Hi, welcome back to the Chinese medicine forecast today. I'm going to be starting a new series about the relationship between our body's physiology the physical function our body and creativity and getting that motivation all that mojo back. So this is going to be useful for people who are in a creative kind of job. So you might be in a job where you rely on your creativity and all you rely on your ability to come up with ideas. Welcome to this.Series addict not a subscriber already to the podcast you can subscribe on audio to Apple Google podcasts or modify or however you're listening to this. So if you're listening on the audio welcome, and if you are new to the podcast Channel on YouTube and you haven't subscribed yet and then click that subscribe button and click the notification bail on that one. Hi, welcome to part one. On on creativity and your body in Chinese medicine. So in this series we're going to be looking at the difference in Chinese medicines way of understanding your body and how that might help you to this particular episode is going to be looking at the basic physiology of your body in a Five Element way. So you have five elements, right? So five elements are represented all ideas of functional systems in our body so they can represent the organs of our body that can represent wood fire earth metal and what are those different elements represent like The fire type functions in our body and they are attributed to different organs in our body and system those organs relate to systems. So for instance the Earth element, if you've been listening to any episodes that I've done before about dampness, then you would be familiar with the Earth element think about how it's related to digestion and grow sort of growing your digestive functions. And those those out the one thing with the five elements is they're not into they're not just Standalone thinks they're interdependent on the relationship between in all the elements. So how does this affect creativity? Why should we understand this because the five elements system is shows how our body is one is dependent on the environment and that's something that we've lost in our society. I think in general now and what is because we we have just lost the ability to live in harmony with the environment because one ways we've kind of lost the need to do that as much as we used to one is through the increase of Technology. It allows Us to create artificial environments and so we don't have to live just at the mercy of the environment. Let's say so but I'm a big proponent of technology. I have an iPhone I have I'm using a camera to film this I have electricity in my house. I use air conditioning. And so what that means is throughout like I live in Perth Western Australia. So this is a very hot season for us at the moment. It's just right at December as all that means is because we have air conditioning you don't have to endure the heat of Summer. You don't really have to To enjoy a 40-degree day for the whole day. You can stick the aircon on you can go to the shopping center. I know people that like, you know, if your house has too hot you go to a shopping center or something to escape the heat, right? So we I'm not saying you're in the old days you would have to have enjoyed that you would have been under a tree wouldn't stand out in the hot sun at 40 degrees, but we don't have to adjust our body as much and in an aging which is the oldest. Sort of fundamental text of Chinese medicine. Let's say one of the things that it says is don't hate the season right one of the things that it's kind of telling us in how to live in harmony without with the environment is if you do this in this in this in summer, you will enjoy the summer season and then you'll suit to The Following season and if you do this this and this in the summer season in the Autumn, then you'll injure, you know, you'll be ready for your body will be prepared for the winter and it's this idea that okay seasons change and and things do change. Change now so and our body and our minds and how we function. What is we can't have the same expectations of our body and we shouldn't really place the same expectations on our body in all those seasons. And that's a very anti productive way of thinking possibly my phone beeping away technology messages comes back them. And one thing I think so Technologies enabled us to kind of function at the same. As we like we don't have to be at the mercy of the environment and that can be a great thing that can be really good thing for productivity. So let's say I decide you know, three o'clock in the morning I want to do something I can I can turn the lights on I can turn my computer on I can you know, crank it all up and I can do something if I want to run an office and it's 40 degrees. I can put the aircon on and you know, all those workers are pretty comfortable in that comfortable it so he were maintaining this comfortable environment and we not so Of having to enjoy very cold or having to enjoy very hot same as with, you know winter there. And and so I'm not saying we have to go back to the Dark Ages and not have those things. But what is that doing to our body? And what is that doing to our lifestyle in general? And one thing that these seasonal things make us do is they make us rest they make us like because you cannot be that productive. You have to rest you have to have a little bit. down time I guess and so something that I find in our world at the moment is that there's a there's I mean, I don't want this video is too serious to be a rant on society, but it's kind of inseparable and that's why I love Chinese medicine so much because it's this understanding of how interconnected everything is how interconnected our body is meant to be with the environment and some of the problems that we're coming across as a society as a general and just you as an individual watching this can be because of that disconnection. I'm talking to myself as well. I'm one of those people that will get up at three o'clock in the morning to I'm a music musician as well. Right? And so what I owe, you know, if I don't get up at three o'clock in the morning very often, but what I'm saying is society lets me do that and actually rewards you for doing that in some ways because it's like well whoever can produce the most whoever's the most productive in a commune capitalist commercial kind of society that's rewarded right? It's rewarded by how much you can produce and how good you can be and so Always about getting more and more more and where does it end? Where does where does this kind of stuff and right even on this channel on this YouTube channel, like how many videos I can make if I can make five videos a week or three videos a week or you know, like if you were making one now make two and Melmac and if you're making to now make three now, I make five make one a day to keep pushing out that content like follow Gary Vee as a guess a person that I follow a safe. We like I admire what he's doing and I you know as a business person like I follow several different business people will recently when I went to his conference. He's telling people would put out a hundred pieces of content a day now that's like on Twitter or Facebook Tick-Tock LinkedIn all this kind of stuff, right? So he say if you want to be competitive in our environment. I'm not having a go at that. I'm saying that you do need to do that. Like I can see that you need to do that. But you can see me sighing. All right, it's very hard for a one man band business to be able to do that now half of his audience. If not more a one-man band type of businesses and he's saying well to be competitive in this environment. That's what you need to be doing. You need to be creative. You know, you need to be having 20 stories on your Facebook or Instagram and you know several Tip-Top videos and some of that content can be the same or similar but it's what he's it's you still basically putting Content all the time and to be up to be noticed to get attention and that's what you need in this environment to succeed. And so I guess I'm making this series because the primary people that I want to talk to in. This series are people that rely on their creativity for their job or for their for their work. And how do we balance? How do we find a balance? Can Chinese medicine help us find a balance between that and find something that works or how to how do you drive your creativity in times where you feel like you can't get it. So that's talk about living in violin. The in terms of the environment so think for yourself you need to ask yourself. Am I living in harmony with the environment or am I living in disharmony with the environment or how much on a scale of 1 to 10 if 10 was the most harmonious you could be and 0 or 1 is like the least harmonious how harmonious with the environment do you think that you are so ask yourself that for now like right now like yesterday this week. How much in harmony do you feel like you are living with the environment and Environment and you can create other environments. I'm talking about the physical environment of winter spring summer autumn for however, you say whatever you form. That's one thing to consider. I think it's really important to think about that in and in terms of that we think about sleep and die it. So those are two fundamental things that help us live in harmony with the environment. So in summer time, you need the least sleep in winter time. You need the most sleep so I know lots of my viewers and listeners on this. Channel from the US and you'll probably being in Winter right now. So you need the most sleeping winter. This is what I'm saying a commercial commercialized environment our society right now doesn't allow us to work less time or work more time in different seasons. Now, I'm not sure about this right now because I haven't been to China for two for a year. I think a year and a half. I've been to China but I've been to China over the last ten years since well more than that over the I've been to China 11 times. Over since the 2001 till now basically so I visited China many times and probably more around 2013 was a most I could get something to go twice a year. So I had a retail shop and I was going for business and so when I was working in a hospital in China, my first one I was first studying Chinese medicine. I noticed something really interesting. So I went there at a change of season and they worked less although they work Less hours in Summer and were given a longer lunch break because it's hot and so they were given more time to kind of like relax and rest because it's hot in the day. Some of the hospitals had aircon some didn't have are corn everywhere and in China it can get to like it's very hot and humid some sometimes it was like 42 degrees and really really humid right now. That was extreme, but I'm talking about Celsius. I'm not sure about the fahrenheit. I'm not familiar with that system. They have a rest. That right as in a rest, they sleep in the day and that's part of I guess the you can see that fade. I can see that fading away. Now that I've gone to talk the more times. I've go what times I've gone to China the more commercialized. It's become the more they're trying to come in line with the West you can see that less and less now in retail will sort of businesses. So let's say the first one of the first times I would basically have my time off from the hospital in the in the lunch time you go have your lunch. Break, and so when I first went there is like ball two and a half hours for lunch while that's a lot of time. What am I going to do with all this time? Okay my lunch. And then what do I do? Like everyone's going for a site now I was like, well, I want to explore China I want to do something so get on my bike and cycle around and everyone was sleeping like you would go around and straight. Everyone's just lying down having a sleep even workers on the side of the road. Like they're just all find a spot and sleep you'd be surprised where people can sleep in China like, you know on the roadside on their bike. They just sort of Slop over something in and have a rest and you didn't go to a market and it's like people who have got their individual businesses now because everyone's sleeping, there's no calm there's no competition of like well if I say if I stay awake in this lunchtime, I might make a bit of extra money because someone might come by something when I was coming to buy something then because everyone knows except I didn't know because I was knew that it was sleepy time and it wasn't perfect commercial buying time. So it's like their shop still open, but Little angry at you because you walk in them up to come in and you know just add them. And so yeah realized that now that's a cultural thing that's in built into the culture of several cultures that do that have a siesta. I'm a little out they allow their workers to do that and that and that's that's good but in our society in like, I'm in Australia, and I'm sure this is the same in the US and the UK, you're not getting a two hour lunch break two and a half hour lunch break even and a lot of people don't even do anything at Lunch, except they gobble their lunch down at their desk. And so that's not really living in harmony with what your body needs. It's not even allowing your body time to digest the food or you know to enjoy that part of it and to be in harmony with your body and in harmony with nature. So one thing I want to talk about is like that's a good place to start. Let's start with that. Let's start with how how much how harmonious are you with the environment around you so in Winter you The 19 says you should go to bed early and get up late. Now. That means you sleep longer it went up and then in summer, it's like the opposite. So if you think of sort of winter as one end and summer at the other end in summer, you can go to bed late and get up early what that means is it's hot, right? So it's hot it's hard to sleep. It's and so, you know you your kind of you might be a bit more. Maybe you had a bit of a longer sleep in the day if you're in if you're in China or country It allows you to do that so you can go to bed a bit later because harder to as harder to sleep. And because the weather's warmer, you can kind of do things in the evening without feeling for you know, freezing cold war as in winter when it's cold want to put a rug got like you're trying to work on your desk. You know, I remember when I was a student and I'll be sitting there trying to do an assignment and it was like you have five runs on you trying to keep yourself warm. It's not what up to a little heat especially if you couldn't afford like central heating or something and you're freezing and you're trying to do you're typing your butt. Cops on everything you see trying to stay warm and you'd love to just go to bed. That's the natural thing to do not to sort of force yourself to stay up. Whereas eating summertime. It's hot. And so your where is the Yang in your body is different in those different season. So in wintertime your Yang's kind of going in inwardly and that's why the outside of our body feels colder in summertime the Yang's kind of out towards the surface. So it's easier to sweat. It's normal to sweat. So that's one thing about being in harmony with the environment is sleep. So you Need any other two seasons, I like transition or Seasons between winter and summer. So if it's like Autumn or fall, then you're starting to transition your body towards winter so you so so yeah, it's a transitional between those two things. So summertime and wintertime and like the opposite times. So in summary you need the most sleeping with you need the least - there you can kind of use the other three seasons to transition yourself towards that with different amounts of sleep. So getting up early or getting it or go to bed later. That's according to the Nigerian that's ancient wisdom of Chinese medicine. Right? So that's what more than 2,000 year old textbook and then aging is like a philosophy of Chinese medicine and a philosophy of just how to be healthy person. And what is what the basics of Chinese medicine and acupuncture and herbal medicine are kind of based on these ideas. So our Chinese medicine Practitioners job one of their jobs is to keep you healthy as a patient. We want to keep you free of illness. We want to keep you. Not getting sick. We want to prevent you from getting sick. And that's how we want to prevent you from getting sick. That's one of the reasons why I made this channel is because this is my way of spreading that message to people what don't have timing consultations to give people these long lectures about how to help them be healthier and to be honest not every patient wants that not every person wants to do that. So, yeah, so that would be the first place that I would start is the season so think about seasonal Attunement how To the season. I you now it doesn't mean you have to stop using your air conditioning or stop using your heating. It just means to be thinking in more mindfully in off the seasons and being aware. Now. This isn't so much about creativity and that aspect of things but Jack definitely you get sick more easily when you transition very abruptly from different season. So I don't know if you've ever traveled overseas and one country has been very hot one country being very cold. Well, that's very it's easy to get sick like that. That because you're transitioning very quickly in an artificial way, you know in an aeroplane and so your bodies are tuning towards being let's say you're in winter. So it's your Yang's going in inwardly it's going right. Let's preserve that and so you outside your body's a little bit cooler and then you suddenly go into a hot place will then and there's all this Warmness around you and your game is kind of pushed out to the outside. There's no transition towards that there's a reason why we have Year of you know, 365 days and those and there's a reason where there's a reason why seasons take the time that they do because our body needs that transitional time. It's not very healthy to do that. Now if you did that once or twice in your lifetime, it's not a big deal. But if you're traveling a lot and you're kind of excited you're putting that pressure on your body. It's just something to be aware of now the second thing to help you be in tune with the seasons is your diet. What are you eating? Are you eating foods and fruits and foods that are in season now, I've got quite a lot of videos on different diet things and how to eat seasonally. There was one interview that I did recently with Jason Chong who's a Chinese medicine practitioner of Melbourne and that was something that we discussed on the in the interview and that's on the audio podcast and on the YouTube channel so go back and have a listen to that one. That's probably a good thing. Just talking about food miles how much food travels before you get it and that influences how healthy it is. Where's food? How long We've been stored all that kind of stuff so you can eat stuff that's seasonally grown like season like as in it's in it's grown in that season. If you grow on itself, that's even better or you become part of a food co-op or something like that and you're able to get the food like that. It's that's a much healthier way to eat and help your body through that way. So that's the end of this first part of the series. We just talking about how to help our creativity. And the first one is to be in tune with a if we can help our body be in tune with the environment the ensuring with the seasons throughout diet through our lifestyle. That's one thing that you can do to really help your body. Like I guess one is to avoid elders and the second way is so then if we're if our body is healthy, then it's easier to turn on the things that we need to turn on our mental and emotional functions that are related to to these different aspects in Chinese medicine. It will help you out. You can join me on the next part. We're going to be talking about emotions and we're going to be talking about things like a life purpose and planning and how what how our purpose is important in this how to find your purpose in life in a Chinese medicine way and how sometimes a fizzy physiological dysfunction could affect us in finding our purpose and being purposeful or being having a light having life planning and having purpose. So I hope you can join me on the next episode ads are thanks very much. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a comment below Fist and it's helped you for the questions and you'd like to know.
New series over the holidays ...mind body and Chinese Medicine. Technology means we don't have to be at the mercy of the environment, but what is it doing to us long term in our living habits and health ?In this series Marie Hopkinson, Chinese Herbalist and Acupuncturist from Perth, delves into the mind-body connection looking at the issues about purpose, meaning and fulfilment in life, alomg with other mental-emotional aspect and their interplay with the physical body - all from a Chinese medicine perspective of course. This is one broad view that looks at the importance of living in harmony with nature - sleep and diet are two main aspects. We will focus on sleep in this episode. How much sleep do you need in different seasons .... Summer, winter etc? lets take a look together In today’s episode, Are you living in harmony with the environment ? Marie's practice details:  MARIE HOPKINSON, Registered Chinese Herbalist and Acupuncturist in Australia (AHPRA)  Consultations for treatment (individual) please call my clinic office to book in: 08 93289233 (Perth Natural Medical Clinic) or  go to : http://www.bespokemedicine.net/ Email hello@bespokemedicine.net  IMPORTANT: This video, as with all videos on the The Chinese Medicine Podcast are NOT a replacement for a health professional diagnosis. While Marie may answer your questions, all answers are not of a professional consultation level - it is impossible to check your pulse through the internet, hence Chinese medicine cannot be practiced properly through the internet. If you have any undiagnosed symptoms, or changes in your health condition The Chinese Medicine Podcast urges you to see your own doctor, GP, Chinese medicine practitioner, acupuncturist or other health professional as appropriate. If it is an emergency call 000 in Australia. If you are unsure if this advice is appropriate for your individual situation ask your own practitioner before applying any diet or lifestyle techniques /concepts discussed in this video. Marie Hopkinson and The Chinese Medicine Podcast wishes you the best of health and improvement in your own health journey. 