My Way of Keeping in Good Health

Nearly every patient or patient's relative who comes to see me says, on meeting me: "So young!"

On one hand it is a fact: at the age of freedom from perplexity, though life is half over, for our people who believe doctors grow more experienced with age, a forty-year-old TCM doctor is still a young man.

On the other hand I look deceptive, seeming about thirty. When I tell some people my real age, they hardly believe it.

Only when they finally realize I have not lied about my age do they marvel: you medical folks really do know how to take care of yourselves, to look so young.

Three or four years ago, when I was volunteering as a laborer at Longquan Temple in Beijing, a worker on the site said to me: "Young man, why aren't you at school? Coming here, won't it hold up your studies?" They thought I was a college student.

Though I have never valued this stinking skin-bag of mine, when enough people say it, I cannot help pulling a petty, triumphant face and bristling with self-satisfaction.

So let me brazenly indulge in a bit of narcissism, trading on my youth, and talk about my way of keeping in good health. Anyway my skin is thick enough and my heart big enough; if I say it wrong and take a few jeers, I'll treat it as a bath for my soul.

In fact, my health regimen boils down to being poor.

My family was poor from childhood. Of the several hundred households in our village, mine was among the last to get a television, and it was a black-and-white set my aunt gave us after her family bought a color one. When I married in 2005, my family bought its first color TV.

So you can imagine our home conditions: plain food and water year-round.

My father put three children through school; both sons got into university in turn, which cost a great deal. My younger sister dropped out only because she was too mischievous at school to apply herself; she was held back three or four years in primary school.

Money was tight at home then. My father always said all the money went into the children's intellectual investment; as long as a child had any hope, he would support the child's schooling. So though he had a hot temper and beat me often, I still respect him greatly.

In our family we ate meat only at festivals, and never got our fill. My father was sallow and thin all his life, looking undernourished; years ago a doctor there told him that, being so undernourished, he would not live long.

The doctor who said that has been dead for years; that doctor had a ruddy complexion and obviously abundant qi and blood, yet he died before fifty. My father is now over seventy and still robust, farming a few mu of land alone at home; he won't stop even if told to.

Last year a patient of mine, Brother Lin, insisted on introducing a master to me, said to be highly skilled in TCM. I went with him once; the old man was a few years younger than my father, yet frail as a leaf, walking unsteadily. My father alone could probably take on ten of him.

Coming out, I told Brother Lin: a medical man this frail himself is probably not that skilled; I won't study with him.

Many people tell me a vegetarian diet is nutritionally inadequate and leaves one not in good shape; I can't be bothered to listen. I have an aunt, about ten years older than my father, now nearly eighty, who still works in the fields year-round.

When I went to pay her New Year calls this year, my aunt was still full of energy. To keep me for a meal she gripped me and would not let go; the strength she used was not that of an eighty-year-old Beijing woman at all.

My aunt has been vegetarian all along. Why? Because my grandmother was a devout Buddhist; my aunt, following my grandmother, is also a devout Buddhist and has eaten vegetarian all her life. Even now, going to the temple to burn incense on the first and fifteenth of the month, over hills and dales, she is not at all tired.

Incidentally, my grandmother, in her eighties, also crossed hills and dales to the temple to burn incense on the first and fifteenth every month. In the summer of her eighty-fourth year, the weather was too hot and she died of the heat.

So the dietary habit in my regimen may count as a family inheritance. I eat mostly vegetarian year-round, but unlike my aunt and grandmother, I do eat fish and meat; it is just that, mostly, I still eat vegetarian. Used to a poor life, I cannot abide a life of rich food and meat.

Two of the long-lived elders in my hometown have passed away these last two years, both at over a hundred.

One never used electric light in her life; her house was the only one in our village without electricity. As for modern communications and appliances, she never touched them.

She hardly ever went to hospital in her life and looked after herself until shortly before death. She had no faith, ate both meat and vegetables, but poverty limited the meat in her diet; she finally truly died of no illness, at the age of one hundred.

The other was my wife's dry grandmother, who also died last summer. She lived to ninety-nine, eating leftovers all her life: only after everyone had finished would she eat what was left, or what was left from the day before. She consumed a fair amount of the carcinogen nitrite over her life, and a small cup of wine with every meal; yet she lived free and easy.

She had longevity genes. Born to a landlord family whose home was ransacked in the Cultural Revolution, she had great psychological endurance.

The shared trait of these two elders was strong psychological endurance, no picking or choosing about life, living quite freely. As far as I know, both bore grudges against no one all their lives.

Buddhism speaks of "karma"; past and future lives may not exist at all, but the karma of this life does exist. I have treated many patients who, during illness, were much disturbed by their past "karma."

For example, bad relations among close kin are enough to give a person a hard time. Some people, once ill, have relatives deliberately come pick fights to vent spite; this is really because they mishandled relationships before falling ill, and others, nursing revenge, come to kick them when down.

Others used to look down on people; once ill, they unconsciously feel others are laughing at them now, and shrink from seeing anyone, living in great repression.

All this is karma. If a person normally handles relationships well, clashes little with others, keeps a balanced mind, is even-tempered, and treats others as equals, he may avoid many illnesses. Even if he falls ill, these problems won't arise.

A good state of mind is usually accompanied by good relationships and good habits.

These examples I give of long-lived, healthy elders all have another trait: early to bed and early to rise.

This is also the habit I have kept for years; I basically go to sleep between eight and nine. I occasionally stay up late, but that is rare.

Sleep is actually the "great human medicine" people most need; the gastrointestinal mucosa and nervous system repair themselves during sleep. People who stay up late are prone to headaches, stomach trouble, and weak hearts. Now many so-called elites in the first-tier cities die of too much staying up late, and die suddenly.

I fall asleep fast: within a minute of my head touching the pillow I am asleep. I occasionally wake at night; there was a spell when I worried over too many patients, a good number critically ill, and after waking at night I could not get back to sleep.

Now I control the number of patients; if I wake at night and can't sleep, I lie in bed and read something very dull—philosophy or Buddhist sutras, which are utterly tedious to me; usually after two or three pages I am snoring again. I never read Jin Yong when I can't sleep; that would keep me up even longer.

A while back my health was not great, but recently, by reducing patients, reducing workload, and sleeping more, I have adjusted back to good health.

I consider myself thick-skinned and big-hearted. I can basically take whatever is said, and laugh it off. Of course, unpleasant words I avoid hearing.

For example, my hometown has an ugly custom: every New Year, neighbors and relatives ask how much you earn and what car you bought. Heh. I can't match them on income, and I have no car.

But I can avoid them and not discuss such things. If someone corners me and insists I discuss it, I play deaf and dumb.

Being a bit thick-skinned saves you a lot of mental discomfort. Skip gatherings when you can, skip banquets when you can. When relatives have happy occasions, send the gift, then slip away when no one is looking.

My heart is big enough. As long as nobody attacks me with a knife, whatever injustice is done to me, I treat it as if it never happened. If someone wants to make trouble for me, I just avoid contact with them in future.

No gossip, no petty anger. To win the delight of a thousand is not as good as releasing the resentment of one. I never think taking a loss is a blessing, but when I really must take a loss, I take it willingly. Taking a loss can release resentment; with no one bearing me a grudge, my heart is much at peace.

Playing with children is great fun. Wherever I go, there are plenty of kids—neighbors', relatives', relatives' neighbors'—endlessly, continuously producing children. As long as we play with them, they are thrilled.

Every year when I go home, I spend most of my time playing with various children. So now, as soon as I arrive home, the kids all know: ah, this adult is fun, and swarm around me.

If you play with people's children, the parents won't dislike you. Even if you can't be bothered with them, they'll think you a kind person and won't become your enemy.

I am a fairly hardworking person: farming, sweeping, washing dishes, cooking, tidying the study—I'm willing to do it all myself. After meals I take a walk; I often play badminton or swim with the children, and occasionally climb a hill. Transport is basically by two legs or a two-wheeler—a bicycle. Even now I have never bought a car.

Add to that: I don't smoke, don't drink, don't drink tea, dress simply, and aside from buying books and learning the qin, spend almost nothing.

So there is no smoke choking me, no wine burning me, no tea exciting my brain and keeping me awake, and no pressing financial need driving me day and night. Sleep when sleepy, eat plain food when hungry.

So actually I have no deliberate health regimen at all; yet imperceptibly I have kept my looks quite well, though with a few small ailments. The skin-bag is unimportant, but it is better for it not to break down than to break down.

In my view, the reason so many of my patients suffer repeatedly is simply that their physical and mental load is too heavy: they cannot control their appetite and abuse their stomachs; they cannot control their inner selves, living on edge, restless, and abusing their spirits. In the end the stomach cries out and body and mind collapse.

Bacon said the two things hardest to fill are a man's stomach and his bank account—true! If one can lighten the physical load, the gastrointestinal load, and the mental load, most illnesses won't come knocking.

Of course, remove the pleasures of the mouth and the distractions of song and sex, and many in the multitude won't know what they live for. That is only because their inner field is too barren, and their fortune and lot are thin.

Those who can find joy in themselves in life are blessed people.

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