Why do patients with periarthritis of shoulder often have abdominal pain? Why should Chinese medicine treat scapulohumeral periarthritis by tonifying kidney and strengthening yang?
Why is body odor closely related to our eating habits? Why do we feel better when we sleep with our hands up and our armpits exposed?
What is the meaning of "Yihe" in the Summer Palace and what does it have to do with our health? Why shouldn't the Summer Palace be translated into "Summer Palace"?
These little problems that subvert our common sense can be found in the book "bosom friend".
I first met Xu Wenbing, the author of this book, when I was listening to a program "Rediscovering the Yellow Emperor's Internal Classic" by Liang Dong in the Himalayas more than ten years ago. I think it is very interesting, which gives me a new understanding of Chinese medicine and the relationship between our body and nature.
Traditional Chinese medicine pays attention to the cultivation of the environment and emphasizes the harmony with the natural environment. The self-knowledge of TCM is inseparable from the nature of heaven and earth, and it is used to treating our bodies as a whole system. It does not treat headache and foot pain alone, and there are few surgical operations such as opening, resection and transplantation.
Western medicine, on the other hand, is used to exploring the root and essence of things, disassembling the body into thousands of components, each of which can be subdivided into cells, and the cells can be subdivided into molecules, atoms, particles and quarks … endlessly. Only after understanding the source of the disease can we prescribe the right medicine. Where there is a lesion, remove it. If the blood vessel is blocked, put in a device to artificially dilate the blood vessel and fill anything missing in the body …
We have no intention to argue which is more scientific and which is closer to the truth. It is too early to draw conclusions based on our existing knowledge.
The book bosom friend combs 53 "parts" of our body from the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine, covering almost all body structures and tissues and organs.
But don't mistake this book for a medical book or a regimen. It is more like a popular science book or a humanistic exposition. From the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine, we can better understand the relationship between ourselves and everything in nature.
When I was young, I was full of energy and had a strong desire to conquer. I like to get to the bottom of it. I think man can conquer nature. At this time, I believed in the power of science and felt that western medicine was omnipotent.
As we grow older and have more experience, the more we have awe of the laws of nature, and the easier it is for us to understand the far-reaching significance of harmonious life. I gradually feel that the traditional classics of our ancestors seem to have some truth.
In fact, Western medicine's exploration of objective origin is not in conflict with Chinese medicine's emphasis on the natural environment, which can be understood as different directions, and there is no right or wrong.