Traditional Chinese medicine can restore energy and well-being, detoxify your body and even lose weight. Here are the main precepts to be inspired by to feel good in your body and in your mind.
"Let your food be your medicine"
This quote from Hippocrates is based on the principle that if the body is well nourished, and that it receives a balanced diet, there is less risk that it will go wrong and therefore that diseases will take hold or that there will be have weight gain.
Far from calorie counting and restrictive diets, Chinese food medicine is based on common sense. Foods are defined according to five natures: cold, hot, fresh, lukewarm, neutral, and according to five flavors: acid, bitter, sweet, pungent and salty. Each nature and each flavor has an impact on the body.
A cold food will cool the body and slow down organic functions while a warm nature food will warm up, stimulate vital functions and increase metabolism.
As for the flavors, each corresponds to an organ on which it acts in a specific way: the acid flavor plays a role on the liver and the gall bladder, the bitter flavor will play a role on the heart, the sweet flavor plays a role on the spleen and the pancreas, the pungent flavor plays a role on the lungs and finally the salty flavor plays a role on the kidneys.
The ideal is to eat a little of each type of food and each flavor over the seasons, emphasizing a flavor and a type adapted to the needs of the body and/or according to the weakness of a particular organ.
To drain food toxins and lose weight, foods with a spicy and lukewarm flavor are to be preferred. The distribution in terms of food must be as follows: 70% fruit and vegetables, 10% oilseeds and first cold-pressed vegetable oils, 10% cereals (buckwheat, millet, rice, etc.), 10% eggs , fatty and lean fish, shellfish and meat in small quantities.
Certain foods should be excluded
Certain foods must be limited or even excluded in traditional Chinese medicine because they hinder the proper circulation of fluids (blood, lymph, etc.), which weakens the body and does not allow energy to circulate freely. In addition, they are caloric and promote weight gain.
These are animal proteins, alcoholic beverages, flour products, dairy products and sweet products.
Listen to each other
Being aware of the food you swallow helps to limit weight gain because satiety happens more quickly.
Traditional Chinese medicine is an art of eating well but, more generally, it is a true art of living. Serenity must be the key word, especially when it comes to eating. A stressed body will not assimilate food well, which can cause digestive problems, a bloated belly and even weight gain if meals are constantly taken on the go and/or in a stressful environment.
Doing breathing exercises before eating can promote weight loss.
Sport but not too much
To lose weight, it is often a question of doing sports intensively. In traditional Chinese medicine, it is the opposite: it is recommended to move but gently because exhaustion activates the adrenal glands and blocks weight loss. Gentle gymnastics, yoga, Nordic walking are all activities recommended in traditional Chinese medicine.
In any case, it is necessary to respect its rhythm and its body, not to try to tire it but on the contrary to unite with it to be in harmony and to inhabit it fully.