Growing Up With Feng Shui

GROWING UP with

FENG SHUI

BY: TSOI NAM CHAN

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Rising to the clouds It is a clear autumn morning during my early youth. The trees are starting to turn turn yellow and red. The air is pungent pungen t with fall smells. I decide to skip school. As usual, I race to the top of a nearby mountain to pay homage to my favorite wok-shaped rock. Massive in size, this rock lies in the middle of an even larger stadium-shaped hollow cut in along the side of a hill. A stream runs nearby, and a slight wind rustles the leaves. I sit here for some time admiring the rock and the beauties of the steep-sided gorges and hills that surround it. The sun is high in the sky, and the air is wonderfully won derfully clear. I glance upward at the procession of clouds marching across the turquoise-blue sky. I watch for many minutes, spellbound, observing as the ever-changing animal forms in the clouds meld one into another. There’s a giant musk ox. There’s a falcon. There’s a two-headed horse.

Then, suddenly, without warning, I feel a curious lightness. The next moment I am leaving my m y body entirely and rising to the sky. sk y. A moment later I am literally floating with the clouds, dancing between them, changing shapes with them,  blending with the rhythm of all creation. So strange and sublime is this feeling that I lose all awareness of time and space, merging into a sense of oneness with my surroundings. I look around and see leaves flying through the air without motion. I listen, and hear water running without sound. I sense the rocks and ravines, the water slopes, the flapping birds, the th e wild grasses, as it were, from the inside, from the essential center. The more I gaze the more I can see that the earth is an entirely different place than my ordinary senses tell me it is. I understand for a precious moment that everything, all of abounding nature, is constantly being b eing created, then recreated every ever y second, every millisecond, in one unimaginably vast orgasmic dance. Looking back on this event eve nt many years later, I realize I was undergoing a moment, as the Buddhists call it, of “seeing into,” a kind of mystical absorption. As a young daydreamer, I was

 prone to these sudden and mysterious experiences, why, I did not know. I often found myself wondering what was happening to me, and what I was really doing here on this planet. Today I understand that these moments of o f heightened consciousness I experienced as a youth were the beginning of a quest that all of us must someday set out on - a quest qu est to

understand how the symphony of existence ex istence is orchestrated, and how the visible and invisible realms of nature work together to produce the astonishing world that surrounds us.

Tigers and dragons in Hong Kong Harbor Many people think of Hong Kong Kon g as a busy, modern city. In fact, it is a 399 square mile island covered with mountain ranges where, from atop any of its jagged peaks, you can look down on miles of forest spreading in all directions. Tucked away in this rugged countryside coun tryside you will also find many reminders of China’s remarkable past - monasteries, forts, abandoned cities,

ancestral tombs. Everywhere you look there is an ancient beauty. As a child I grew up in this wild land, sleeping under the stars, making friends with animals, observing the changing moods of the clouds and wind and sea. My schoolmates and I visited Taoist monks in nearby mountain caves. Several Se veral of these men were reputed to never eat, and to be more than 120 years of age. I also listened to the elderly men and women in my village matter-of-factly discussing the “generosity ” of certain rocks, or the “fickle behavior” of powers that lived in hills and water, the invisible forces of nature that can punish us or reward us, u s, and that shape the destiny of all living things. I was raised in this small village with my seven siblings, six brothers and one sister. In order of birth, I am number six. My home was located on a hill overlooking Victoria Harbor where on a shoulder-like outcropping my father had h ad built a stone dwelling in the shape of an emperor’s throne. From this vantage point two great hills sloped down to the harbor below, one

flanking either side of our residence. The hill to our left was covered with lush bamboo (it was actually called the Green Bamboo Forest), and housed a busy Buddhist monastery mon astery that I visited frequently as a child. It always reminded me of o f a great green dragon. The hill to our right housed a considerably different type of institution, a military fort built by the British in the last century. This looming concrete and cement structure stared down protectively and, I thought, a bit menacingly, at the harbor below, giving the hill the look of a great white tiger ready to pounce on all invaders. Green dragon and white tiger - excellent Feng Shui, my father always told me.

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Across the harbor from our home was another landmark, Kowloon Peninsula, its name in Chinese meaning “nine dragons.” This signified more good Feng Shui for all of us my father

said.  Nine dragons? Good Feng Shui?

The art and science of Feng Shui The ancient Chinese art of Feng Shui is, in essence, nothing more than a practical method for understanding the ways in which environmental forces, seen and unseen, influence our material and spiritual lives. It is the study of how form, ene rgy, and space affect human experience. Feng Shui can also be called a science –  but a science profoundly different from the Western discipline that concerns itself only with matter and the world o f sight and sound. Unlike Western science, Feng Shui believes in the existence of etheric realms beyond our five senses, and treats these realms with the same care and attention it gives to material objects. It also charts the world of primal energies - especially the energy the Chinese call chi, which for lack of a  better definition can be called the fundamental life force underlying the universe. Do you ever wonder what this strange animating power of life is that cou rses through our limbs, and then moves on? The power that makes the plants in your garden, your dog dig holes, your children grow up, your own physical body pulse with life?  No problem say the Chinese sages –  it is all chi. This force of chi is at once everywhere and nowhere, unseen yet ubiquitous. It influences both our physical and psychological worlds, and is at the very heart of nature, animating the rocks, mountains, trees, lakes, oceans, and geographical formations that surround us. These formations, Feng Shui practitioners believe, exert a subtle but potent influence on our thoughts and deeds; and thus on our health, wealth, and luck. In the Chinese language, the term Feng Shui means “wind and water” - but “wind and water” in the symbolic sense as well as the

literal, wind suggesting the subtle chi energies that move the universe, and water the flowing and ever-changing river of human fortune.

Feng Shui, the nine dragons, and the curse of Bruce Lee

From a Feng Shui perspective, therefore, the nine dragons of Kawloon Harbor that my father thought such good omens are named for nine real-life mountain ranges. These mountains begin far to the north, snaking their way down hundreds of miles, and ending finally at the harbor in Hong Kong. Because of their twisting, serpentine shape, the mountains are said to represent nine playful dragons. The harbor itself, which geographically describes a kind of circle, is a ball that the dragons are busy chasing all the way down from Mainland China. On a deeper metaphysical level the ball is also the Golden Elixir of life, the Pure Essence, the true gnostic wisdom. These nine dragons, the ancients believed, provide superb protective powers, and were sent to earth thousands of years ago to watch over the Emperor of China and guide his good fortunes. (For this reason in Chinese art images of the emperor or “Son of Heaven” are often shown surrounded by dragons.) Since the nine dragons are also, symbolically speaking,  playfully cradling the ball of Hong Kong Harbor in their mighty claws, the city of Hong Kong is nine times protected, and nine times blessed. Or at least that’s the way it was until a few years ago.

Today all of this has changed, and Hong Kong has fallen on hard times. Though there are many possible explanations for its decline, the city’s downward slide from a Feng Shui point of vies it is due, quite simply, to the destructive diggings and burrowings ordered by its new government. We will discuss these mysterious changes in sections below. Each of the nine protective dragons of Kowloon, it should also be pointed out, bears five claws, representing the five elements that compose the universe. Th e architecture of the Imperial Palace in Beijing itself is based on this same number nine, and on the number five, both of which are believed to generate good Feng Shui, and to ensure the long life of the Dynasty. In the old days, ordinary people were not allowed to use the image of the dragon in any capacity. It  belonged to the Emperor alone. Those caught displaying it were considered in violation of sacred law, and were imprisoned. Interestingly, a story is still told in Hong Kong concerning the power of the nine dragons and the legendary Bruce Lee. During the height of his career the great actor and martial artist lived in a section of Hong Kong called the Nine-Dragon Pond. In traditional Chinese thinking, it is believed that the 5

sound and vibration of a name has enormous power, and that people must choose the names they give to things with great cleverness and care.  Now Bruce’s Lee’s name, it turns out, in Chinese means literally “little Dragon.” Since

Lee lived in an area of Hong Kong dominated by the far stronger Nine Dragons of myth, these creatures, Feng Shui experts believe, slowly weak ened the lone little dragon’s inner powers, and

ultimately contributed to his premature death.

Crickets, spiders, and rain All this talk of invisible forces was perfectly normal and reasonable to me when I was growing up. The power and mystery of nature seemed obvious to all of us in the village, and it was never questioned. I spent much of my early youth immersed in it, sleeping on gigantic  boulders, climbing trees, catching birds, fish, shrimp, crabs, crickets. Greatest of all catches were the spiders - not just any spider, but a certain black and gold variety that was well known to have a great “fighting heart.” When we found one of these little

 beauties we built special containers for it out of spikey leaves picked at a nearby monastery. Then a group of us gathered round, turned our catches loose on one another, and watched as they sparred. The spiders seemed to know they were the feature of the day. They battled with enormous energy, ramming each other back and forth, skittering from side to side, looking for all the world as if they were having a friendly match of tai chi push-hands. On other days my friends and I awoke early and raced up the mountain trails to watch the sun come up. Invariably, several old men from our village were already sitting there on a rock, drinking tea, gazing at the mountains, talking with one another about the weather, the clouds, the rising sun. No matter how early we arose, these old wizards with their laughing eyes and crinkled faces always seemed to be there first. “Hey, young man,” one of them might shout at us as we stumbled up the hill. “Come over here! Have some tea with us!”

Sometimes while romping in the mountains sudden storms came up, with claps of thunder that produced a depth and quality of sound the likes of which I have never heard anywhere else on earth. One minute we are playing games in the sun, the next we are swallowed up in impenetrable mists and a downpour that pelts us with rain and hail. We hide under rocks or in caves to avoid the lightening flicking around us like the tongue of some huge cosmic bird.

Then, just as quickly, the storm vanishes, and rays of sun light beam down from the sky, warming us and clearing the wet air until it becomes like crystal. Of all the delights I remember from this time, however, the one I most enjoyed was gazing up at the stars at night as I slept in the open, and wondering what other beings lived out there in these dark pockets of space. I imagined - as I still do from time to time - that I had come from one of these distant planets, and that perhaps some day I’d return.

Even in these benevolent valleys, bad spirits were sometimes encountered. There was one spot in particular, an open slope of pastureland that I could never walk through without feeling suddenly terrified. As I crossed this strange area my hair would sometimes literally stand on end. It was only later when I grew up and could understand such things that I learned the truth about this terrible place. During World War II Japanese soldiers had he rded hundreds of local villagers into this field and shot them down without mercy. Evil events generate evil chi, and if the events are horrible enough, this evil chi lingers in a certain place, as it were, poisoning the land with an unholy spirit of sadness, anger, and pain.

The airport’s tongue The village I lived in was situated in a kind of hollow, and for this reason was known as Shau Kai Wan. The name literally means “the bay that is shaped like a wash basket.”

And indeed, the concave geography of the area around my village plainly resembled what today we might identify as a microwave dish –  which, in turn, is a highly efficient shape for receiving positive energies from the atmosphere and even from stars and galaxies. We will return to this subject below. From my front yard we could also see Kai Tak Airport far below. Its location coincided  precisely with the mouth of Kowloon’s Nine Dragons, and so from a Feng Shui perspective its runways serve as “tongues” for the nine creatures to la p up and regurgitate cosmic energies.

All day long we could watch the planes taking off and landing at this great hub. The great steel flying machines passed into the clouds while others emerged out of them, then vanished again, with all the people on board, all of it activity and swirl, appearance,

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disappearance, here one minute and then plain air: It was an excellent subject for meditating on the Buddhist notion of the impermanence of all things. Sometimes too when I stood in our front yard with my father looking down at this airport he would say something to me he had told me many times: that my fate was different from the fate of my brothers and sisters, that someday I would leave China and travel far away to a foreign land, that I would blossom there, and not return back home for many, many years. And so it was.

The dead are always with us Like all good Chinese family patriarchs, my father’s first concern was that h is children

 be properly educated, and that the tombs of his ancestors be aligned in a direction that was auspicious for his sons and daughter’s education (and, in fact, every one of his children went on

to receive advanced degrees). For a Feng Shui master, arranging one’s home, one’s office, and especially one’s family

cemetery plot, is similar to dialing a radio to a specific frequenc y; or to tuning a TV to the educational station rather then, let’s say, a music or adult entertainment channel. As you will

discover in Feng Shui, the direction a building faces can mean the difference between success and failure, luck and disaster, even life and death. Many years ago my father used his Feng Shui skills to look into the future and predict coming political changes, specifically the arrival of the Communists with all the chaos and upheaval that followed. Based on these and other observations, he uprooted our family from its large ancestral estate in mainland China, and moved us to the village outside Hong Kong City where, as he knew it would, we prospered. Providentially, this village had always attracted people well v ersed in the Feng Shui arts;  perhaps because, ironically, the Feng Shui of the area itself was so good. Here it was not uncommon for uneducated and seemingly unsophisticated locals to discuss the subject of Wind and Water at great and sometimes profound depths. Everyone you met seemed to know something about the energetic workings of this pond here, that stand of trees over there, and most commonly, the Feng Shui laws that governed the construction of ancestral tombs.

The notion of entombing one’s ancestors in an auspicious location is not, of course,

considered of much importance in the West today where, I am told, every fifty years or so some commercial cemeteries plow up their graves and discard the bones of the dead to make way for new interments. Such a practice is unimaginable to tradition-minded Chinese who believe themselves linked to their ancestors in actual physical ways, and who imagine their forefathers to be alive in the next world and actively looking after their children and grandchildren’s welfare - but only if  paid the homage due them. Indeed, the earliest forms of Feng Shui were dedicated solely to the construction of tombs, and it was only later on, as the art evolved through the centuries, that people began to apply Feng Shui to the affairs of the living as well as the dead. As a child wondering through the hills outside our town, I remember seeing family tombs as frequently as one might see telephone  booths on a busy street in New York City. A number of these tombs were covered with fine stone carvings, black and white ceramic tile designs, even pictures of the deceased inlaid into the stone. The families that built them had clearly paid Feng Shui masters large sums of mone y. Studying the way they were built and aligned taught us more about Feng Shui than reading a hundred books. Still, books have their value, especially in the beginning. Eva Wong, an American Chinese expert on Feng Shui, grew up in Hong Kong where she had many childhood experiences similar to my own. As an adult she has written a number of books on the subject. As a twelve-year old girl, Wong tells us in  Feng Shui: The Ancient Wisdom of  Harmonious Living for Modern Times, she was fascinated by Taoist esotericism, and the

divinatory arts in particular. Worried that her parents might disapprove of these “supe rstitions,” she set out on her own to explore the rural areas around Hong Kong, and to discover the secrets of the past. Like myself, she quickly discovered that many of these secrets can be found in ancient ancestral burial plots. Wong writes: I started making plans on how I would learn Feng-Shui. The project had to be carried out discreetly, for I wasn’t sure what my parents would think if they found out . . . I took

hikes around the rural areas in Hong Kong, and made note of the locations of burial sites. There were plenty of those back then, for the rural region of Hong Kong, known as the 9

 New Territories, was not developed. Many grave sites dotted the hillsites, and on a good day I could spot and study five or six of them. Like myself, Wong wondered why these families went to such great lengths to preserve their dead relatives. Why take all the trouble? We love and cherish our departed relatives, certainly. But no matter how honored, deceased family members are, after all, gone from this earth forever, and no longer play a part in the world of the living. Or do they? As with many of the supposedly naïve practices found in ancient cultures, things are not always what they seem. Beneath the surface of practices that appear as pure superstition to outsiders often lurks a remarkably sophisticated, if somewhat esoteric, form of science. The veneration of ancestors, for example, is one of the most esoteric of all oriental  practices, and one of the least understood. In one sense, this ritual is not so far from Christian  beliefs in the immortality of the soul, and in the power of prayer to influence family members long since passed away. Oriental people, however, take the idea of the immortal soul several steps further, believing that the actual physical remains of deceased men and women stay sympathetically “tuned” to the flesh and blood of their living descendants. Given the right

circumstances, this connection can be used as a kind of communication device, much in the way we use a telephone or TV. Let us assume for the sake of analogy that every family possesses its own distinct  biological “frequency;” its own individual “telephone number” assigned to it by nature.

This frequency is determined by the biological materials a family shares in common as  part of its similar genetic inheritance –  blood, minerals, metals, genes, the crystalline pattern structures in the bones, the very DNA. These materials have their own unique electrical charge or signals which, under the right circumstances, can be transferred across our planet’s electromagnetic field like any electronic

message. Since all members of a family are tuned to the same channel (or share the same telephone number), and since there is a kind of mutual magnetic attraction between the physical materials they all share, if properly tuned, family members, both the living and the dead, are capable of serving as electronic sending-and-receiving stations for one another. Relatives can, in this sense, broadcast psychic information back and forth between themselves on their own  private genetic network.

But there’s a catch: All the necessary communication components must be properly set

up and in sync if this transmission is to take place. That is, the mausoleum must be housed in the  proper location. It must face the right direction. It must be composed of the correct materials. And so forth. These elements, in short, must be adapted to fit the specific Feng Shui of the family in question. Just as you and I have different phone numbers, so our family history also differs, with its unique combination of biological variables. My family cannot receive your family’s signals;

your family cannot receive mine. The fit must be exactly right to work properly. There’s another catch too.

If all the necessary components are all in place for broadcast, let us say, but are improperly arranged, transmission will take place, yes. But it will become jumbled. Or worse, it will become short-circuited, possibly even “electrocuting” those in the vi cinity. A poorly designed tomb is often more dangerous to surviving ancestors than no tomb at all.

Voices from our ancestor’s tomb Enter the Feng Shui master. Assuming this master is indeed a master with real experience in the ancient art of mausoleum placement, he or she will study a family’s Feng Shui, learn a bit about their history,

then design a tomb site that is tailor- made to this family’s unique Feng Shui needs. Once correctly designed and built, this burial place then serves its purpose as a finely-tuned telecast station for all family members, both the living and the dead. What are the elements a Feng shui tomb expert must consider? First there is shape and size. An ideal tomb is constructed to look something like a modern microwave dish, with concave center and raised rim. This contoured shape serves as both an energy-transmitting  platform and as an energy receiving station. The bones of a deceased person, we know, are formed by nature into distinct  biocrystalline structures that remain intact for many centuries after death. If these bones are  preserved in a dish-shaped tomb, and if the tomb is properly aligned to the family’s good Feng 11

Shui direction, the tomb helps aim and send the electric output from the bone’s crystal structure to all family descendents, and genetic messages can then be accurately sent from the grave. Along with the positive signals broadcast by an ancestor’s remains, moreover, preserved  bones serve as receiving stations for higher energies sent to our planet every microsecond from the cosmos - from the sun, moon, planets, and stars. These forces were absorbed into our ancestor’s bones during their own life times, and

now, while in their resting place, they continue to be absorbed over the years. If circumstances are right, and if the tomb is properly aligned, these positive forces can be deflected toward descendants. Ancestral remains, in this sense, are both a safe deposit box for the etheric traces of family genetics, and an antenna for receiving and broadcasting higher energies from the universe. A second important consideration in tomb building is the placement and structure of the structure itself To begin, the tomb should be constructed so that it opens out onto a broad, unencumbered view. If a body of water is located somewhere in this vista, all the better. A large mound of earth or even a mountain is then situated at the back of the tomb for support, while gentle hills on either side of the mausoleum grant further protection. Tomb materials are usually made of earth and stone, sometimes very ornate stone with ingenious decorations, religious carvings, and meaningful inscriptions. In one of her essays on Feng Shui, Eva Wong tells a remarkable story demonstrating just how powerful the influence of a burial site can be on all of human history. Tutored by her venerable granduncle for several years in the practice of Feng Shui, this old man one day decides to see how much his young pupil has learned. Hiking together into the Hong Kong wilderness, they make their way to a grave site located in an especially picturesque part of the forest. Wong’s uncle tells his niece to study the

tomb, and to analyze the effect the structure should have on its descendants, The grave turns out to be over 100 years old, and the many inscriptions on its headstone are almost obliterated. Using her Feng Shui comp ass, the lo’pan –  more on this later  –  Wong

takes bearings and examines the landscape surrounding the tomb.

In front she sees a large, cleared area with waterfalls in the distance running down slopes and into pools directly below the grave. Here is the water and open space called for by the masters. Very good so far. On the left of the tomb is a large green hill inlaid with rocks, and resembling the shape of a dragon. Also excellent. To the right sits a smaller hill topped with granite outcroppings  polished white by wind and rain. Green dragon on the right hill, smaller white tiger on the left - the perfect blueprint for a successful tomb. (This same arrangement, you will recall, graced m y family’s home overlooking

the harbor in Hong Kong.) Continuing to examine the area, Wong finds that the land behind the tomb is backed by a large vertical rock wall beautifully lined with green moss. “It was as if the grave were cradled  between the arms of a chair,” she writes. “And this was no ordinary chair, for it resembled the

seat of an emperor as I had seen its pictures of the Imperial Palace in Beijing.” Putting all the evidence together, Wong realizes that this site is no ordinary tomb. “When

I matched the calculation for the site with the surrounding landform, my mouth dropped open in disbelief. The grave in front of me was a ‘king-maker’ site. In other words, a descendant of the  person buried in that grave was destined to be a king, or have the status of one.”

And yet, Wong notes, China had not had an Emperor since the Ching Dynasty was deposed in the early 20th century. Puzzled, Wong nonetheless relates her findings to her uncle, announcing that whatever the case may be, this tomb bears the marks of a royal generation. Her uncle agrees –  his grandniece has passed the test. He then calmly informs her that this tomb holds the remains of the mother of SunYatsen, the famous revolutionary leader who in the early 20th century established the first modern republic in China. “Sun Yat-sen never became the emperor of China” Wong explains, “although he could have if he had wanted to. Yet he is honored as the ‘Father of the Republic of China,’ and remains the most respected figure in Chinese history.”

Direction, then, and placement, are critically important Feng Shui concerns when designing a tomb. But there are other considerations as well, especially the environmental temperament of the area itself. 13

Weather conditions, for example. Rain, lightening, thunder, snow, high winds, sudden storms, all have a profound effect on the electric charge surrounding a burial site, and all must be factored into the Feng Shui equation. If the site is located in a place that cannot process these weather conditions in a way that makes good Feng Shui, a kind of electrical interference results, just as interference occurs on a cell phone or TV, and reception is quickly blocked. This interference then exerts a direct effect on the nervous system of all family descendants, and causes subtle but real chemical changes to take place. Eventually many aspects of the descendants’ lives such as health, education, business success, personal relationships, and day-to-day good fortune, become negatively modified. If, on the other hand, the directional Feng Shui of a tomb is properly balanced, and a harmonic convergence of genetic forces takes place, the tomb’s energetic output becomes

 positive, and benevolent effects are broadcast to descendants. Health improves as a result, minds sharpen, and luck run smoothly and on a steady course. In our society when things go wrong, we turn inward for reasons. Am I depressed? Am I neurotic? The Chinese, on the other hand, look around at the world. Is my Feng Shui bad? they ask.

Killing Hong Kong Every place on earth, every woods, field, valley, monument, house, and especially every city has its own unique destiny. Like people, a place is born, it lives, it dies. The destiny of a place is determined in many ways  – written, as some people say –  but most especially by the men, women, and animals that live there, and by the quality of the Feng Shui that prevails. The great free port of Hong Kong, Pearl of the Orient, has been no exception. For many years after its founding as a British Crown colony in the mid 19th century, Hong Kong was one of the largest centers of shipping and trade in the East. After the Second World War it also became a favorite stop-over attraction for tourists who could now get an

exotic taste of the real China without actually going there (mainland China was embargoed by the West from the 1950s on, and closed to outsiders). Then, sometime in the 1970s and 1980s, good luck seemed to pour into Hong Kong from all directions as never before, and within a matter of a few years the city transformed itself into a mega-sized international hub, a world class center for banking, business, light industry, and high finance. Showpiece skyscrapers sprang up overnight along Kowloon Harbor designed by the world’s greatest architects. Hi tech equipment, expensive textiles, fine jewelry appea red in the

chic new stores, and enormous shipbuilding factories and plastic production plants opened their doors. Vast fortunes were soon made, and the city grew in size many times. Prosperity was everywhere, at least among the privileged classes, and the citizens of Hong Kong saw no reason to suppose the bonanza would ever end. The relatively sudden and inexplicable rise to  prominence of this city over the past 40 years was, in fact, one of the great socio-economic success stories of the 20th century. Why so successful? According to my father, for one simple reason: Hong Kong, as the Feng Shui masters had always told us, was protected by the nine dragons from the north. “But,” my father added, “good luck never lasts forever.”

When prosperity comes to a city it is in the nature of things for its people to want more. “Wars, weapons, a hero’s sword,” my father used to say, “will not be powerful enough to destroy Kowloon’s nine dragons. But human g reed will easily destroy them.” Again, I didn’t know what he meant. How can greed cut up a mountain and a river?

Then the last time I visited Hong Kong I understood. I entered the great harbor and looked all around me. I was amazed. In the late 1990s the new Chinese government, anxious to make even greater profits from its business enterprises and luxury hotels, ordered excavation crews to carve enormous hunks out of the mountain protecting Hong Kong, and to dump the mountain’s sacred soil into the harbor as landfill. The mountain was literally cut up, and in the process the nine dragons figuratively decapitated. 15

On the site of this landfill were now erected office buildings, highways, an enormous convention center. Much of the great open Kowloon Harbor, the same Feng Shui “ball” that the nine dragons had chased for time immemorial, the very Pearl of the Orient itself, was sliced up and reengineered into a long, straight, narrow canal. What did all these topographical changes mean for the city itself? What happens when you disturb the delicate balance of a city’s chi? Remember, in Feng Shui water is a symbol of

money and good fortune. Change the shape of a body of water, and you alter its symbolism as well. So consider: The harbor is dug up, narrowed, and sliced into strips. These excavations expose the currents in the harbor to stronger winds, and cause the water to flow more quickly out the new canal and into the sea. Strong winds and swift waters carry good chi away. And with this chi, symbolically speaking, goes much of the city’s capital resources and good luck. “Like flushing mone y down the toilet,” one Feng Shui master describes it.

And so, at the end of the 20th century the magic began to leave Hong Kong. But there’s another force at work too in all this symbolism.

My father frequently spoke of Hong Kong as representing the black spot on the white side of the yin-yang circle. This makes the city, symbolically speaking, the center of all yang activity in the area. My father went this concept one further too though, comparing Hong Kong’s geographic position as

outlet into the sea with the shape of the male phallus. The male genitals are the organ that releases life-giving energy into the world –  hence Hong Kong is a leader in shipping and commerce and trade. The genitals are also the center of regeneration, and the repository of the life force. And in Chinese medical theory, the male orgasm is a means of ridding the body of chemical and psychic toxins. But what becomes of this fertile symbolism when modern technolog y truncates the landscape? In the case of Hong Kong it causes the symbolic phallus at the tip of Hong Kong to disappear, draining the area of its life force. This act of geographic castration, in turn, produces negative Feng Shui affects all across the area, and ultimately leads to its atrophy and paralysis. Indeed, since Communist China took over Hong Kong and excavated the harbor, the city’s

financial fortunes have plummeted, Fortune Five Hundred companies have pulled out of town along with many of the financial elite while crime, pornography, AIDS, and other woes of the times have arrived to fill the vacuum.

Moral: if you have a recipe for success, don’t tamper with it. Let it be. There is a famous

Chinese proverb that when reduced to its essential message echoes the wise and apt American  proverb which tells us if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Number one rule of Feng Shui.

The myth of independence Be in control of your life. Take charge! Do it your way! Be free! I come across such phrases in books on self-help all the time. The authors promise that whatever I desire can be mine for the taking. All I have to do is practice this exercise, take that course, follow this star - just decide what I want, then go for it. No limits! Simple as that. Underlying these promises is the belief that people can run their lives through their actions and their will. That we are all in control. Also, that we are independent beings who can do what we want when we want - have what we want the moment we want it - all regardless of the consequences. I once saw a cartoon in the New Yorker  that expressed these notions in bitingly funny terms. A group of men and women have just arrived in the pits of hell where the y are being briefed by a demon. The demon stands on a podium, smiles unctuously, and announces to his stricken wards that: “We just want you all to know, ladies and gentlemen, that down here there is no right or wrong. Only what works for you.”

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From a traditional Chinese standpoint the idea that human beings are separate from the rest of nature, and that we can use nature in any way we wish for our own pleasure, is a strange  philosophy indeed. Yes, it is possible to get what we want in life, the Chinese sages believe. And yes, we are masters of our fate. But only in a certain way. What way? First, people must stop thinking of themselves as individual units separate from the rest of creation, and realize they are all as much a part of the natural world as any rock and tree. This, the Chinese sages say, is the first prerequisite. People are not controllers of nature, they are participants in it, Taoism insists, threads in a tapestry that was woven a t the beginning of time, and that extends infinitely into the future and infinitely into the past, with a grand design that is known only to the Infinite –  that which the sages call the Tao. When people are born and when they die they are merely ripples in the movement of this Tao. Wind creates ripples on water, it does not change the water’s properties. Transitions through different stages of life and

death do not change the Tao. The Tao is eternal. Second, the sages tell us people must realize there are immutable laws, both physical and spiritual, that govern creation, and that all of us are subject to these laws. Finally, people must learn to cooperate with these laws, and live in harmony with them. If people achieve these goals, the sages tell us, they will be in tune with the Tao. Then they will live happy, prosperous lives. If they oppose these laws they will be unhappy, sick, miserable, and out of tune. It’s like

rowing in a fast-moving river. If you row your boat upstream against the current an enormous amount of effort is required, you will move at a snail’s pace, and sometimes you will capsize.

But float downstream with the current and you will be swept along, effortlessly reaching your goal. The river does all the work for you –  as long as you cooperate with it. The same is true for the Tao.

Learning to recognize the laws of nature How do we go about discovering the laws of the Tao?

Start with the world around us. Everywhere we look we see evidence of these laws. There is electricity, gravity, the movement of the planets around the sun, and the sun’s

rotation within the Milky Way. All these paths are ordered ac cording to fixed laws. Think of the cycles of day and night. The phases of the moon. Or of animal behavior. The creatures of this earth eat, sleep, nest, migrate, and spawn according to nature's prescribed rhythms. Wild geese fly from north to the south like clockwork when autumn comes, then return like clockwork in the spring. They recognize seasonal changes in climate. The lunar cycle affects the glands of animals as well. The moon is full during the middle of the lunar month, and at the same time the ovaries and digestive glands of crabs become rich and plump. There is evidence that the menstrual cycle of women is also influenced in this wa y. Think of the seasons: living organisms give birth in spring, grow in the summer, reap in autumn, and hibernate in winter. Summer, fall, winter, spring. The sequence never varies. During the day the sun shines on the earth, and at night the moon comes out. Plants thrive and  photosynthesis goes on with carbon dioxide inhaled and oxygen exhaled. Animals are lively in the daytime foraging for food. When night falls the earth grows dark and still, and animals and man sleep. We cannot change these flows and cycles. We are as much a part of them as the rocks and stones and trees in our own backyard. Yet, Taoists believe, modern man has forgotten the importance of these cycles, and no longer lives in accord with their phases and tempo. Struggling to succeed –  and survive - in our technological dream world, we stop hearing the lessons nature whispers to us, and lose contact with the subtle rhythms of our own bodies. The result of living out of sync with these cadences (and for some people, of behaving in opposition to them) is more dangerous than we believe. The more we act as if we are above nature rather than part of it, the more we unleash on ourselves the physical and mental imbalances that typify modern life: depression, fatigue, sexual malfunction, insomnia, anx iety, allergies, and chronic disease. In our materialistic society, doctors attribute such disorders to  physical origins alone: viruses, stress, cholesterol. But at their root, the Chinese sages insist, these problems result from a single primary error: living out of harmony with the Tao .Each of us is made of the same building blocks as the rest of creation. These materials come from the earth itself, and are subject to the same natural forces that determine the earth’s 19

environment - heat, cold, light, temperature, magnetism, electricity. The y shape our soil, our weather, our atmosphere. More importantly, they are the stuff of our own bodies and minds. We cannot escape them.

Once in the dead of winter I was driving along a highway with my mother-in-law, heading in a westerly direction. As we drove, I explained why in Feng Shui during the cold months we are advised to face a southerly direction during much of the day. “But that’s just superstition,” she insisted. “And anyway, modern science h as invented heat and air conditioning. Why do we need Feng Shui?”

At that moment I noticed several large rock cliffs facing us on both sides of the highway. I told her to look at these cliffs carefully. The sides facing south appeared to be dry and sunny. They even had traces of vegetation growing on them, though it was the middle of winter. The sides facing north were sheer walls of ice. The condition of the human body is something similar to this, I told her. No matter how high we turn the thermostat, if we stay mostly in the north side of our living space during winter time, the blood and fluids in our bodies stagnate like ice. Why? Because the laws of nature are the same for everyone and everything- for a rock cliff or for a human being. This is not superstition, I assured her, just good common sense. Good Feng Shui.

Feng Shui and the roots of human illness When I was a young man my father taught me a great deal about the way the subtle energies in the environment around us affect our health. Along with the people in my village, my father seemed to take it for granted that in order to survive and prosper a human being must live in accord with the movement of these energies and with the cycles of nature. He learned this knowledge from my grandfather, and my grandfather learned it from his father a generation before. Such knowledge was part of everyday life in China. I assumed that everyone else in the world know about these things too. Then in the early 1970's I moved to New York City. During my first months in the United States I was dazzled by American energy and know-how, and especially by the clinical miracles I saw in American hospitals.

Soon, however, I began to notice something that puzzled me. Though technologically advanced, people in the United States seemed surprisingly uninformed concerning the simple health and Feng Shui methods that were an integral daily part of life in China. In their rush to get the job done, I noticed, Americans abused their bodies and their vital spirit in ways that would have amazed people in my home village. People here, I could see, were unknowingly shortening their life spans, killing themselves with habits that they thought were harmless and even healthy. And when it came to knowledge of the subtle energies that are the basis of all sickness and health, they appeared to know nothing at all. Today I continue to practice the Chinese healing arts in my medical offices near the United Nations where I treat thousands of men and women every year. Many of my patients are highly motivated, successful, talented people. Yet most of them share a major blind spot in common: they ignore the fact that powerful organic and environmental factors have a direct effect on the way they think and feel. Many of my patients, for example, expose themselves to powerful electronic devices without knowing the consequences. They eat the wrong foods at the wrong times of year. They rest during the hours they should be working, and work when they should be resting. They  practice bedroom habits that deplete their sexual energy rather than increase it. Many of my patients are unaware that their physical and mental needs are different in the winter than in the summer, in the fall than in the spring, in the morning than in the evening. They do not know that sleep is linked to the rotation of the earth, and that the direction their head faces at night affects the depth and quality of their rest. They are unaware that because of the 24-hour cycle of energy circulation in their bodies, there are optimum times of day for eating, socializing, doin g mental work, exercising at the gym, having sex, performing meditation. They have not been told that what promotes wellness when they are young hurts them when old, and vice versa. Most of my patients do not know that men are controlled by entirely different bodily rhythms than women, and that the health needs of each sex are profoundly different. They ignore the effects that elemental forces such as wind, rain, sunlight, color, temperature, and

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magnetism have on their emotions. They do not arrange the living space in their houses or apartments in harmony with the sun, moon, and four directions; and they suffer accordingly. With advances in technology, scientists have come up with a variety of artificial devices that make our lives easier, but which literally poison us and make us sick. Electromagnetic waves and chemical emissions bombard on all sides of our cozy homes- the gas stove, the TV, the electric alarm clock by our bed, the cell phone next to our brain - the refrigerator, radio, microwave oven, computer, FAX machine, stereo –  on and on. Most homes now come equipped with these labor saving devices, and we take them for granted. The results? We live in a kind of chemical and radioactive waste dump that kills us be degrees. I myself have seen innumerable instances of polluted household environments making  people sick. On a Saturday afternoon, for example, I received an interesting call. One of my patients, a famous singer, was feeling dizzy and disoriented. Her boyfriend explained to me that she was booked for 12 appearances at major theaters across the country, and that she had barely made it through her first performance. At times the singer h ad trouble simply standing up. And there were 11 more shows to go. Her worst fear was that she might collapse on stage in the middle of a show. Could I help? I went to her loft immediately. When I arrived she was lying on a living room couch feeling sick and dizzy. I questioned her, examined her pulses, and took a history. “I have these fainting spells,” she explained. “They come on suddenly. I never know when they’re going to strike, and knock me galley-west.”

Where do they happen most? I asked. She thought for a moment. “Well, I guess here in my loft. In New York”

Had she visited any specialists? I wanted to know. “I’ve been to doctors all around the world,” she answered. “They’ve given me brain

scans, Catscans, MRIs, you name it. They can’t find anything wrong.” I performed a course of acupuncture on the spot, and the woman felt better right away. But this improvement was symptomatic. I wanted to get to the bottom of things here.

I began walking around her apartment, poking into hallways, bathrooms, examining the living room, dining room, kitchen. From a Feng Shui point of view nothing appeared to be amiss. I asked permission to check her bedroom. There was nothing unusual there either. Then, suddenly, a picture flashed into my mind, and in an instant I realized what the  problem was. The kitchen and bedroom in the apartment were located next to each other. This is not considered a very good Feng Shui arrangement to begin with. But far worse, the refrigerator was on one side of the wall, the woman’s bed directly on the other. This meant that every night the

refrigerator motor had been spinning a few inches away from her brain.  Now brain waves are electrical in nature. And like any electrical current, when they are situated near a strong electromagnetic force (such as the type generated by a refrigerator) they are easily disturbed It was obvious then what the problem was: the refrigerator motor had been scrambling this poor woman’s brain waves on a nightly basis for years. It was amazing that her fainting

spells had not started sooner. That afternoon we moved the singer’s bed from one side of her room to the other, and

that night she slept peacefully for the first time in months. Next day she gave her performance with blazing colors, and then went on to finish the 11 more shows without a hitch. I was invited as a guest to attend one of these shows, and at the end of the performance the whole crew came up and thanked me for tracking down the problem. Here was an excellent case, I thought, of “what you don’t see can still hurt you, and usually will.”

Another basic law of Feng Shui. A similar event happened several years ago. A middle-aged lawyer visited my office. The woman was suffering from multiple brain tumors, I learned, and had recently undergone several brain operations. The surgeons who operated were unable to remove all the tumors, however, and none of doctors could not explain why the tumors kept reappearing, and why they were growing so aggressively. I questioned the woman carefully, and soon found a possible cause of her problem. Like most of us today, she kept several computers in her home. And worse, both were located barely a foot away from her head. Brain scrambling again. 23

The woman moved the computers, and improvement followed. Several months later, however, she moved the computers back to the original spot. A week or so after that she was in the hospital with a sudden resurgence of the tumors. Several weeks later she was dead. Our outer world and our inner world, Feng Shui tells us, are moved by invisible forces. What you don’t see in either world can hurt you. And what you don’t change in either world can

change you as well.

What this book will do for you This is a book about Feng Shui. Specifically, it is a book about Feng Shui and health. There are, of course, a number of volumes available on Feng Shui today, and clearly the subject has become trendy, both as a kind of do-it-yourself hobby, and as a subject for cocktail conversation. This is all well and good, and certainly it is time that this powerful branch of learning is  paid the attention it deserves. Yet like any that is discipline taken from an ancient culture and grafted onto a modern one, there is much in Feng Shui that has been oversimplified, mistranslated, and most of all, wrongly explained. Most misunderstood of all, I believe, is the relationship between Fen g Shui and health. Like the lawyer and the famous singer who were both made sick by bad Feng Shui in their own nests, I frequently find that my patient’s physical problems stem from environmental causes rather than organic ones. The remedy for these problems is often simple, fast, and astonishingly effective. Sometimes –  certainly not always, but sometimes - a few changes, a few alterations in a person’s living space or working place, make the ailments of a lifetime vanish in months, and occasionally in days. Not every case of sickness and disease fits this picture, of course. But a surprising number do. At the same time, much of what is written on the connection between Feng Shui and healing is sketchy and sometimes downright incorrect. Some books offer ridiculously simplistic

solutions. Others feature Feng Shui instructions that are based on incorrect c omputations or even on systems that are outmoded and wrongly calculated. The emphasis in this book, therefore, is on presenting a system of Feng Shui that my  patients and any interested readers can use in their own lives, in an easy, hands-on way, to gain  better health, and to overcome ailments that are already in place. We will also learn to construct Feng Shui diagrams and charts based on birth times, and on the arrangement of the home and office. And we will discover how to appl y these charts to a variety of the most common ailments and health conditions. Through the many years I have seen good Feng Shui cure people, and I have seen bad Feng Shui kill people. I have watched Feng Shui operate effectively here in my own practice in  New York City, and I have seen it produce wonders in the Orient where it originated. Feng Shui works –  it is real. And it affects all of us whether we know it or not. In this book I will tell you why Feng Shui helps us to better health –  and I will show you how.

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THE GLOW Achievin g Super H ealth with the Cycles of th e Tao

By: Dr. Tsoi Nam Chan with

David L. Carroll

OVERVIEW AND OBJECTIVES

Chinese Medicine Comes Into Its Own Since it was introduced to the United States in 1972 traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has become an important complement -- and for many, an alternative -- to conventional Western medicine. Healing techniques such as acupuncture, pressure-point massage, and herbal therapy, once ridiculed by the American Medical Association (AMA), are now provided as supplementary treatment by more than sixteen thousand MDs across the United States. Note the following: 

To date, more than twenty-three thousand clinical studies have been carried out worldwide on TCM. A majority of these studies suggest higher rates of cure with TCM than with conventional medicine -- sometimes  substantially higher rates -- for ailments such as arthritis, asthma, depression, diabetes, hypertension, impotency, indigestion, infertility, insomnia, ulcers, and many others.

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Many hospital cancer clinics across the country regularly prescribe acupuncture and Chinese herbs to relieve the nausea, fatigue, and vomiting triggered by radiation and chemotherapy.

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Approximately 200 American pain clinics currently use adjunct Chinese medical therapies to reduce chronic pain caused by a variety of diseases.

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Approximately 35 percent of herbal supplements now sold in pharmacies and health food stores in the United States contain traditional Chinese herbs and/or are based on Chinese herbal formulas.

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The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends acupuncture for more than 40 chronic and acute ailments ranging from asthma to diabetes, arthritis to depression.

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In 1997, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) panel found acupuncture to be “a demonstrably effective treatment” for many disorders including fibromyalgia and

general musculoskeletal pain.

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In 1998 eight million Americans consulted a licensed practitioner of TCM. In the last eight years this number has doubled. Many more statistics could be cited to show the dramatic rise in Chinese medicine’s

 popularity. Plainly, this system has gone mainstream, changing the way Americans look at their own bodies and at the forces that promote or sabotage their health. At the same time, TCM is more than a system for curing disease. “If you see a doctor with an office full of sick people,” writes a famous seventeenth century physician from Canton, “avoid that office. Only visit doctors whose patients are smiling, in good humor, and full of constant good joy.”

Why? Because in China a crowd of sick patients languishing in a waiting room is a sign that the doctor’s primary duty has not been fulfilled: to make patients so healthy that they do not get sick

in the first place; to keep them, one could say, in a state of super wellness -- in a state of The Glow.

Getting The Glow The trouble is that most of us in the West do not really believe in super-health. Conventional doctors respond to this idea with an arched eyebrow, assuring us that the  best we can expect from our bodies, health-wise, is a condition of “not-sickness.” The notion that a person can live in a protracted state of youthful and radiant well-being is looked on as a  New Age pipedream. This attitude stems mainly from the fact that conventional Western medicine is geared to cure disease, not prevent it; to remedy an ailment once its symptoms appear, but not to make a  patient’s constitution so strong that the ailment cannot take root from the start. The  best

conventional medicine can do in the prevention department is tell us to eat our fruits and vegetables, watch the fats, alcohol, and tobacco, exercise, and stay out of the rain. As a consequence, we are brought up with a distressingly small amount of information concerning steps we can take on our own  to prevent disease and optimize health. Chinese doctors, on the other hand, assure us that any normally fit person can achieve a long-term state of high health. In fact, great good health and the joy it invariably brings are not accidents of circumstance. Their potential is programmed into our physiology by nature, and is our due as

human beings. We are all potential heirs to The Glow. But only if someone shows us how to get it.

Physician to a Variety of Patients There are a number of books about Chinese medicine on the market today. Most of them are heavy on theory and case histories, light on practical, hands-on self-help. This book is different and, we believe, a good deal more useful. Drawn from the experience of two decades as a licensed practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine in Hong Kong and New York City, Dr T. N. Chan introduces readers of The Glow  to a remarkably complete system of wellness enhancement methods based on the

fundamentals of Chinese Taoist medicine (almost all traditional Chinese medicine is derived from Taoism). Dr. Chan’s system focuses specifically on five cycles of nature that were codified

centuries ago by Taoist physicians. When understood and applied in the ways Dr. Chan explains, the exercises derived from these cycles become lifetime allies in the quest for health,  beauty, vitality, and spiritual attunement. Think, for example, of Deepak Chopra’s worldwide

 popularization of the Hindu Auyervedic medical tradition. Or of Andrew Weil’s acclaimed  books and CD’s on alternative Western medicine. Up until now no representative of the Chinese

healing arts has achieved high profile status. With this book we hope to change all that. A longtime follower of the Taoist way, and currently one of the best-known practitioners of Traditional Chinese medicine in the United States, Dr. Chan has helped and touched the lives of a long list of patients, including many global leaders, United Nation foreign dignitaries and celebrities. He has appeared on major television networks, such as CBS and Lifetime. Also, he has given any lectures and teachings to health practitioners as well as medical doctors. Dr. Chan is also an associate at three New York City hospitals. His objective in writing this book is to introduce the Cycles of the Tao to a national audience -- and by doing so, provide readers with a set of powerful self-applied therapies that, like some of my patients, keep body, mind, and spirit so finely tuned that people literally find themselves “glowing.” “Once we recognize how each of the five major Cycles of the Tao work,” Dr. Chan explains in the opening chapter of this book, “they can be used in conjunction with a self -

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applied program of traditional TCM techniques to achieve what I call The Glow. These TCM techniques run the gamut from internal power exercises to energizing herbal tonics, from healing foods to therapeutic massage, from  Feng Shui practices to protect against harmful influences in the environment to acupoint stimulation to relieve fatigue, from Chinese secrets of cosmetic enhancement to sexual positions that cure disease, from breathing exercises that make us look younger to seasonal diets that hold back aging - and much more.” Practiced in China for over 3000 years, the healing procedures associated with these five cycles and presented in this book by Dr. Chan are little known in the United States. A majority of them have long been the privileged secrets of Taoist physicians and of the moneyed elite in China. Most have not yet appeared in print. This book features many of these methods for the first time.

What Are the Cycles of the Tao? What are the cycles of the Tao and how do they work? Are they the same forces that we study in physics class –  electricity, heat, light, sound?  Not exactly. Textbook physics explains the material world. The Cycles of the Tao explain the interactions that organize the material world and that generate its constant transformation of one state of nature to another: summer to fall, hot to cold, day to night, healthy to sick and sick back to healthy. Though the mechanisms of these cycles are invisible, their effects control every living  being and every phase of nature. All change, all movement, all creation and destruction in the universe are produced by their continuous interplay. How were the Cycles of the Tao originally identified? “Once long ago in China,” Dr. Chan tells us, “Taoist doctors studied the world around

them with a keen and practical eye. They looked at the rising winds, the changing seasons, the effect of water on stone, the passing of time and the aging of creatures. They observed the natural circle of birth, growth, maturity, decay, and death that all living organisms, and all  processes in nature, pass through in the great round of creation. “The entire universe, they concluded, is ordered by an immutable set of natural laws and

cycles. Understand the workings of these cycles and nature becomes an open book.

“The Taoist sages concentrated on studying these cycles and using their principles for

the welfare of humankind. Chinese art and architecture, along with the Chinese martial arts, cuisine, landscaping, city planning, literature, spiritual practice,  Feng Shui, Tai Chi, the Tao te Ching , indeed, the very code of culture that has made China one of the greatest civilizations the

world has ever known, were the results. “But the sages did not stop here. “After centuries of scrutiny they discovered fundamental connections between the cycles

in nature and the organs of the human body. “Since human beings are made from the same substances that compose the rest of the

natural world, they reasoned, the same set of laws that control animals and plants and stars must govern the human body as well. We are all part of a single vast eco-system, Taoist doctors  proclaimed 3,000 years before environmental science made its debut. If we learn how these laws work, then live in accord with them, we will prosper. Disobey them, and a hard rain will surely fall. A Taoist doctor would have no hesitation telling us that the problems of air pollution, deforestation, dying oceans, the Green House Effect, and the dozen other doomsday scenarios that threaten our environment and our very existence are the inevitable result of ignoring the Cycles of the Tao.” “A majority of the disorders we suffer from today,” Dr. Chan maintains, “occur for the same reason that global catastrophes occur: because we disregard our body’s own ecology –  the

ironclad programs of nature that bring health and happiness when followed, and ill health and  bad luck when ignored.”

In this book Dr Chan introduces readers to the five cycles of nature that most influence our lives. These cycles, in a nutshell, are as follows:

Cycle One: The Body’s 24-Hour Energy Clock  Every 24-hours life force, or chi as it is called in the Chinese model, makes a complete circuit into every major organ of the body in the same way that blood circulates through the capillaries and cells. The result of this flow is that each of these organs experiences a two-hour energy high and, on the opposite side of the clock twelve hours later, a two-hour low.

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In the opening chapters of The Glow  readers are shown how to use this built-in  biological clock to chart the best and the worst times of day for undertaking important activities of daily living such as eating, sleeping, waking, exercise, sex, and more.

Cycle Two: The Cycle of the Seasons Cycle Two shows readers how to get in tune with the specific health demands that spring, summer, fall, and winter bring. These demands are not merely physical but mental and emotional as well. As in Cycle One, exercises and techniques are provided for those particular Ten Chief Actions that are relevant to seasonal change -- health, exercise, diet, and others.

Cycle Three: Cycle of the Five Ages In Chinese philosophy a human life is thought to represent a complete day. This day is divided into five periods: daybreak, morning, midday, afternoon, and sundown -- that is, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, middle age, and the later years. These periods comprise the Cycle of the Five Ages. Being consummately practical, Taoists have spent centuries developing techniques that improve health and well-being in each of these stages. The five chapters in this section present Glow-producing techniques that work best for each age. Considered are age-appropriate TCM techniques for health enhancement, diet, physical activity, sexual practices, appearance, work, spiritual practice, rest, and more for each period in a person's life.

Cycle Four: The Cycles of Flying Star F eng Shu i  : Keeping Your Home Safe, Prosperous, And Aglow As time and environmental forces change in our lives, the conditions in our homes change as well. Using the easily grasped principles of Flying Star  Feng Shui, in this section readers are shown how to adapt their household environment -- decoration, furniture placement, furnishings, wall color, interior space, room direction -- to the shifts in positive and negative energy each year over a 20-year period.

The charts and formulae featured in this section explain which rooms and which directions in a residence are auspicious or inauspicious, healthy or harmful, romantic or antiromantic. A year-by-year Feng Shui blueprint is provided, showing readers how to prevent their home from becoming oppressive, confusing, even hazardous, and how to enhance their  prosperity, health, and inner spirit.

Cycle Five: The Yin Yang Cycle Of Man And Woman Thousands of years before physicists discovered the atom, Taoist philosophers observed that nature operates according to the interplay of opposites. Without night there is no day. Without hot there is no cold. Without a positive proton there is no negative electron. And without the male-female dichotomy there is no human race. The sages considered this interaction of opposites and the equilibrium it created to be the fundamental creative force of the universe. They called it the cycle of Yin and Yang . The sages also understood that because men and women embody opposite charges -- male positive, female negative -- they are correspondingly different in their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. If either sex is to function at the top of its game, they insisted, a program of health, appearance, and well-being must be followed that is appropriate to each sex. Based on the cycle of interplay between yin and yang, this chapter provides a comprehensive wellness and lifestyle program for men and for women.

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CHAPTER-BY-CHAPTER OUTLINE FOR TH E GL OW  The tone of The Glow is first person, informal, and advisory in a friendly, non-directive way. Its structure is step-wise and programmatic. The Glow begins with a general introduction to concepts of Taoism and Chinese healing

methods in general. Five sections follow, each containing a set of chapters elucidating a different Cycle of the Tao, and explaining how each of these cycles can best be used to get The Glow. The book concludes with a general chapter of little-known wellness strategies designed to help readers survive and prosper in today’s high speed, high-tech, high burnout world.

The chapter-by-chapter structure of The Glow is as follows:

Introduction: Getting The Glow A Childhood In China - Dr. Chan tells of growing up in rural Hong Kong in the

company of Taoist scholars and 100-year old monks. As a child it was taken for granted in his village that if a person lived in accord with the cycles of nature and followed certain rules of living passed down in China for centuries, a state of “super health” was not only possible but

expected. Coming to New York  - Dr. Chan comes to New York City and opens a suite of medical

offices near the United Nations. Here he quickly discovers that his American patients are woefully lacking in many of the common sense preventive and health-enhancing skills he was taught as a child. He sets out to educate his patients as well as to cure them. These efforts inspire him to write The Glow. What Is The Glow? What are the Cycles of the Tao? - The Glow is a state of

maximum physical and mental health. It can be achieved through knowledge of Cycles of the Tao. The reader is told how and why they work. Overview of Chinese Medicine  - A synoptic overview of the fundamentals of Chinese

medicine is next provided, introducing readers to key concepts in Taoist medicine: yin and yang, chi flow, the jingmai and acupoint system, the three basic human energies, the five emotions, the eight causes of disease. All explanations are non-technical and concise. Tie-ins are made with concepts of The Glow and the Cycles of the Tao.

The Tools of the Taoist Healing Trade  - Readers are familiarized with the tool chest of

TCM techniques used throughout this book in conjunction with the Cycles of the Tao: acupressure, cupping, tui-na self-massage, herbal elixirs, breathing techniques, chi gung healing and energy development exercises, moxa applications,  shen dao  neck release, Five Elements diet, Feng Shui, Do-In, life style modification, Glow-inducing meditations, and more. Getting The Glow   - Dr. Chan concludes his introduction by telling us that we are all

 programmed by nature to live decades longer than we suppose, and to enjoy a greater degree of health than we ever imagined. Longevity and well-being are part of our natural heritage. Whether we claim this heritage is up to us. The practices and exercises in this book are based on a scholarship that comes down to us from a remote and illustrious past. They do not stem from a single mind, but from the trial and error and empirical observation of more than five thousand years of healing experience in China. On the most fundamental level, they embody the collective wisdom and genius of the Chinese soul. Yet despite their great age, Taoist health practices are strikingly relevant for today’s

world, touching us at our deepest core and addressing our most urgent needs -- health, happiness, freedom from stress, the quest for emotional aliveness, and the brightening of the ordinary routines of life that are so often colorless and drab. The way to stake this claim, moreover, is clear: * Start now, today, this very minute. Follow the road map laid out for you in this book and choose the exercises within each of the five cycles that dovetail with your particular constitution and temperament. * After you have discovered the techniques best suited to your needs, the ones that effectively stimulate The Glow in body and soul, forget about the rest. This book is filled with a large number of suggestions and techniques. Not all of them fit each person’s body type or life

style. Just find the ones that work best for you. * Finally, stay with your favorite routines, do the best you can, believe in these timetested methods, and most importantly, believe in yourself. Give it all time, and give it hope. The rest will follow as surely as the cart follows the horse.

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CYCLE ONE: LIVING IN TUNE WITH THE BODY’S 24-HOUR 24 -HOUR ENERGY CLOCK Chapter One: Introducing The Body’s 24-Hour 24-Hour Energy Clock We all have a 24-hour bioenergetic time clock hard-wired into our systems. This clock connects our mind and body to the rotation of the earth, and to the internal flow of life energy that Chinese physicians call chi. Plug into the rhythms of this clock in the appropriate ways and the rewards quickly  become apparent. Indeed, one of the main reasons that people undergo so many oddities of health and unpleasant states of mind is because the timing of their everyday endeavors -- eating, drinking, exercising, taking naps, imbibing alcohol, having sex -- is out of sync with their body’s true  biological needs of the moment. This imbalance can be quickly remedied by learning to cooperate with nature’s bio-energetic rhythms.

Study the diagram to the right. Note that when the name of an organ -- the lungs, liver, heart -- is  printed in bold letters this means the chi energy is strongest in this organ during the corresponding two hour time period marked in the circle. On the opposite side, twelve hours later, the same organ is  printed in italics. This organ is now at its weakest two-hour point on the  bioenergetic cycle. The energies in our bodies, in other words, behave much like tides on a beach. Every 24hour period a particular organ experiences a high tide of life force and a low. For this reason there is a best and worst time of o f day or night for any major activity.

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There is a favorable and unfavorable time for mental concentration, say, or creative thinking; for sleep, elimination, eating, making love, holding meetings, making decisions,  playing cards, building a house. Taoists doctors organize these activities into ten major categories, officially referring to them as Ten Chief Actions : 1. Wellness enhancement : Health empowerment, fitness training, exercise, sports, games,

 physical activity of all kinds 2. Food and nourishment : Eating, digesting, eliminating, maximizing nourishment

co -workers 3. Work : Solving problems, making decisions, dealing with co-workers 4. Creativity: Artistic endeavors, original and creative thinking, active imagination 5. Appearance and personal hygiene : Skin, hair, and nail care, preserving a youthful look,

enhancing cosmetic appearance 6. Socializing:  Friendships, family time, celebration, entertaining, party planning 7. Sex: Romance, love, sexual play, fertility concerns 8. Gaining knowledge : Cognitive learning, study, concentration, gaining wisdom 9. Spiritual practice : Meditation, intuition, self-attunement 10. Rest: Relaxation, reducing tension, lowering stress, sleep, dreams

Let’s take several examples.

If you suffer from palpitations, fibrillations, or heart problems, avoid intense exercise  –  working out at the gym, hiking, playing tennis -- between the hours of 11 A.M. to 1 P.M. This is the peak hour for coronary activity, and the cardio-pulmonary system is now working at full capacity. If you push an already stressed heart beyond its limits at this time of day shutdown can occur. More heart attacks occur between the hours of 11 A.M. and 1 P.M. than at any other time of day. Likewise, avoid drinking alcohol at mid-day. According to the body’s 24-hour energy cycle, blood circulation is now at its strongest, and alcohol reaches the brain at lightening speeds. Even after having one beer with lunch you may end up returning to the office with a red face and blurred speech. It is also common knowledge in China that lobster is excessively yang, making it inflammatory and over-stimulating for persons with circulatory problems. If you fall into this category avoid lobster for lunch when your heart energy is at peaking. (Also note: if you suffer

from a cancerous tumor, do not eat lobster at any time. Its red, aggressive energy will seriously aggravate your condition.) The best time of day to eat breakfast on the 24-hour clock is between the hours of 7 and 9 in the morning when the chi is most active in the stomach, and when the flow of digestive enzymes is at its height. On the other side of the stomach cycle, at 7 to 9 in the evening, the movement of digestive juices is correspondingly lethargic; which is why fashionably late dinners so easily trigger bloat and indigestion. The Chinese therefore believe that breakfast should be the largest and most nourishing meal of the day, while dinner is be best kept light and is the meal you can most easily skip (“Eat  breakfast like a king,” goes the Chinese aphorism, “dinner like a pauper.”)

When cooperating with the rhythms of the body’s inner clock it is also prudent to avoid certain activities at certain hours of the day. Take for example a typical weekend scenario for a hard working, fun loving individual. Around 7:30 P.M. on Saturday night our friend eats a massive, salty dinner just when the gastric enzymes in his stomach are at their lowest levels (see chart). Half-digested meals result,  possibly with gripping stomach cramps occurring later in the evening. By 9 P.M. our friend is at a bar, downing cold beers or iced vodka tonics, all at a point on the energy circle when his body’s inner thermostat (called by Chinese doctors, the “triple  burner)” has the strongest need to retain heat. Result: shivers, hot flashes, and other assorted

short-circuits to the body’s internal te mperature gauge. As he clinks glasses with friends he also ingests quantities of spicy bar foods. Trouble is it's 10 P.M. now and his spleen energy, so necessary for processing hard – to-digest to-digest foods, is at the weakest point on its cycle. c ycle. The evening progresses to 1 A.M., let us say, and our friend’s liver, now flooded with alcohol, is at the bottom of its cycle, a time when the quiet that sleep brings is most needed to  build new blood and remove toxins. Returning home at 3 A.M., his body is seriously dehydrated dehydra ted  by alcohol and salt. He gulps down large quantities of water to compensate, just at the time of of day when bladder energy is at a 24-hour low. For the rest of the night he will probably be getting up every hour or so to urinate.

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Finally, feeling wretched from toxicity and lack of sleep, our friend slumbers through the morning hours  – the very time on his body’s energy cycle when elimination and detoxification are most effective. Living this way every weekend, perhaps for years, perhaps for decades, our typical individual then wonders why he or she feels so unwell so much of the time. In short, by ignoring our body’s daily clock we are reducing our chances of enjoying a

long and healthy life. On the other hand, once we learn the simple knack of living in accord with these cycles and remaining in harmony with their tempo. Our mental capacities sharpen, our emotions move at a more even keel, our physical powers increase, and soon The Glow follows.

Chapters Two through Seven Chapters Two through Seven in Cycle One now profile the six two-hour morning and evening periods on the body’s energy clock, guiding readers through the best and the worst

times of day to undertake essential daily activities. These activities, as mentioned, include the Taoist Ten Chief Actions. The following section from Chapter Two profiles the first Chief Action, Wellness enhancement, for the hours of 5 to 7 in the morning and 5 to 7 in the evening.

1. Wellness enhancement  –   Energy reaches its peak in the colon, and its low point in the kidneys, from five to seven in the morning. Unpleasant symptoms experienced in either organ during these hours may indicate a significant energy imbalance here, and thus the  potential for health problems. The following are examples of what can be done:

Morning from five to seven: high energy time in the colon

* Waking up - The colon’s job at this time of day is to expel wastes. If prevented from  performing its function, toxins in the feces are reabsorbed into the bloodstream and recirculated throughout the system. People feel tired and out-of-sorts as a result. Energetically speaking, therefore, five to seven A.M. is the ideal time to wake up and begin the day. But dragging oneself from under the covers is not an easy task. And anyway, it is imprudent to bolt out of bed the moment your eyes open, as too speedy a rising can be harmful to the kidneys, already at their lowest energy point. Taoists, moreover, believe it is better to wake up all organs before physically rising. All organs in the body, they maintain, have a soul.

During sleep this soul is at rest too, and when the alarm clock rings it needs as much time as other parts of us to wake up. The following exercises, designed to help you awaken the right way, by degrees, are done in bed. They are designed to stimulate the kidneys and large intestine, though many other organs including the heart, lungs, and bladder benefit as well. Do a round or two of these exercises before you get up. Your energy level and glow quotient will feel the benefits all day long. Featured exercises include: -

Visualization exercise: opening your heart before opening your eyes

-

Beaming the Taoist “inner smile” onto each major organ in the body

-

Toe wiggling exercise for clearing the mind (and based on the toe-brain connection)

-

Three arm and leg stretches to stimulate chi and get the blood moving

-  Kwan Mu  eye opening and blinking exercises (invented two-thousand years ago by the legendary King Mu) -

Side-ways, forward, and rotation eye movement exercises

-

Hair pulling exercise

-

Cranium tapping exercise

-

Stomach rotation rub and abdominal heating massage

-

Two nostril breathing exercise for focusing concentration

*  Mind-body wake-up and focus - Once you’re out of bed this little known but extremely effective morning exercise regime, known as  Dao Yin, uses a combination of acupressure, stretching, self-pounding of head, neck, and trunk, and self-massage to maximize secretions in the stomach, bowels, bladder, and pancreas, and to promote morning well-being. Key exercises in this routine include - Regenerative alternative nostril breathing - Combing the scalp 36 times with a wooden comb - Rotating, protruding, and massaging the tongue - Tapping the gums and clicking of the teeth for improved dental health - Drumming on the back of the head and neck for instant mental focus 41

- Rotating the head and limbs for elasticity - Shaolin Monastery eye exercises to stimulate the nervous system - Pinching the eyebrows for blood flow to the forehead -  Hin li saliva swallowing exercise for improved digestion at breakfast - Stimulating acupressure points on the scalp, face, and neck - Rotating the arms, hands, hips, knees, and feet to improve joint flexibility - Rubbing the lumbar regions and tapping the ming mun, “ life gate” on the spine - Drumming with the fists on the lower back to stimulate kidney energy - And more * Opening the energy gates acupressure  –   Instructions are given for digital stimulation of kidney and colon-related acupressure points. This two-minute exercise is designed to “open the gates” of several important energy centers in the lower back and  Dantien  area of the stomach. * Sun Lu breathing exercises  - The famous set of Sun Lu  breathing exercises is designed to improve morning circulation and to concentrate the mind. * Colon health self-massage –  Placing both palms on the lower abdomen and making 36 rotating movements clock-wise and counter clock-wise, this classic Taoist exercise speeds up transit time for the feces in the gut, expedites the body’s morning detoxification process, and as

a bonus strengthens sexual function as well. * Full body dry brush  –   One of the best ways to cleanse the lymphatic system is by

 brushing the surface of the body each morning with a soft dry brush made of natural bristles. Special stroke patterns used in monasteries by Taoist monks are illustrated here for brushing the arms, the legs, back and trunk. With this method the pores are opened for better oxygenation, and fluid elimination is improved. Dry skin brushing stimulates the lymph canals to drain toxic mucoid matter into the colon, purifying the entire lymphatic system. Skin brushing is stimulating to surface circulation of blood, and leaves you feeling invigorated for the entire day. *  Maximizing elimination - The colon’s principle job from five to se ven A.M. is to assimilate nutrients and move residues through the gut for elimination. You can help the process along at the colon’s prime time by using the following techniques.

- Because peristalsis is especially active in this wake-up hours, now is the best time of day to have a bowel movement. Nine out of ten people suffering from

constipation can cure their condition by training their bodies to use the bathroom at this time. - Readers are taught to stimulate specific acupressure points on the hands, stomach, and feet to improve elimination and fight constipation.

Morning from five to seven: low energy time in the kidneys

*  Morning urination problems –   Many people are woken up in the early morning hours  by a painfully full bladder. If this occurs from the hours of five to seven, energy in the kidney may be weak. Dr. Chan prescribes herbal concoctions and exercises to reduce discomfort. * The trouble with morning sex –   Since five to seven is the weakest time of day for the kidneys, sex at these hours can be lackluster and unfulfilling. The sexual hormones are, as it were, late risers, usually requiring 10 or 12 hours to fully self-activate. Which is why sex from five to seven in the evening is a preferable time (see kidney high time below). For couples that are trying to conceive, moreover, low levels of sexual hormones in the morning hours statistically reduces a woman’s chances of getting pregnant.

*  Lower back problems and the kidneys - In Chinese medicine lower back problems are associated with insufficient kidney energy. Since five to seven A.M. is low time for kidney function, lower back pain upon awakening is often a sign that this highly critical energy is depleted. The following lower back strengthening techniques will help: *  Dr. Chan’s complete eight-step lower back repair program - This early morning, 10minute exercise and self-massage program is designed to relieve lower back pain, strengthen stomach and intestinal muscles, balance the body’s three  burners or “inner thermostats,” and to

 beef up kidney energy in general. Exercises include: - Four Chi gung  energy exercises for lower back pain relief - Kidney fist pounding in a hot shower - “Wave Hands Like Clouds” Tai Chi exercise for bowel health and lower back  - All-fours Lo Pan Monastery crawling exercise for spinal realignment - Self-applied acupressure stimulation for lower back pain - Three lumbar push exercises

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- Iron stalk back strengthening breathing exercises (with emphasis on drawing Qi energy directly up the spine) - Burning moxa sticks over select acupuncture points for lower back healing. Moxa sticks contain the herb mugwort in compacted form. See sources listed in the Appendix.

Evening from five to seven: low energy time in the colon * Since peristalsis is now at a 24-hour low, attempting to force a bowel can encourage

hemorrhoids and tearing of the anus muscles. If the urge comes at this time follow it, of course. Otherwise give it a rest. * Feeling abdominal cramps and a hollow kind of weakness in the bowels from five to seven in the evening may indicate a deficiency of yang energy in this area. The following techniques help stimulate colon energy: - Herbal elixir for low colon energy. - Four foods to eat from five to seven P.M. to improve digestion and nourish the lower digestive tract. - Miso soup is a fermented soybean paste that adds friendly intestinal fungi plus aspergillus

orrhizae for balance and regularity. Take it before dinner every day. A recipe is provided.

Evening from five to seven: high energy time in the kidneys

* The best and worst times to conceive a child  –   Since the kidneys control sexual  performance -- on the Chinese body map they are the primary organ of fertility and libido -- the twilight hours are prime time for intercourse and, if so desired, con ceiving. On the opposite side of the clock, at five to seven in the morning, the kidneys are at a 24hour energy low. During this time sexual response is often sluggish and disappointing for both  partners. So are sexual hormone and fertility levels. Plan accordingly. * Taoist fertility family aids  - Dr. Chan discusses the problem of fertility and conception from the Chinese medical standpoint. He provides a mini-course on little known techniques to increase fertility in both sexes. These methods include: - Herbal sexual and fertility tonics - Testicle and ovary massage - Testicle and ovary breathing

- Anus contraction exercises for prostate strength - The upward vaginal draw exercise for women - The “microscopic orbit” exercise for men The remainder of Chapter Two deals with the kidney and colon high and low times in relation to specific Chief Actions: eating, work, creativity, gaining knowledge, spiritual practice, and rest.

Chapters Three Through Seven The remaining five chapters in Cycle One continue to move systematically round the  body’s energy clock, detailing best and worst times of day for significant daily activities.

Within the entire 24-hour energy cycle, of course, certain activities are more likely to be  performed at certain hours than others. Depending on the time of day, certain Chief Actions are thus emphasized while others are profiled only in passing. Relaxation or intense mental work, for example, are not ordinarily part of peoples’ routine from five to seven in the morning or

evening. These activities are therefore given less emphasis in Chapter Two.

Chapter Three: Maximizing the Ten Chief Actions from 7 to 9 A.M. and P.M. Chapter Four: Maximizing the Ten Chief Actions from 9 to 11 A.M. and P.M. Chapter Five: Maximizing the Ten Chief Actions from 11 to 1 A.M. and P.M. Chapter Six: Maximizing the Ten Chief Actions from 1 to 3 A.M. and P.M. Chapter Seven: Maximizing the Ten Chief Actions from 3 to 5 A.M. and P.M.

CYCLE TWO: THE CYCLE OF THE SEASONS Chapter Eight: Enhancing The Glow In Each Of The Four Seasons 45

In our busy lives we often forget that we live on a planet, and that we are constantly influenced by our biosphere’s changing environmental conditions: the weather, the climate, and

most importantly, the cycles of the season. Within our biosphere today it also seems that  practically anything can make us sick -- the air, the water, the food. Some of these dangers (smoking, greasy burgers, overindulgence in alcohol) can be avoided. Others can’t. In Taoist

medicine these unavoidables are referred to as the Six External Pathogens  –  that is, the six basic seasonal conditions that undermine our health: Wind, Cold, Summer Heat, Damp, Dry, and Fire. While over-exposure to one or more of these pathogens is considered the primary environmental cause of disease, they can be helpful as well as harmful, depending on how our  body processes them. In the four chapters that follow Dr. Chan shows readers how to minimize the negative effects of the Six Pathogens in each of the four seasons, and how to maximize their health-bringing potential. He also provides a wide range of techniques that help maximize The Glow in every season.

Chapters Nine Through Twelve Principal topics covered in the next four chapters, Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter include: * A diet for every season  – Although the fact is not widely known, food choice and food

 preparation in traditional Chinese cooking is based on a Cycle of the Tao known as the Five Elements. The principles of this cycle will be explained in the text. By mastering the interplay of the so-called Five Elements (as symbolized by water, wood, fire, metal, earth plus their related qualities: the Five Tastes, the Five Smells, the Five Food Consistencies, the Five Food Colors, and the Five Food Nutrients), readers are shown the ancient Chinese art of balancing different foods to tailor-make a diet for each person’s individual constitution and nutritional needs. “Learning to eat properly, at the right time, in the right way, and with the right typ e of foods in the right balance according to changes of season and weather,” Dr. Chan tells us, “is perhaps the single most important road to beautiful appearance and good health.”

Techniques included in this section are: - Cold or hot food: which is best at which time of year. - Food preparation techniques especially for certain seasons.

- Foods and food combinations that make us sick or well, depending on whether the weather is hot or cold. - Food combinations that enhance seasonal glow. - Drinking alcoholic beverages during different seasons. Is there a time of year when alcohol hurts us most? Is there a specific time of year when it helps? - The best foods to eat -- and to avoid -- in each season. *  Appearance and cosmetic concerns –  Included are: - Special Chinese creams and oils that protect skin against winds, dryness, heat, fickle temperatures and other pathogens. - Facial self-massage for the seasons. - Seasonal foods that nourish the complexion. - Cosmetic do’s and don’t for summer, fall, winter, and spring. - Taoist tricks for protecting hair in wind, dryness, and rain. * Sex and the seasons –  Sex can build immunity, cure certain diseases, and help us attain The Glow. But be careful. Sexual energy levels rise and fall depending on the season, and wise lovers go with the flow. During the spring, for example, when the sap is rising and rivers move in torrents, sexual energy is moving too and can be indulged in frequently. During the winter, when the forces of growth return to the earth and nature rests, more restraint is required. Too much sex at this time can deplete the vital force, causing people to become tired and depressed at a time of year that already encourages such feelings. Sex can also be damaging to one’s health and spirit during

heat waves, extreme cold snaps, and in the overly yang environment of direct sunlight. Ways to harmonize sex with our physical needs and emotions during each of the four seasons are explained in detail. *  Different physical exercises for different times of years –  Blood circulation, heart rate,  breathing, metabolism, digestion, energy level, sexual energy, sleep patterns, mental activity –  all require different physical movements and exercises at different times of year. Dr. Chan  provides traditional season-oriented exercises that provide maximum benefit for every time of year.

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*  Rest and relaxation  –   Spring is a time of birth, renewed energy, new ventures, and undertaking projects that seemed impossible in the dead of winter. At the same time, the tendency now is to push the envelope, which in turn can injure the body’s vital spirit. The rhythms of rest and activity for each season are explained. Dr. Chan provides tips for balancing exertion and relaxation during seasonal energy highs and lows. * The seasons and our changing emotions  –   In Taoist medicine, different emotions are connected to different seasons. Anger and kindness belong to the spring, for example, hysteria and joy to the summer, courage and anxiety to the winter, and so forth. Using classic Taoist exercises including The Five Healing Sounds, abdominal breathing, and color visualizations, dark seasonal energy is kept in check and positive seasonal energy called forth. *  Healing smells  –   In China a form of aromatherapy has been practiced for centuries. Based on the so-called Five Smells -- bitter, sour, sweet, salty, and pungent (spicy) -- it was long ago determined by Taoist doctors that inhaling certain essences at certain seasons bolsters the immune system, improves mood, and helps mental concentration and meditation practice. Even skin quality and eye sparkle can be improved by inhaling the right essences at the right time of year. Dr. Chan shows readers how. *  Healing herbs for every season –   Dr. Chan guides us in the use of tonics and herb mixtures for each season: herbs to clean the lymphatic system in spring, cool the blood in summer, build immunity in autumn, maintain body heat and vitality in winter. *  Moxa –  Moxibustion is one of the best-kept secrets of the Chinese medical arts. Made from the leaves of the common herb, mugwort (technical name, artemesia vulgaris), a burning moxa roll is passed over particular acupuncture points to increase energy and prevent disease. While burning, moxa smolders in a slow controlled way, producing a deep, concentrated heat, and emitting the smell of a strong, strange incense (just the odor of moxa is said to be healing). Studies show that when moxa is burned over selected acupoints at the beginning of a new season immunity is provided for diseases common to that season. Moxa treatment increases surface skin chi, beefs up red blood count, and prepares the body for the coming heat of summer or cold of winter. Dr. Chan shows us how to use moxa in each season, and which points to burn it over. * Combating the Six Pathogens in each season  –  Let’s take spring as an example. Weather-wise, and so health-wise, this is an especially treacherous season. There are late snows,

April showers, high winds, damp feet, and widely varying extremes of temperature. All create ideal conditions for sickness. But there are ways to prepare ourselves: methods for off-setting the negative effects of dampness with common fruits; methods to avoid catching cold after spring rains by massaging the feet and pressing certain acupressure points; and much more. * Special healing treatments for seasonal ailments –   Acute disorders are often seasonal: summer bronchitis, rainy day arthritis, fall allergies, winter colds, spring fever, to name a few. All are induced by climactic extremes. Dr. Chan provides readers with powerful but little known remedies for a number of season-specific ailments.

Chapter Ten: Summer Chapter Eleven: Fall Chapter Twelve: Winter

CYCLE THREE: CYCLE OF THE YEARS Chapters

Thirteen

Through

Seventeen:

Enhancing

The

Glow

Throughout A Lifetime Each of the Taoist Five Ages -- childhood, teenage years, maturity, middle age, and the later years -- has its own discrete health and welfare requirements. “What cures us at twenty can kill us at fifty -- and vice versa,” a Chinese proverb declares. The following five chapters, one for each age, feature appropriate age-related advice: 49

* Secrets for improving appearance as the years pass - Wrinkles, blemishes, cracked

skin, thinning hair, and other classic signs of aging, according to Chinese thought, originate inside the body, not out. They are the result of internal energy slow-downs: stagnant circulation,  poor lymph distribution, incomplete elimination, and most of all, sluggish chi flow. Wrinkles, for instance. According to Chinese thinking the cracks in our faces are metaphorically equivalent to cracks in the earth that appear during a drought. Moisture from rain -- i.e. expensive external skin treatments -- brings life back to the parched land, yes; but only temporarily. After a few days the rains stop, the water evap orates, and the drought returns. It is better, Taoist beauty experts assure us, to irrigate the soil by replenishing water springs beneath the earth - that is, by strengthening the energy channels that flow below the skin surfaces on the face, neck, scalp, and torso. In this way the “land” is moistened and permanently

nourished, and the grass and flowers are brought to bloom. The older we get the more we need the healing cosmetic tricks and techniques profiled in this section. -  Beauty methods of self-massage. Five unusual palm friction-rub facial exercises are offered for bringing moisture and smoothness back to the face, neck, shoulders, and arms. Stimulation of selected facial acupoints produces similar results. Self-applied methods of percussion, kneading, digital stimulation, pounding, and rubbing. -  Facial exercises  –  Facial “calisthenics” are offered for increasing facial blood and lymph circulation. Wrinkling the nose, massaging the forehead, puffing out the cheeks, clicking the teeth, protruding and wiggling the tongue, jutting the chin, stimulating critical acupoints on the cheeks and around the eyes, tightening groups of facial muscles *

in rotation, and lots more is offered to “irrigate” the skin from below and increase

health-giving chi flow. - Over-the-counter Chinese medications –   Pearl Cream for complexion ,* Li Po Tablets

for wrinkles ,* Ren Li Shan* to feed hair follicles, and many more over-the-counter Chinese beauty products are profiled. These products really work and are highly affordable. Dr. Chan tells us about a number of remarkable beauty medicinals that treat skin and hair on an energetic level. An Appendix tells how and where to purchase these  products.

*

 See Appendix for sources in the United States

- The Heart Jingmai exercise - A special internal energy exercise for eliminating crows feet and eye wrinkles, and stimulating the pineal gland to “wake up” nerves in the ears,

cheeks, eyes, mouth, and neck that regulate facial appearance. - The Fourteen-Jingmai Visualization exercise  - For increasing skin tone, banishing fatigue lines, and strengthening the lungs, the organ in Taoist medicine that exerts a constructive or destructive influence on skin and complexion. - Tan Lu saliva swallowing exercises –   Saliva is a regenerative elixir if manufactured in adequate amounts and swallowed in large quantities at the proper times such as after Chi Gung exercises -- provided here -- and between partners during sex. Scientific analysis of saliva shows it contains a number of enzymes that promote protein synthesis (skin), reduce bleeding time (menstruation), and inhibit the growth of skin cancer cells. Saliva also contains immunoglobulins and other compounds that have an antibacterial effect. One study of chi gung practitioners shows after exercise their saliva contains twice the usual level of immunoglobulins. Saliva swallowing exercises also have a nourishing affect on physical appearance, brightening the eyes, increasing skin tone, and increasing longevity. Tips are given for increasing “the precious juice,” as the Chinese call saliva, at different ages. - Herbal tonics  - Especially for restoring youth and improving physical appearance.

Different formulas are offered for different ages. - Dry skin brushing  –  A little known miracle for purifying the lymph glands, detoxifying

the body, and restoring complexion radiance. Also explained are methods for stimulating  beauty centers by combing and stroking the scalp with a wooden comb. * Appropriate energy-building exercises for different stages of life  –   A selection of internal Chi Gung energy for childhood, youth, middle age, and the later years. * Diet  –   Dietary requirements, the Chinese believe, change dramatically as the body

ages. Certain fruits and vegetables that nourish children should be carefully regulated as one  passes through various stages on the aging cycle. In this section we learn about: *

- The best and worst foods for growing children. - Feeding your teenager the Taoist way.

*

 See Appendix for sources in the United States

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- Eating for an active life from 20 to 45. - Mid-life: changing foods for changing hormones. - The later years: foods that keep us young and promote longevity * Herbs - There are tonic elixirs for each age: to help build bones and muscle, boost

athletic performance, fight yeast infections, increase fertility, prevent PMS, reduce the rigors of menopause, combat impotency, increase sex energy, turn graying hair dark again, elevate mood, and promote longevity. Some of the important herbs introduced in this chapter include  Ho shou wu,* said to return gray hair to its original color; the fabled rishi* mushroom, now commercially grown and easily available, but at one time sold for more than $2,000 an ounce in Hong Kong to promote longevity; Kou chi tza* and tsa tsao,* used together for centuries to increase sexual potency and fertility;  Pai shu,*  a youth and energy preserver; Suk gok*  to replenish sexual fluids in older  persons; Huang Ch’I,* for athletic endurance at all ages; Ti Huang ,* to build blood and improve circulation at middle age and beyond; Tang Kuei,* the ultimate young woman’s tonic, especially good for taming PMS and improving fertility; Tang Shen,* to restore vigor in women during the later years; Fu ling , to relieve anxiety and improve mood, especially for persons over sixty; Tien men tong ,* for total relaxation of body and mind at any age.

Dr. Chan tells us how to shop for the best commercial Chinese herbs and how to stock a Chinese home medicine chest. This selection discusses loose herbs, Chinese patent medicines, and emergency blood-coagulating preparations like Yunnan Paiyao, known during the Vietnam War as the Vietcong’s “secret weapon.”

CYCLE FOUR: KEEPING YOUR HOME PROSPEROUS AND PROTECTED WITH FLYING STAR F ENG SH UI  Chapter Eighteen: What is Flying Star F eng Shu i  ? The not-so-well-kept secret is that Fortune 500 companies regularly hire  Feng Shui experts to design their most important buildings. The architectural plans for Coca Cola’s World

Headquarters in Atlanta were overseen by  Feng Shui masters. British Airways built their new offices for 3000 people under the guidance of a  Feng Shui consultant. Corporations like IBM, Siemens, Donald Trump, the Hyatt Hotel Group, and many others build according to Feng Shui  principles. Especially keen on  Feng Shui are gambling casinos. The architectural plans for the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut, for example, were drawn by a  Feng Shui  master in the shape of a three-finned propeller, designed to create a subliminal sense of swirling energy inside its game rooms. This over-stimulating vortex plays strange tricks on the mind, keeping gamblers 53

at cards and dice long past their bedtimes, and at the same time generating confusion, misjudgment, and a throw-it-to-the-winds spending frenzy. There are two basic schools of Feng Shui. The first, the so- called “form school,” concerns itself with the way objects inside and outside a house –  furniture, wall color, garden design - affect the occupants. The second form of  Feng Shui, the compass school, derives its calculations from the direction a house faces, the orientation of its entrances, and the year the building was constructed. Used with great frequency today by masters in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Malaysia, Flying Star  Feng Shui  belongs to the compass school -- but with a twist. The measure of its uniqueness lies in its use of time  along with direction  –   time, in this case, referring to the changes in energy patterns that occur in a given location over a 20-year period. Health, quality of work, romantic success, financial fortune, creative powers, and spiritual life -- all are influenced in subtle but very real ways by the passing months and years, and the shifts of energy they bring. Mapping and analyzing these yearly shifts within home and office, then taking steps to maximize positive potential and neutralize the negative is what Flying Star is all about. Here it should be mentioned that according to many  Feng Shui  analysts the 20-year  period profiled in this chapter, Period 8 (see chart below), begins in the year 2004. Using a more traditional form of Chinese computation based on the lo pan  Feng Shui compass and a full 180-year cycle of nine 20-year periods (all to be explained in the text), Dr. Chan has determined that this date is incorrect.  According to traditional  Feng Shui, Period 8  begins in the year 1996, eight years earlier than modern convention tells us. Here is a corrected table of periods based on Dr. Chan’s calculations.

FLYING STAR CURRENT 180 YEAR TIME CYCLE PERIOD STARTING YEAR  ____________________________________________________________ Period 1 1864 Period 1 1882 Period 3 1906 Period 4 1930 Period 5 1954 Period 6 1975 Period 7 1996

Period 8 Period 9

2017 2044

As a result of this remarkable miscalculation,  Feng Shui masters today often cause more havoc than benefit. As a traditional  Feng Shui master in Hong Kong confided in Dr. Chan, “A lot of modern-minded  Feng Shui  practitioners are hired in Hong Kong and Singapore, sometimes for millions of dollars, to advise big companies. Using wrong dates and flawed computations, they give clients piles of false data that end up causing wrong, sometimes drastically wrong, results. There has been an epidemic of suicides among bankrupt CEOs and

industrialists in Hong Kong. Word in the Hong Kong  Feng Shui  community is that these  powerful men lost their fortunes, then took their lives, because of critical miscalculations made  by the Flying Star masters who advised them.

Chapter 20: Using Flying Star To Bring Good Fortune To Your Home And Family

4

9

2

3

5

7

“Flying stars” in Flying Star Feng Shui are the numbers one

to nine. They are, as you can see, placed in boxes inside a grid. This grid is known as the Lo Shu square, and the numbers in this “magic” square reach a sum of 15 any way they are added along a

8

1

6

straight line. Using Flying Star, the numbers in the square are made to

“fly” from box to box, assuming different positions depending on a few easy calculations. These

calculations are based on the year a given structure was built and several oth er variables. Once the calculations are in place, the numbers then take on specific meanings in relation to their position in the square. The numbers 5 and 2, for example, are the numbers of sickness. The number 7 brings financial success. And so on. Numbers are also classified as helpful or harmful. One, 2, 9 and 10 are unlucky, 3,4,7 are lucky. Five and 6 are more or less

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neutral. The stars in Flying Star  Feng Shui. In short, are basically energy patterns that move from one part of a structure to another over time as the chi energy changes. To put Flying Star to work the grid for the present year is superimposed north to south over the floor plan of one’s home.

If the auspicious numbers in the square fall, say, in the north and southeast part of the residence, these rooms have positive energy for the present year. This makes them ideal areas for sleeping, say, or mental work, depending on the actual configuration.

If the sickness

numbers 5 and 2, fall in the north and south, however, anyone spending too much time in these rooms -- and especially sleeping in them every night -- runs the risk of illness. For readers eager to understand the mechanics of Flying Star, basic calculations are explained. For those who wish to cut to the chase and quickly learn what parts of their home are safe or risky in the coming year, a kit of pre-prepared charts is supplied that does all the work for you, providing fingertip information on the safe and unsafe parts of a home for each coming year up to 2017. In this chapter readers learn: * Where the ideal areas in the home are over this and coming years for romance, jobs requiring creative or mental work, relaxation and rest, good health, attracting money, social activity, and more. * Where year-by-year harmful energies will locate themselves in the home, and how to neutralize, divert, or avoid these forces. * Where in the house or apartment to place good luck yin or yang objects (such as wind chimes, fish tanks, bells, figurines). These objects multiply the beneficial aspects of positive Flying Star numbers, and/or reduce the ill effects of unlucky numbers. * How to avoid the so-called “three killings” -- sickness, financial loss, accidents. This trio of misfortunes shifts from one part of a house to another every year. In 2002, for instance, it was located in the north section of the house. Readers learn how to find each year’s three killing

direction, and what they can do to circumvent its harmful influence. * What the quality of energy will be in important rooms and areas of a house or apartment: the kitchen, the bedroom, the front door, etc. Methods are given for disarming the  bad Feng Shui in these sectors and enhancing the good.

* How to design a house or workplace that harmonizes with the environment rather than clashes with it. With this harmonious design wealth, happiness, and good fortune naturally come to the occupants. Taoist practitioners believe that we are irrevocably connected to the terrestrial energy currents that enliven our planet. Since we cannot escape the good and bad effects of these cosmic “winds,” it is better to learn how they work and to cooperate with them in full. “We can never conquer nature,” a Chinese saying goes. “But we can learn to ride it.”

CYCLE FIVE: YIN AND YANG: THE MALE-FEMALE CYCLE Chapter 20 - Male Glow, Female Glow: Especially For Women, Especially For Men Based entirely on Taoist teachings of yin and yang, this chapter helps male and female reach their fullest physical and creative potential. Especially for women

* PMS - Chinese healing arts provide a range of powerful remedies, plus exercises and  potions for preventing PMS. Many are new to Western readers. All are easy to use, natural, and remarkably effective. Women often discover that they no longer need strong chemical medications to offset symptoms once they start using this program. * Menopause - Many people note that middle-aged Chinese women are calmer and more centered than their Western counterparts. One reason for their composure is that Chinese women have long had access to a rich arsenal of therapeutic methods for treating “Fire in the Valley” -- menopause. These treatments are natural and easy to use. Most remain unknown to

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the West. We introduce many of them for the first time. (moxa, acupressure, diet, exercises for hormonal balance). Menopause is also a time when much of a woman’s yang energy “leaks” out, leaving her

enervated and depressed. Several herbal tonics are presented here for strengthening female yang in the post-menopausal period. * Nutritional secrets for women  - Some foods, especially yin foods, are more helpful for women than men, and vice versa. Certain foods and food combinations stimulate agefighting hormones in females, but have no comparable affect on the opposite sex. Some foods are healing to women’s skin, replenishing nourishing oils that dry up with age. Others are  palpably harmful. In this section female readers are presented with information on yin and yang foods that heighten mental clarity, improve appearance, prevent female ailments, and improve mood and state of mind. Also for women: - Chinese aids for a sickness-free pregnancy and easy delivery. - Stress-reduction techniques especially for women.

- Learning the relationship between healthy liver energy and an easy monthly menses. - Lifestyle and wellness aids especially for women. - Natural methods for preventing yeast infections. - Time-honored techniques for slowing down female aging. - Methods for preventing flagging desire and alleviating vaginal dryness. - Building immunity to breast and ovarian cancer with herbs, meditation, and exercise.

Especially for men:

* Improving Prostate health  - The Chinese believe that the prostate gland is one of the most important “organs” in the body, affecting almost every major system in a man’s organism.

If kept elastic and properly nourished, they believe, a state of overall well-being and youthful appearance result, along with increased sexual prowess. In this section male readers are given an extensive program for maintaining prostate health and for building immunity to prostate cancer. Exercises include: - Testicle squeezing.

- Testicle tapping exercises. - Anus tightening exercises. - Stomach and dan tien massage. - The deer exercise for increased sexual vigor. - Herbal potions for prostate health. - The Microcosmic Orbit meditation for prostate health and increased chi circulation. - Burning moxa to overcome impotency and prostate problems. - More. * Nutritional secrets for men   - As with women, there are foods, usually yang foods, that deliver special benefits only for men -- foods that increase male hormones, beef up spermcount, improve skin tone, and slow down aging.

Also for men: -

Stress-reduction techniques.

-

Lifestyle and wellness aids.

-

Male sexual herbal tonics –  when, how, and should you?

-

Getting a sound night’s sleep for men.

-

Taoist male longevity techniques.

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Chapter 21: Last But Not Least Aids For Getting The Glow The final chapter in The Glow  provides useful and often surprising Taoist-inspired advice on health and lifestyle concerns not covered in the Five Cycles above. These techniques help readers survive, prosper, and even shine in our demanding modern world. Subjects include * Protecting yourself from the electromagnetic assault  –  Though the body contains its own bio-electric field, it was not designed by nature to withstand the constant onslaught of electromagnetism we are exposed from TVs, cell phones, microwave ovens, electric clocks, and so many other everyday devices. Till the present century regular exposure to large amounts of radiation and electromagnetism was not a problem. Today it clearly is. Citing a number of scientific studies measuring the effect of radiation and electromagnetism on health, Dr. Chan explains practical things we can do to reduce the risk we face from our own high-tech conveniences. Mechanical devices that retard radiation from computers, types of minerals that shield the body from electromagnetism, mushrooms and fungi that eliminate radiation from the blood, best placements of electronic devices in the home and office, and much more are described. * Surviving your TV  –   Digital TV, many laboratory studies show, causes cataracts, nearsightedness, and other vision defects. Positioning a TV set at the foot of your bed is also bad

 Feng Shui (the TV acts like a mirror, reflecting negative energy back at occupants of the room).

Finally, there are important acupuncture and reflexology points located on the soles of the feet. The powerful electronic emissions streaming out of the TV interfere with the energetic balance of these points, poisoning the bedroom environment and undermining the watcher’s health. Dr.

Chan tells us what we can do to prevent these and other TV induced perils. * Which wrist for your wristwatch? - There are many critical acupuncture points located on the wrist, several of which exert a measure of control over heartbeat. When a battery powered watch is strapped over one of these points and worn every day the electric charge generated by the battery exerts a slow but inexorable destabilizing affect on the pulse, and finally on the heart itself. Missed beats, tachycardia, and worse can result. Better to use a mechanical wind-up or automatic watch, and if this is not possible, to wear a battery watch on the right wrist rather than the left. There are other things you should know concerning cellular  batteries and their effects on the health of the heart and nervous system. * Piercings  –  There are over 360 acupuncture points, some of which are located on parts of the body where piercings are frequently done: the upper ear, below the navel, the tongue, and so forth. In certain instances piercing acupuncture points can actually be helpful. In ancient Japan Samurai soldiers embedded a needle just below the kneecap to provide a continual stream of energy while on forced march. In other instances, however, pierced acupuncture points trigger ailments such as back spasms, stomach pains, headaches, and more. Dr. Chan tells you which  points are okay to pierce and which can cause serious problems. * Tattoos  –   For reasons similar to those mentioned above, tattoos can be harmful to health and overall energy level. On the other hand, when rightly placed on the body tattoos bring good fortune and improve health. Dr. Chan explains. * Proper toileting posture  –   Squatting is the normal mode for making a bowel

movement. When practiced regularly Taoist doctors maintain that this posture prevents virtually all colorectal disorders and disorders of the pelvic floor including constipation, Crohn’s diseae, and colitis. According to laboratory studies, there is also rapid relief from constipation and improvement in hemorrhoid conditions within seven days using this method. Men with

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uncomplicated lower urinary tract symptoms, studies show, often improve after three months by squatting. Normal function is usually regained after six months. Dr. Chan tells us where to purchase special “squat-seat toilets” and shows us a simple

maneuver made with the legs while toileting that relieves the pressure on the stomach and  bowels induced by conventional toilets. * Sitting the Chinese way for back and stomach health  - The art of sitting properly for long periods of time at a desk or table is a neglected part of our education. Dr. Chan describes the Chinese “art of sitting,” and recommends several postures that relieve spinal pressure,

improve digestion, and reduce levels of fatigue. * Beware of cold food and drink  –   In Taoist medicine the stomach is considered the furnace of the body. “Would you pour water on a fire if you wished it to burn?” asks a Taoist medical classic. “Why pour cold liquids onto the body’s furnace. It will put the fire out, causing cold where there should be hot.”

One of the many harmful eating conventions we have accustomed ourselves to is drinking ice water and refrigerated liquids with meals. This practice is far more harmful than  people suppose. Cold water dilutes and neutralizes stomach acids in the bo dy’s “furnace,” which

in turn triggers indigestion. The popular solution is to take an antacid. But the stomach is a reactive organ, not a thinking one. When antacids reduce enzyme and acid levels the stomach assumes it is time to produce more acid. And so the cycle continues. The dangers of Viagra  – In 2000, researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los

Angeles did an analysis of 1,473 adverse medical events involving the use of Viagra. They found that 522 deaths had taken place, most involving cardiovascular malfunctions that developed four to five hours after taking a 50 mg dose of Viagra. The majority of these deaths occurred in patients who were less than 65 years of age, and who had no reported cardiac risk factors. Cedars-Sinai researchers concluded that there "appears to be a high number of deaths and serious cardiovascular events associated with the use of Viagra." Other population studies of Viagra have reached similar conclusions. Why? Dr. Chan explains that this “harmless” erectile inducer is actually an extremely yang

 potion that causes the arteries to dilate and blood pressure to drop significantly, a one-two combination known to trigger heart attack and stroke, especially -- as per the body’s 24-hour

 bio-energy clock -- during the hours of eleven A.M. to one P.M. mid-day when the heart is already working overtime. After explaining the dangers of Viagra, Dr. Chan tells readers about safe herbal potency drugs used in China for centuries, showing how to make three male potency concoctions that are effective and risk-free.

EXCERPTS FROM TH E GLOW 

From the introduction Nature’s secret light Those who make night time flights over the Pacific Ocean often witness one of nature’s

most spectacular surprises: vast clusters of single-cell algae that stretch to the horizon, and that emit a phantasmagoric glow that lights up the sea. This fascinating phenomenon of self-generated light is not confined to simple-cell organisms. A number of creatures ranking far higher on the eating chain generate their own fluorescence. Sharks have this ability. So do certain species of earthworms. Most marvelous of all, after studying these strange capers of nature for several decades, scientists now realize that under certain circumstances human beings are also capable of emitting  biologically generated patterns of light. These patterns have been measured and charted. Under certain circumstances they can be photographed in the laboratory. “Sensitives” and clairvoyants

claim to see them. Viewed from this perspective, the halos circling the heads of saints in Renaissance  paintings and the golden auras surrounding figures in Eastern art are not simply emblems of 63

sanctity. They are depictions of the fiery physical magnetism that radiates from people who are flushed with good health and spiritual attunement. Some scientists believe that this phenomenon of human bioluminescence originates in the  pineal gland, the tiny endocrine gland located directly between the eyes, the one traditionally referred to by mystics as “the Third Eye.” Composed of a grid-like molecular structure similar to

the matrix found in liquid crystal, studies show that under certain circumstances this mysterious organ serves as a kind of sending and receiving station for electromagnetic energies. When stimulated in the proper way -- meditation, tai chi, and acupuncture are three powerful methods -the pineal’s crystalline structure literally vibrates like a tuning fork, receiving electrical impulses

from the surrounding world and converting them into light. Scientific evidence notwithstanding, however, physical luminosity and the states of heightened health it brings remain suspect to Western science, and play little or no role in conventional medicine. The following is a recent quote from an ex-Surgeon General of the United States. “The condition of so-called ‘super health,’” he maintains, “is a hoax dreamed up by

members in good standing of the feel-good community. We are all sick in some way or other, or we are all going to get sick soon.”

Such attitudes are basic to conventional medicine that concentrates on curing disease rather than preventing it. Yet for a healing art that gives priority to prevention and that is engineered to thwart the influences that cause disease before they become disease, the idea of glowing super health is an axiom. If our physical energies are nurtured in proper ways, Chinese doctors maintain, we not only stay healthy, but become the energized, balanced, and shining  persons nature meant us to be. Good health, the Chinese believe, is every person’s birthright.

Claiming Our Human Birthright The human body, Chinese physicians insist, wants to be well. It is programmed by nature to function perfectly, and every moment of the day it is striving to reach metabolic equilibrium. Our job is to cooperate with its efforts. Strength and vigor will invariably follow. For this reason, Chinese healers insist, most diseases are an irregularity, not a norm. They are brought on by a weakened immune system that in turn is caused by living habits that are out of step with nature’s laws. Corr ect these habits, substitute better ones in their place, and the body

takes care of the rest. The purpose of any authentic healing system, Taoist healers believe, is not

to palliate symptoms or suppress disease. It is to create conditions of balance within the organism that in turn help the body to help itself. To achieve the state of health nature intended a comprehensive program of therapeutic techniques is needed, a program that runs the gamut from physical exercise to herbal tonics, from healing foods to therapeutic self-massage, cosmetic rejuvenation, sexual positions that cure disease, and much more. Certain of these therapies are familiar to Westerners. Many remain unknown. This book will introduce you to the most effective of these methods and show you how to put them to work right away to feel better and to get better. It explains how, by incorporating these practices into your everyday living routine, you can regain those lost feelings of radiance, health, and inner  power - the state of mind and body we call The Glow.

Coming to America My name is Dr. T. N. Chan, and I have worked as a doctor of the Chinese healing arts for almost 30 years. As a child I grew up in the Arcadian wilderness of the Hong Kong countryside. Here I slept under the stars, made friends with wild animals, and observed the changing moods of season, earth, and sky. During these early years my father taught me a great deal about traditional Chinese knowledge. Like others in my village, he took it for granted that if a person lives in accord with the cycles of nature and follows certain rules of living passed down in China for centuries, a state of “super health” is not only possible but expected. Such knowledge was a

 basic part of life in my home village. I assumed that everyone else in the world knew about it too. One day when I was fourteen years old a friend of my father’s, a Taoist monk who was also

a famous physician, stopped at our house for several weeks on his way to a mountain monastery. This remarkable man was known to be 100 years old and perhaps a good deal older. Not only did he appear to be scarcely past middle age. He had a shimmering vigor that amazed everyone who met him. When I expressed my surprise at his great age and obvious good health, he told me matterof-factly that there was nothing remarkable about living so long, that it was quite natural.

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“It may be natural,” I replied in my teenage wisdom. “But there don’t seem to be many  people doing it these days.” “You’re quite right,” he chuckled, addressing me with a degree of respect unusual for a Chinese boy to expect from his elders. “But as your father knows, at one time in China it was taken for granted that the life span of an ordinary person is 100 years. That’s about the number of years

our organs are engineered to last.” “Then why do people die so much sooner?” I asked, interested now.

The answer the old monk gave me that day was so intriguing that it became one of the reasons I later became a doctor. I relate here the essence of what he told me, translated, of course, through the memory of the years and from the monk’s somewhat old-fashioned and highly formal

Chinese. “We get sick for many reasons,” he explained to me that day. “Little reasons - or what

seem to us like little reasons. Little mistakes we make every day when we ignore the laws of right living that our ancestors passed down to us, and that they considered to be sacred.”

Western doctors, the old monk went on to say, believe that we die from disease. “Don’t we?” I asked, not getting his meaning. “The idea of disease does not provide a complete picture of how sickness and death really work,” he answered. “Disease represents the final stage in a decline that takes place inside our

 bodies for years. It is the result of a slow wearing down of our life force. This stems from the major and minor insults we subject our bodies to every day. And from the lack of things we do to offset their harmful effects. These insults, the old doctor maintained, gradually reduce our energy reserves and weaken the ability of our organs to function in the proper way. This decline is usually very slow, he emphasized, like sands in an hourglass or a watch spring gradually coming unwound. “Can we do something to stop our bodies from running down like this?” I wanted to know. “We can never stop it entirely,” he replied. “We all have to die eventually, after all. But we can slow it down. Let’s say, for example, that you get a certain disease. Let’s say you come down

with diarrhea. Western science maintains that you are infected by microorganisms, probably from something you ate. This may be true. But don’t we eat millions of microorganisms every day at every meal? Aren’t viruses always swarming around us, attacking us from all sides? Why do we

happen to get sick from this particular virus at this particular time?”

He waited for a moment, I thought for me to answer, then went on before I could think of a reply. “Traditional Chinese medicine looks at the problem in a different way. They believe a

human body can withstand the most ferocious viruses and bacteria when its energies are in proper  balance. If internal forces are flowing strongly in the body, if the vital force is at its peak, our organisms will automatically fight off these invaders. Something must be weakened first, thrown out of equilibrium by our lifestyle, in order to get sick. Once when this weakening takes place -and only then -- do we become vulnerable to microorganisms that would normally not affect us. Infection, in short, is not the root cause of the diarrhea. It’s a secondary effect of n eglectful living.” The old monk concluded with an ominous but what I now know to be imminently timely warning. “When serious physical problems start,” he said, “you may not have seen any previous

signs of sickness. Physical symptoms come at the end of a disease, not at the beginning. By the time they appear the sickness has been burrowing its way through your body for months and maybe for years. All this time you may seem quite healthy to everyone you know. You feel good and look good. Everything is fine. Until one day you ‘suddenly’ get sick. “Your friends in the village are surprised. Shocked. “You seemed so fit and full of life just a short time ago, they all agree. “Now you’re ailing. Maybe you’ll even die. “Not because your heart and your lungs are inherently weak. But because over the years you did not live in tune with your body’s ironclad rules and demands. With nature’s rules. You die

too soon because you do not live the way you should - day by day by day.”

Life Style Tells All After studying Oriental medicine in China, I moved to the United States during the mid 1970s where I set up a practice in New York City. Here in my office near the United Nations, I  began treating clients with traditional Chinese medicine. Over the next few years I proceeded to take care of patients suffering from a seemingly endless variety of ailments.

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But as time went by, and as literally thousands of men and women passed through my doors, it became clear to me that a majority of these people were suffering less from specific pathologies, more from a sluggish energy flow. This problem, in turn, was due to patients’ lack of information concerning how to fine -tune

their bodies in accord with their environment and with certain critical cycles of nature that were long ago identified by Taoist physicians. Often they were victims of lifestyle habits they believed were harmless, but which from a Chinese viewpoint are risky and over the long run, profoundly corrosive. This list of lifestyle habits was, and remains, a long one. It features all the usual suspects, of course: alcohol, tobacco, stress, poor diet, lack of exercise. But it does not stop here. It includes a number of seemingly innocent practices that no one ever cautions people against in Western society, and that are often standard and even encouraged behaviors. Such as wearing a battery-powered watch on the left wrist (a quartz battery subtly interferes with the rhythms of the heart). Such as having sexual intercourse at the wrong times of day (sex at the right hours builds energy, at the wrong hours depletes it). Or having sex during a lightening storm (electrostatic changes in the air can seriously interfere with sexual activity) Behaviors such as sleeping in the wrong position at night (for certain heart ailments lying on the stomach or left side night after night can be fatal). Such as drinking cold liquids after dinner (cold causes heat to rise in the body, over-stimulates the mind, increases urination, and makes it difficult to fall asleep). I tell my patients: If you drink a warm glass of sea salt water when you get up in the morning it eliminates toxins from your system. But drink the same potion at night (or any salty drink) and your body retains these toxins, sometimes producing toxemia. (The first sure sign that people are suffering from too much salt in their diet is an unexplained laziness and lack of motivation. Seemingly overnight a person suffers a total loss of fighting spirit without any known emotional reasons. Cut back on salt and the spirit quickly returns.) Many of my patients, I observe, expose themselves to powerful electronic devices, remaining in unshielded contact with computers, microwave ovens, electric blankets, cellular phones, etc. for long periods of time. They have not been told how powerfully these devices can impact on the electric fields surrounding their bodies, and how to take simple precautions to protect themselves. My patients, I also notice, rest at the hours they should be most active, and are active when their body most requires rest. They assume that stimulants such as caffeine give them energy when, in fact, these substances burn up critical energy stores that are already there. And so-called

“recreational” drugs like marijuana and cocaine deplete inner resources so quickly that a chronic user’s life can be reduced by as much as ten years. The same is true for “safe” male sexual

stimulants like Viagra. Long-term use can strip years off a man’s life. My patients, by and large, are uninformed concerning the many critical ways in which natural, planetary, and seasonal forces affect their lives. They have not been told that their sleep is linked to the rotation of the earth, and that the direction they lie in bed affects the depth and quality of their slumbers. They are unaware that their needs while eating, sleeping, and working change dramatically with the seasons and at different stages of life. They have little awareness concerning the effects that elemental forces such as wind, rain, temperature, sunlight, and the phases of the moon have on their emotional disposition, their powers of concentration, their susceptibility to disease, and even on their sexual performance. Most of my patients do not even know that their immediate environment -- including the rug in their bedroom and the pictures on the walls of their office -- affect the quality of their work, play, and moods. They do not know that the angle of a mirror in the bathroom or the direction a desk faces at work can exert subtle influences on their thinking and on the way they interact with co-workers -- influences that can tip the balance between failure and success. Perhaps most profoundly, no one has told many of my patients that the internal rhythms and  physical cycles of men and women are profoundly dissimilar, and that each sex requires substantially different health agendas to achieve optimum fitness. Still other problems my patients complain of are due to cultural fads. Case in point: Many young patients visit my office today for the treatment of lower back  pain. This is a curious request, first because these patients are  so  young. In the past, doctors traditionally expected back patients to be mainly over forty. And second, because a majority of these men and women have multiple piercing in their ears.  Note that according to the principles of auricular acupuncture, the acupuncture points that govern the functioning of the lower spine are situated on the upper rims of the ear shell -- the same areas that are frequently pierced. If my young patients, male or female, complain of lower back pain and happen to be wearing earrings in these spots, I tell them to remove the rings, let the holes heal for several weeks, then come back and see me again. Approximately a third of the people who return 69

are pain free. Even more dangerous, for reasons that will be explained in the last chapter, are  piercings on the nipples and the tongue. There are also, it should be added, acupressure points that respond positively to piecing, a secret that pirates and sailors stumbled on centuries ago. Many an old salt wore his gold earring not for appearance’s sake, but because he knew that if the earlobe is pierced in the right spot, and if this

hole is kept permanently open with a ring, the ability to see long distances at sea is dramatically improved. If you do plan to have a piercing on any part of your body, I tell my patients, first ask a doctor of acupuncture which areas of the body are safe to puncture and which are not.

The Dreaded Drab Feeling Besides lacking what traditional Chinese people think of as basic common sense knowledge about one’s health, I noted that my patients complain of one specific problem above all others - a

sense of fatigue, dullness, spiritlessness, low energy -- a feeling of being half alive. “Drab” is the word I most often hear. “What’s wrong with me?” patients ask. “I’m not exactly sick. I don’t really feel well. Is it my

nerves? Should I go to the gym more often? Do I have a weird flu? Would I feel better if I stopped eating meat?”

Hearing these complaints so often I have come to believe that the basic American disease is not the common cold or arthritis or depression. It is a compromised energy level - a lack, one might say, of The Glow. What can be done to help?

When my patients ask this question I tell them that the answer depends on a number of variables, all of which -- and this is a crucial point -- are entirely under their control. This feeling of drabness, I explain, does not just come from poor exercise habits or from eating too many fats. Its roots run far deeper, far below the level of microbes and organ systems, to the parts of us that we cannot see, the parts that are invisible -- to the very center of where all good and bad health originates. To the very cycles of nature that control our life force. Today we are living in a kind of world, I tell patients, that people have never lived in  before, a world filled with physical hazards that did not exist 100 years ago, and that are entirely new to the human race. The first line of these new hazards consists of the well-known, high profile culprits: the toxified earth, air, and water that poison our daily bread; all the common doomsday threats that have become so much a part of modern consciousness. As if these risks are not enough, however, every moment of our lives we of the “wireless age” are also exposed to a shower of man-made radiations that are scientifically known to be damaging to the body’s electro-magnetic field -- to the very invisible parts that determine our

states of health. Precisely how harmful these forces are no scientist knows for certain, as no scientific instrument has yet been invented that is sensitive enough to measure their full impact.  Nonetheless, common sense plus volumes of laboratory data tells us that our continual emersion in radio and TV waves, ultraviolet and infrared light, EMF’s, X-rays, micro waves, and all the

other new and powerful emissions generated by electronic devices exert a gradual eroding effect on the subtle electromagnetic field that is the very wellspring of our life and vitality. Indeed, a combination of toxic environment plus an atmosphere saturated with these dangerous radiations is, according to modern Chinese medical thinking, one of the major reasons why society is experiencing an escalation of degenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s Disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, lupus, Alzheimer’s, and cancer. Submerged every moment in seen and unseen contaminants, the body’s energy field gradually loses its edge as a protective shield. The powers

of the cellular and immune systems weaken accordingly. Finally, disease moves in. How can we protect ourselves?

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The most effective remedies, we believe, are not chemicals and more high tech machines. They are harmonious living practices that strengthen the body’s subtle forces and immune response, protecting us from disease, and generating the essential energies that determine our state of health.

Learning to Stay Well “And once I’m feeling well again? What then?” my patients ask. “What can you do to keep me healthy?”

Superb question. Unfortunately, not one I hear very often in my treatment room. For patients who ask, the answer is always the same. “It’s not what I can do.” I tell them. “It’s You. What you can do. You are the one who must put these practices to work. After you leave my office you are the doctor.”

Preventive medicine. Self-healing. Self-care. Not concepts one hears very often in Western medicine. “I can cure what ails you.” I assure my patients. “Great!” “I can boost your vitality level and give you back the light you’ve lost over the years.” “Wonderful!” “After a few treatments you’ll probably be feeling pretty good and looking your best. In fact, you may feel better than you’ve felt in years. Others will notice too. That’s what attracts so

many people to Chinese medicine -- it raises one’s physical, emotional, and spiritual parts to their fullest potential.” “Sounds fantastic.” “But… but . . . unless you then grip the reins and take charge of your own health, applying the life style practices I’m going to teach you, your ‘glow quotient’ will drop again. Before you know it you’ll be back in my office with the same complaints you had six months ago.” “What are you going to teach me?” I’m asked. “A comprehensive health regime,” I answer. “A complete, self -applied healing and

maintenance program that is designed to stimulate every organ system in your body, and to 72

rejuvenate the vital functions that stress, anxiety, and destructive habits of living have weakened in you over the years. These techniques are engineered to raise energy levels to such a degree that you will literally feel as if transformed into a kind of body electric.” “What is this system based on,” they sometimes ask. “Generally speaking, on traditional concepts of Chinese medicine. But more specifically

on certain basic cycles of nature that control the way we think, feel, and act. These cycles were known to ancient Taoist doctors many thousands of years ago. So I refer to them as the Cycles of the Tao. I then explain how the most important of these cycles work  –   as I will for you in the next chapter  –   and how knowledge of them helps people see themselves and the world around them in an entirely different way. The Cycles of the Tao, I tell patients, is the royal road to The Glow.

A Few Minutes A Day Some patients are interested. Some are not. Those in the second category invariably give the same explanation: they just don’t have the time.

I tell these people that the exercises and methods I give them -- and the ones that are featured in this book-take a few minutes a day to practice. Some can be done while at work or sitting on a bus or eating dinner or lying in bed. “And something else,” I add. “I am not going to waste your time telling you what you

already know about basic fitness: that if you want to be healthy you should exercise, drink in moderation, eat a well balanced diet, get enough rest, go easy on the caffeine, stop smoking,  blah, blah, blah. By now everyone has heard these cautions a thousand times. All are important, of course. But they stop far short of what men and women really need to gain a state of super health. If you follow the exercises connected with each of the Cycles of the Tao, they will give you all your body needs.”

The Next Step After many years of fine-tuning The Glow in my patients and watching them become well and strong and beautiful, I formalized my regimen into a basic Five Cycle program.

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This program is based on a combination of formal Taoist medicine, folk longevity secrets I learned as a youth in China, and little-known Chinese lifestyle do’s and don’ts. The exercises connected with these five cycles form the basis for   The Glow. They are simple to learn, easy to apply, and take only a few minutes to put into practice. Most of them can be done during the course of the day without much down time. All are related to simple activities we do as a matter of course - eating, sleeping, working, playing, sex, exercise, and more. While each cycle in this program is a healing system in itself, moreover, and is often used in this capacity without benefit of adjunct therapies, when combined with methods in the other cycles it creates a self-healing synergy that is more potent tha n the sum of its parts. We are all programmed by nature to live decades longer than we suppose, and to enjoy a greater degree of health than we ever imagined. Longevity and well-being are part of our natural heritage. Whether we claim this heritage is up to us. This book will tell you how.

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COMPETITION Among the books on Chinese medicine written for the layman, a majority are heavy on theory and scanty on instruction and self-application. Daniel Reid is one of the foremost writers of on Chinese healing. His book The Complete Book of Chinese Health and Healing  is medically useful but lacks many important

topics such as Feng Shui, moxibustion, acupressure, chi gung, life style techniques, and more. The same can be said for Misha Ruth Cohen’s, The Chinese Way to Healing: Many Paths to Wholeness. Her subject matter is far ranging, but her presentation is hurried and superficial;

and like so many books on the subject, her narrative is clinical, lacking many of the self-care methods that Dr. Chan specializes in. Two classics in the field, Ted Kaptchuk’s  The Web that Has no Weaver   and Harriet Beinfield and Efrem Korngold’s  Between Heaven and Earth  are immensely important and

ground-breaking volumes, but both are dedicated to explaining the basic medical theory behind Chinese clinical practice. Kenneth Cohen’s The Way of Qigong   is well written and touches on important elements

of the Chinese healing arts but centers mainly on exercise. Interestingly, at publication the book was featured by the Book of the Month Club and the Quality Paperback Club, showing how mainstream Chinese healing arts have become. A worthy volume too is The Complete Illustrated Guide to Chinese Medicine  by Tom Williams. As the title implies, this book is largely a visual presentation of Chinese medicine, relying far more on handsome illustrations than in-depth narrative. It is lacking in much of the substance and subject matter planned for our book The Taoist practitioner, Mantak Chia has published a series of works over the past ten years that deal with many aspects of Taoist practice including Taoist Secrets of Love, Awaken  Healing Energy Through the Tao, Fusion of the Five Elements, Taoist Way to Transform Stress into Vitality, and several more. Fascinating and inclusive, these books tend to be a bit radical for

the average reading audience (weight lifting exercises for the genitals, and directions for striking one’s body with a sheath of metal rods), and are published by Chia’s own small publishing

company. They remain out of the mainstream and are rarely seen for sale outside of occult and  New Age bookstores. 75