Tea and a Health in Chinese Philosophy
Tea Master Yang giving a talk on tea and health in Chinese philosophy at a teahouse in Beijing.
I have been so excited to share my recent experience in an illuminating tea appreciation and tasting seminar led by Tea Master Yang here in Beijing at a friend’s teahouse. It was richly philosophical, thought provoking, inspiring, and such a deeply relaxing and delightful mind and body experience.
Tea Master Yang led our group of Chinese tea enthusiasts through a guided tea tasting according to the ancient “Seven Cups of Tea” poem from the Tang Dynasty, expounded on tea’s pivotal role for a healthy lifestyle according to traditional Chinese philosophy, and challenged everyone to live more consciously connected to your mind and body with a daily tea practice.
quick disclaimer: the whole session was in Chinese so these are my rough English translations/approximations that I think best capture the spirit of what was discussed in Chinese with added commentary and context so everything will make more sense.
What is Health According to Chinese Belief?
To succinctly summarize thousands of years of philosophy, texts, and debate about health in traditional Chinese thought and in the rich legacy of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM): Chinese define health as balance and harmony. One theme that is repeated over and over is balance between two opposing forces (think yin and yang).
Master Yang took the Chinese characters for health 健康 (jian kang) and analyzed how in fact they were describing two opposing forces “fortifying” (健 jian) and “detoxing” (康kang) which combined together mean “health.”
Drinking Tea is as Essential to Everyday Living as Eating
If we think of eating food as a daily necessity towards fortifying (健 jian), we should think of drinking tea as the equally essential complement to eating since it works on detoxing (康kang), according to Master Yang.
He mentioned how just as cleaning (your home, your workspace, your clothes and etc) is an essential practice in living, so is cleaning your internal body systems.
According to traditional Chinese philosophy, each meal should be accompanied with tea to complete the eating ritual. In this way, tea serves as an essential digestive to all meals–the necessary detox to balance the fortification to achieve health.
To Get Really Specific About It…
Traditional Chinese philosophy on the ideal lifestyle is inspired by the rhythms and elements of nature. And over the course of the last 5,000 years, those contributing to this cannon had time to get really specific about it. I mean really specific.
According to traditional thought there are universal ideal times of day for carrying out everyday essentials like sleeping, eating, and working that correspond to various natural rhythms and elements.
Since Chinese philosophy believes tea should be drunk after every meal there are specific times that are considered the ideal times of tea to drink tea: between 9:00 am-11:00 am, 3:00pm-5:00pm, and 9:00pm-11:00pm. With the most essential and important time for tea drinking as 3:00pm. (hmm, it seems that British high tea time is perfectly analogous to this idea…)
And there is the ideal accompanying feeling you should receive from drinking tea: In the Summer, your hands should feel cool, in the Winter your feet should feel warm and overall you should feel perfectly satiated.
Specific AND Sort of Goldilocks
Ok, so not only are there specific times of day that are considered ideal for drinking tea, but there are specific conditions for tea drinking. There are in total 8 conditions to avoid when drinking tea according to traditional Chinese philosophy:
You shouldn’t be too full
You shouldn’t be too hungry
The tea shouldn’t be too strong
The tea shouldn’t be too weak
The tea shouldn’t be too hot
The tea shouldn’t be too cold
You shouldn’t drink too much
You should drink too little
Back to the main idea I presented in the beginning, Chinese traditional thought (on all topics including health) is really focused on balance and harmony and so you can take these 8 conditions to mean as a whole: nothing too extreme but valuing balance.
Tea as Your Teacher to Connect with Your Mind and Body
The main idea that Master Yang emphasized was how tea is nature’s most precious gift to humans for maintaining a healthy lifestyle and connecting with our mind and bodies in a unified and balanced way.
According to Master Yang, true health is not just going for a medical check-up and having no external signs of disease, but rather being in touch with your internal systems and intentionally managing and balancing your reactions to both external and internal indicators.
One example he listed was choosing what to eat. Instead of eating what looks the most attractive, or smells the most aromatic, one should check-in internally to gauge what the body needs and chose food to eat according to that.
Master Yang proposed that tea is the best teacher for understanding your body since it actually enters into your body and thus can help you become alert and in touch with your internal organs and systems.
Traditional Chinese Health Philosophy and Tea
To sum up all the concepts and ideas he touched upon, Master Yang concluded with:
If we each spent 30 minutes a day drinking tea (ideally after each meal, but at least everyday at 3:00pm) it would help us connect with our mind and body in a deep and essential way, allow our mind and body to process and detox, and provide the balance and harmony that is the foundation of health according to Chinese traditional thought.