I Can Hear the Heart's Voice of Traditional Chinese Medicine-Chapter 261 - 116: Old Friends, From Today I, Old Zhou, Have a Teacher

After Zhou Jiande finished speaking, Lu Xuan looked at him with surprise.

His words were nearly identical to what the Heart's Voice described.

"Indeed, as expected of an acupuncture master, it's no trouble for him to grasp complex concepts through analogy."

Lu Xuan felt a profound sense of admiration, as this was not something an average person could accomplish.

Even if an ordinary person heard what he said, it would still be difficult to glean any real insights from it, especially within such a short time frame.

"But as for the numbers nine and six, I can't seem to think of their significance at the moment," Zhou Jiande said, furrowing his brows and gazing at Lu Xuan.

Lu Xuan thought for a moment and said: "As for the numbers nine and six, they derive from the principles of the Book of Changes and must be applied via techniques; they cannot play a role on their own.

In the application of opening and closing, during Mountain Burning Fire, 'tight closure upon needle withdrawal' is used to 'preserve the true Qi,' preventing the outgoing Yang Qi from escaping.

During Heaven-piercing Cold, 'slowly lifting the needle' and enlarging the aperture facilitates the path, which allows the Qi to expel more effectively, thus better dispersing the Yang pathogen.

As for twisting the needle, which essentially involves rotation, there were actually two differing views in the past: one was based on the forward and reverse of Yin and Yang, recorded in the Great Achievement in Acupuncture, which holds that Yang receives Qi externally at the four extremities, while Yin receives Qi internally at the five organs. Turning left from the outside generates Yang heat, whereas turning right internally produces Yin cold;

The other was based on the flow direction of the meridians, as stated in the Acupuncture Inquiry, which posited that one must consider whether the circulation of Ying Qi is excessive or insufficient. Excess should be countered by drawing away the surplus, while insufficiency should be aided to compensate for its lack, thus having no direct relation to cold and heat.

Due to the divergence in views regarding twisting for tonifying and draining by the ancients, in specific applications, it can only serve as assistance and cannot be the primary basis for generating sensations of heat or cold."

"What about the indications for Mountain Burning Fire and Heart-piercing Cold?" Zhou Jiande considered and inquired.

"Summarizing the records from ancient literature, coupled with my own experiences, the effects and indications for Mountain Burning Fire and Heaven-piercing Cold should include the following…" 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

Lu Xuan paused, then continued: "Mountain Burning Fire helps to supplement Yang and dispel cold, which is essentially the warming method, or it can be called the supplementing method. According to descriptions in ancient medical texts, it can address long-term paralysis, stubborn numbness, cold paralysis, epilepsy, cold malaria, cold limbs, and all cold syndromes."

"What do you think?" Zhou Jiande pursued further.

Lu Xuan pondered and said: "For cold stagnation and cold knots, dwindling life fire, and all disorders of insufficient Primordial Qi in the organs and meridians, Mountain Burning Fire can be used."

After listening, Zhou Jiande remained silent, seemingly in thought.

Zhou Jiande murmured: "I can understand cold stagnation and dwindling life fire, but it's the latter part…"

Cold stagnation and dwindling life fire are relatively easy to understand, as the extraordinary technique of Mountain Burning Fire is inherently a method of invoking Yang, so addressing these two conditions posed no issue for him.

But the mention of all disorders of insufficient Primordial Qi in the organs and meridians by Lu Xuan caused him to furrow his brow, somewhat understanding, yet not.

Lu Xuan smiled and said: "To truly understand this, we have to mention what we often talk about—Primordial Qi. For instance, we often say that someone is deficient in Primordial Qi and needs to replenish it, but what exactly is Primordial Qi?

Primordial Qi is a concept in traditional Chinese medicine, passed down for over two thousand years. Using modern Western medicine's language to describe Primordial Qi, it can be seen as every person's vitality, which is a composite indicator of the functions of all the body's organs.

The Primordial Qi is generated simultaneously with the formation of life, originating from parental inheritance and residing in the body's kidneys.

It can be said that Primordial Qi is the innate foundation of bodily health and the elemental force of life. When Primordial Qi is abundant, the body is healthy; when Primordial Qi is deficient or damaged, illness occurs; when Primordial Qi is depleted, life ends.

Throughout human life, from birth until the final departure from this world, Primordial Qi undergoes a continuous process of consumption.

It can be said that it is precisely the Primordial Qi within our bodies that sustains the entire course of life."

Zhou Jiande squinted his eyes. The notion of Primordial Qi is something anyone studying traditional Chinese medicine will encounter. Some practitioners of Chinese medicine delve deeper and thus understand more about it.

For a master of acupuncture like him, his understanding of bodily Primordial Qi would naturally not be lacking.

Lu Xuan continued explaining: "In traditional Chinese medicine, when discussing Primordial Qi, it refers to 'true Qi, which is received from heaven and unites with grain Qi to fill the body.'

What does this mean?

It means that what you receive from 'heaven'—to put it simply—is that when each person is born, our bodies contain the innate Qi from our parents, which is called 'Primordial Qi.'

Aside from this innate Qi, we also have postnatal breath Qi and grain Qi, which sustain each person's life journey.

The ancients spoke of Qi gathering to give life and Qi dissipating leading to death.

From our cultural standpoint, the smallest substances that form everything in nature and create the myriad things in the natural world are called Qi.

Therefore, traditional Chinese medicine is always established on the premise of harmony between humans and nature; without this harmony, there can be no discussion of health in traditional Chinese medicine.

The concept of Primordial Qi is derived from this very notion.

Just think, when we were still in our mother's womb, only the umbilical cord connected us to her. Once born with a cry, our own Qi formed a unique correlation with the universe.

Traditional Chinese medicine long has the adage 'when genuine Qi resides within, no evil can invade,' which conveys the same principle.

Primordial Qi is fundamental to eradicating any disease, as the renowned Qing Dynasty physician Xu Lingtai stated in On the Origins of Medicine, 'Diagnosing whether a disease will be fatal or not, depends not on the severity of the disease but on the persistence or depletion of Primordial Qi; then nine out of ten diagnoses will be accurate.'