When we explore Oriental medicine in general and Chinese nutritional therapy in Orlando, in particular, we are learning how to attain balance in our lives through balanced eating that can provide us the energy we need to live the life we want to live.
According to great sage Lao Tse, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.”
Health is a Balancing Act
If someone asks you “How balanced are you?” How will you answer? Most people associate balance with not falling while riding a bicycle or not falling while standing or walking. Asking one how balanced he/she is in the framework of Chinese medicine may mean if he/she is balanced not only physically but emotionally and psychologically, as well.
“You Are What You eat”
If your diet is energetically and nutritionally balanced, so are you. From the perspective of Oriental medicine, you may want to include in your checklist the questions: Am I ‘energetically’ balanced?, or Am I ‘nutritionally’ balanced?; your food provides you with the energy you need to be balanced energetically and nutritionally balanced — and you’re healthy in terms of spirit, mind, and body when you consider yourself an energetically and nutritionally balanced person.
The Five Flavors
A diet that’s energetically and nutritionally balanced may include foods that combine the following five flavors:
1. Spicy
2. Sweet
3. Bitter
4. Sour
5. Salty
A Balanced Feeling
Lots of individuals ‘think’ they’re balanced. But obviously there’s a huge difference between ‘thinking’ and ‘knowing,’ just as there’s a definite distinction between thinking that you just ate something nutritious compared to knowing you did. When it comes to knowing if you are indeed energetically and nutritionally balanced, the most important factor to consider is that you FEEL energetically and nutritionally balanced.
Intellectually, it is easy to demonstrate the difference between feeling and thinking, but because our culture espouses the development of our mental faculties, whilst tending to abandon the fostering of our intuition and feelings, it’s a little bit hard to know what balance feels like. This irrational and unhealthy imbalance can hilariously manifest in a normal conversation when a person genuinely asks someone “Are you really feeling okay?” and the other wryly responds, “I think so.”
Even this underlying imbalance in self-realization can be addressed with the power of Chinese nutritional therapy.