Mandarin Course

Hot and Cold, Part Two (26)

The concept of Hot and Cold was first introduced in one of my earlier videos. In this video entitled Part II, this concept is extended to Chinese herbs and the nature of illness. In so doing, we’ll be able to combine the herbs more effectively to create synergy, and at the same time to avoid contradictions. For a review of the material already covered, you may like to see my previous videos: “Hot and Cold”, “Herbal Knowledge”, “Naming Convention”, and “Natural Healing”. Every Chinese herb has multiple effects as explained in the dictionary. With regard to a particular herb, you have to grasp its major healing effect and what the herb is basically used for. Please do not invent the micro effects such as to kill a certain bacteria or to produce a certain hormone. Ancient Chinese herbal knowledge cannot possibly involve modern discoveries at the micro mechanical level. Besides the herbs, you have to know what kind of illness you are dealing with, that is, the nature of the illness as shown by its symptoms, and what you perceive correctly to be the root cause of the problem. When we separate the herbs and the illnesses into Hot and Cold categories, there will be less chance of making a mistake. Furthermore, we can even query why a certain herb is used in the package. The simple rule is to apply Hot herbs to Cold illness, and vice versa. In addition, there exists a third less obvious category called Neutral. It represents borderline cases, or cases where it becomes …