Health Preservation Cannot Rely on Pills Alone
People often ask me, since you studied TCM, tell me what I should eat for health preservation. This question annoys me greatly. As far as I know, many people in history who tried to preserve health through herbs died off while taking them; many emperors could not escape this bad habit—Emperor Yongzheng, for one, died suddenly while taking health-preserving pills. People today live a bit better and hope to live longer, so they turn to health cultivation.
Health preservation cannot rely on medicine; it relies on a balanced mind, a balanced diet, and moderate exercise. Many chronic diseases have no drug cure; over 80% of chronic diseases are strongly related to lifestyle. To uproot these chronic diseases, one must change one's lifestyle. If you smoke and drink, play cards and stay up late, eat gluttonously of meat and fish, indulge in sex, and cannot regulate your emotions—yet hope to use medicine and food to build up your health—you are dreaming.
As long as you maintain a balanced mind and good habits, even coarse tea and plain food will keep you healthy. Those of us who study TCM often look much younger than our years; many old TCM physicians of eighty look only fifty or sixty. As for me, now nearly forty, I look little different from a university student—something Western medicine cannot match. Why is this? Because TCM classics mostly emphasize a clear mind and few desires; the Huangdi Neijing already teaches, 'When spirit and essence are preserved within, how can illness arise?'
Someone who wants to learn TCM health preservation must first settle the mind into a state calm as still water. Do not eat or drink to excess, do not indulge in sensual pleasures, balance work and rest, and even keep up a few fitness exercises. If you do this, even minor chronic illnesses will resolve on their own, with no need to maintain them with medicine. If you cannot do this, taking a pile of medicine will only maintain you for a while, not for long. Moreover, drugs have side effects; one day you may die suddenly from wrongly taking too many.