physicians agree. Therefore, if you consume oranges, lemons and other acid fruits, or acids such as vinegar, along with starch, no ptyalin is secreted in the mouth to initiate the first stage of starch digestion. Consequently, the starch hits the stomach without the vital alkaline juices it needs to digest properly, permitting bacteria to ferment it instead. A single teaspoon of vinegar, or its equivalent in other acids, is all it takes entirely to suspend salivary digestion of starch in the mouth.

Rule: Eat starches and acids at separate meals. For example, if you eat toast or cereal for breakfast, skip the orange juice as well as eggs. If you're eating a starch-based meal of noodles or rice, avoid vinegar as well as concentrated protein.

* Protein and acid. Since protein requires an acid medium for proper digestion, you'd think that acid foods would facilitate protein digestion, but that's not the case. When acid foods enter the stomach, they inhibit the secretion of hydrochloric acid, and the protein-digesting enzyme pepsin can work only in the presence of hydrochloric acid, not just any acid. Therefore, orange juice inhibits the proper digestion of eggs, and a strong vinegar dressing on salad inhibits the digestion of a steak.

Rule: Avoid combining concentrated proteins and acids at the same meal.

* Protein and fat. In McLeod's Physiology in Modern Medicine, we find a fact accepted by all physicians: 'Fat has been shown to exert a distinct inhibiting influence on the secretion of gastric juice.' For two to three hours after the ingestion of fat, the concentration of hydrochloric acid and pepsin in the stomach is sharply decreased. This delays digestion of any proteins taken together with the fat, which gives bacteria ample opportunity to putrefy the protein. That is why fatty meats such as bacon and 'marbled' steaks, or lean meats fried in fat, sit so heavily in the stomach for hours after eating them.

Rule: Eat concentrated proteins and fats at separate meals. When you cannot avoid mixing them, eat plenty of raw vegetables to assist their digestion and passage.

* Protein and sugar. All sugars, without exception, inhibit the secretion of gastric juices in the stomach. That's because sugars are digested neither in the mouth nor in the stomach. Instead, they pass directly into the small intestine for digestion and assimilation. When consumed in combination with protein, such as cake after steak, not only do the sugars inhibit digestion of proteins by suppressing gastric secretions, the sugars themselves get trapped in the stomach instead of moving swiftly to the small intestine, and this delay permits bacteria to ferment the sugars, releasing noxious toxins and gases which further impair digestion.

Rule: Avoid consuming sugars and proteins at the same meal.

* Starch and sugar. It has been established that, when sugar enters the mouth along with starch, the saliva secreted during mastication contains no ptyalin, thereby sabatoging starch digestion before it reaches the stomach. Furthermore, such a combination blocks passage of sugar through the stomach until the starch is digested, causing it to ferment. The by-products of sugar fermentation are acidic, which in turn further inhibits digestion of sta

Read a Sample Chapter

Chapter 1

Diet and Nutrition

Food and drink are relied upon to nurture life. But if one does not know that the natures of substances may be opposed to each other, and one consumes them altogether indiscriminately, the vital organs will be thrown out of harmony and disastrous consequences will soon arise. Therefore, those who wish to nurture their lives must carefully avoid doing such damage to themselves.
[Chia Ming, Essential Knowledge for Eating and Drinking, 1368]

One of the great advantages of learning Tao is that the same basic principles apply to everything from the macrocosmic to the microscopic. In the case of diet, the overriding Taoist principle of balance between Yin and Yang is established by harmonizing the Four Energies and Five Flavors in foods.

The Four Energies in food are hot, warm, cool and cold. These categories define the nature and the intensity of energy released in the human system when food is digested. Hot and warm foods belong to Yang; cool and cold foods belong to Yin. The former are stimulating and generate heat, while the latter are calming and cool the organs.

The Five Flavors are more subtle distinctions based on the Five Elemental Activities: sweet (earth), bitter (fire), sour (wood), pungent (metal) and salty (water). Each of the Five Flavors has a 'natural affinity' (gui-jing) for one of the five 'solid' Yin organs and its Yang counterpart: sweet influences pancreas/stomach; bitter moves to the heart/small intestine; sour has affinity for the liver/gallbladder; pungent affects the lungs/large intestine; and salty associates with the kidneys/bladder.

Thetherapeutic effects of the Four Energies and Five Flavors are as follows:

* Cool and cold Yin foods calm the vital organs and are recommended for summer menus, as well as for combating 'hot' Yang diseases such as fever and hypertension. Yin foods include soy beans, bamboo shoots, watermelon, white turnips, cabbage, pears, squash and lemons.

* Warm and hot Yang foods stimulate the vital organs, generate body heat and are recommended for winter consumption, as well as palliatives for 'cold' Yin diseases such as anemia, chills and fatigue. Yang foods include beef, mutton, chicken, alcohol, mango and chilies.

* Sweet 'earth' foods disperse stagnant energy, promote circulation, nourish vital energy and harmonize the stomach. Corn, peas, dates, ginseng and licorice are examples of sweet foods.

* Bitter 'fire' foods such as rhubarb and bitter melon tend to dry the system, balance excess dampness, and purge the bowels.

* Sour 'wood' foods such as olives and pomegranate are astringent, tend to solidify the contents of the digestive tract, stop diarrhea and remedy prolapse of the colon.

* Salty 'water' foods such as kelp soften and moisten tissues and facilitate bowel movements.

* Pungent 'metal' goods such as ginger, garlic and chili neutralize and disperse accumulated toxins in the body.

Taoists balance their diets according to favorable combinations of energies and flavors and strictly avoid combinations that conflict. They also avoid excessive consumption of any single variety of food-energy. For example, frequent excessive consumption of 'hot' fatty Yang foods can cause fevers, heartburn, congestion, chest stagnation and other unpleasant effects of 'heat-energy excess'. As this excess 'evil heat' seeks escape from the body, carbuncles and absesses may develop. Too much pungent food can cause gastro-intestinal distress, upset the stomach and result in hemorrhoids. Even the freshest, most wholesome foods are rendered nutritionally useless if consumed in combinations that interfere with digestion, cause putrefaction and fermentation, block assimilation and cause internal energy conflicts.

Mother Nature's Menu

When formulating personal dietary guidelines, it is helpful first to determine your own basic metabolic type, of which there are three: vegetarian, carnivore and balanced. The vegetarian and carnivorous types each represent about 25 per cent of the general population, with the remaining 50 per cent falling into the balanced category. These human metabolic types stem from the prehistoric switch by some segments of the human species from a fruit and nut based diet to a meat diet.

Vegetarian metabolisms are 'slow oxidizers', which means that they burn sugars and carbohydrates slowly. Because the body must burn sugar in order to provide sufficient energy to digest meat and fat, slow oxidizers have trouble burning sugar fast enough to efficiently digest large quantities of meat, eggs, fish and other concentrated animal proteins. Consequently, large doses of protein foods tend to make vegetarian types feel tired and sluggish after meals. An easy test for metabolic type is to eat a large steak or a whole chicken and see how you feel afterward. If it leaves you feeling 'wiped out', mentally depressed and lethargic, then you probably tend towards a slow-oxidizing vegetarian metabolism, in which case you should restrict protein and fat consumption and favor vegetables, fruits and carbohydrates in your diet. If a large intake of concentrated animal protein leaves you feeling strong, vital and mentally alert, then you probably lean towards a fast-oxidizing carnivorous metabolism.

Since carnivorous metabolisms burn sugar and carbohydrates very rapidly, excess consumption of sugar or starch tends to make them excessively nervous and agitated due to overstimulation of the nervous system. Fast oxidizers derive energy by digesting large quantities of animal fats and proteins, which are sent to the liver for conversion into glycogen. The liver then dispenses the glycogen into the bloodstream in the form of glucose -- the only form of fuel the body can burn -- in gradual measured doses, as needed. That's why fast oxidizers require a steady supply of protein and fat in their diets and should restrict intake of sugars and starches.

Fortunately, most of us have balanced metabolisms that can handle both varieties of food when properly combined. Although our digestive tracts were originally designed by nature for a diet of fruit and vegetables, our digestive systems have evolved the capacity to produce the gastric juices required to digest the meat that became part of the human diet 50,000-100,000 years ago. If large quantities of animal protein don't leave you feeling depleted, and if large doses of sugar and starch don't make you nervous, then you are probably a balanced metabolizer who needs only worry about selecting wholesome foods from both categories and combining them properly for consumption. In the Tao of diet, however, these are just the first steps in regulating diet. Season and climate, for example, must also be considered in order to ensure that the extreme external cold winter is balanced by the extra internal heat of Yang-foods, hot summer weather is complemented by cooling Yin-foods, dry climates are compensated with extra moisturizing foods, and so forth. Foods consumed out of harmony with season and climate can cause all sorts of problems, including skin eruptions, constipation, gas, fatigue and bad breath.

Taoists tend to favor local produce because it is far more likely to be fresh and brimming with the vitality of its own chee. Today, the modern food-processing industry, in conjunction with high-speed transport, has made it possible to eat Florida oranges in Alaska, frozen prawns in the middle of the desert and all sorts of processed packaged 'junk food' any time of day or night, anywhere on earth. As a result, modern diets are completely out of synchrony with the natural prevailing conditions of geography, season and unseen cosmic forces.

Taoists also make a point of eating foods with natural affinities for their weakest organs and related energy systems. Taoist diets a