THE YIN AND YANG OF HUMAN BODY

The assessment of quality of things and events is essential tool of Traditional Chinese  Medicine (TCM) in its undestanding of nature. Inspite of variety of fenomena, comprising the universe, their qualities always allow to gather them into few groups and analyze their interaction. Although the concept of quality of things also exists in the West, its role in the process of assessment of various fenomena is not crutial. Let’s view the differences between TCM and modern biomedical science in terms of their way of dealing with things and find their advantages, related to human body.

            According to western reductionistic approach, arbitrary for modern biomedical theories, any natural fenomenon, including human body, is divided into small pieces and then each part is analyzed separately from others. So instead of “WHOLE” we deal with small parts of the “WHOLE”, and make decisions on the processes within those parts only. Here we have to pay tribute to success of modern theory, which managed to explain many tiny processes like thermodynamics or functioning of various human systems. However, when we need to get the overall assessment of the human body, instead of syntesis of the data taken from its parts, we present the function of the body either by transferring the result of the part to the whole organism or by gathering the results of its parts.

            Since the establishment of medical problem in conventional medicine we divide the event into two “participants”: one is the person and the other is his health problem. Since that moment the only concern of modern medicine is the disease, whereas the “owner” is left behind. Treatment aims to eradicate disease, often with no worry about the patient, which hardly can be accepted: although biologically we similar, but chemically we are not. The ignorance of individual characteristics often leads to such undesirable reactions like  ineffectiveness of chosen dose of medication, overreaction to routine dose or side effect of the drug.

            TCM view the human organism as part of nature. All qualities of environmental events can be found in human organism: heat, cold, dryness, dampness, etc. As daytime and night replace each other to make the day; or hot and cold periods changes through the season, so our organism has periods of being awake and fall asleep or being in action and having rest. These two polar features or qualities of life are known in TCM as Yin and Yang. Yang represents daytime, sun, heat, awakeness, active condition etc. whereas Yin symbolizes night, moon, cold, sleep and passive condition. This Yin – Yang division became so popular in the West, that many biomedical researchers use them to interpret their findings in chemistry, biology and physics.

            The above-mentioned polarity of functioning systems can be found within the human body as well. Nervous sytem is one of the vitally important systems of the human body. Both structurally and functionally this system is divided into several subsystems and autonomic nervous system is one of them. The latter consists of 2 oppositely interacting systems: sympathetic (SNS) and parasympathetic (PNS). Both of them work involuntarily, providing us with vitally important activities: heart contractons, breathing, bowel movement, heat production and regulation, stress reaction and so on. SNS and PNS counteract with each other and balance each other at the same time. For example, SNS increases the rate and strength of heart contractions (Yang-featured actions) and PNS decreases them (Yin-featured actions), SNS is active during the daytime (Yang period of the day), whereas PNS dominates at night (Yin period of the day).

            If we recall that nervous system controls and regulates all bodily functions we can anticipate that abovementioned Yin – Yang interaction of autonimic nervous system creates the net, within which all bodily systems are formed and act. Consequently, the development of disease implies imbalance between Yin and Yang, which results in prevalence one quality over other. For example, person with Yang overload will be restless and will jabber, have insomnia, red face, rapid pulse and heat intolerance. Whatever his medical problem is, the reason will be Yang excess and the treatment must be focused on decrease of Yang-featured patterns of behaviour and increase of Yin-featured patterns. Besides, reestablishment of balance by the acupuncture treatment and utiliization of individual nutritional strategies is also achieved through application of Yin- Yang principle.

There are various methods in TCM, allowing to determine Yin –Yang prevalence within the body. Of course, the best way to detect personal Yin – Yang condition is to visit TCM practitioner. However, if we aimed to get the general picture of our health status, the only thing we need is to answer on series of questions. By answering on questions below the reader can find his body type, i.e. either Yin or Yang-oriented, and then reffer to the article YIN – YANG NUTRITION on this website to choose relevant food for balancing his Yin – Yang properties. Pictorial presentation of Yin – Yang status will help to understand detected condition after answering questions. Picture No1 presents balanced state of Yin – Yang forces at their normal level.

There may be two versions of Yang-oriented status.

1. Excessive Yang. (Picture No2). The questions, allowing to detect this condition are listed below. Since the degree of preference for each question may vary, the answer options can be chosen from the scale, graded from 0 to 10 points. So “0” will stand for “never” answer option and “10” will stand for “always” answer option of respondent.

2. Relative Yang excess due to Yin deficiency (Picture No3). In this case inspite of the normal level of Yang forces there is excess of Yang-featured qualities within the body. This condition is developed because of the lack of Yin-featured characteristics. The questions below allow to detect this condition.

There are also 2 Yin-oriented sonditions.

1. Yin Excess condition. The questions, allowing to detect this condition, are listed below. Picture No4 presents the visual version of the condition.

2. Relative Yin Excess due to Yang Deficiency (Picture No5). In this case inspite of the normal level of Yin forces there is excess of Yin-featured qualities within the body. This condition is developed because of the lack of Yang-featured characteristics. The questions below allow to detect this condition.

After getting your scores from all abovementioned blocks of questions, calculate their averages and find the highest among them. The latter will probably indicate the type of your imbalance.

            So, if you you have absolute Yang Excess, you have to avoid Hot nutrition (to decrease Yang). If you have relative Yang Excess, you have to add COLD food to your diet (to increase Yin). In case if you have Yin Excess, you have to avoid COLD food staff and if you have relative Yin Excess so you have to add HOT food. In case if you have mixed condition, e.g. both Yang Excess and Yin Deficiency, so you have to both avoid HOT and prefer COLD food. In case if you are not sure which food is relevant for you or you have good Yin – Yang balance, you can start with PLAIN food. 

            Abovementioned terms of HOT, COLD and PLAIN food are explained in another article, which you can found on this website under the title YIN – YANG NUTRITION.