Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Western practices offer safe and simple solutions to weight loss and detox
Key takeaways:
TCM sees weight gain as an imbalance in your internal system.
TCM takes a whole-body approach to weight loss and detox that encompasses the mind, body, and spirit.
Chinese medicine techniques address the root causes of weight gain.
There are more diet programs, pills, and supplements available today than ever. Their techniques vary from counting calories to excluding carbs and sugars to only eating at specific times. Some people choose weightlifting, aerobic exercise, or another intense activity to lose weight. Others choose even more extreme measures such as lap bands and other weight-loss surgeries.
Advertisements for weight loss programs are numerous. They're in magazines, on television, and on the radio. Diet programs and products are a $40 billion a year industry but as many as 95% of dieting Americans gain back all, or a portion of, the weight they lose.
Traditional Chinese Medicine sees weight gain as an internal imbalance in the body. Western medicine treats obesity by looking at external factors such as calorie intake, exercise regimen, and starting weight. Taking a broader look at the issue by combining these two approaches allows for a more pinpointed cure.
According to Chinese medicine, weight gain is a symptom of a more significant problem. It results from an imbalance of qi, the body's natural energy force. We will talk about traditional Chinese weight loss techniques that help you lose and keep the weight off as well as detoxify your internal system.
Nutritional counseling: What we eat matters
Many people think that at nutritional counseling they will only receive information about dieting tactics. This is not true at Eastern Acupuncture and Wellness (Eacuwell).
Dieting is about restrictions, counting calories, and filling up on bland, low-calorie foods. Nutritional counseling with a focus on Chinese medicine is about developing food habits that will bring positive results while encouraging choices that sustain lasting health.
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, there are five flavors of food – pungent, sweet, sour, and bitter. Eating bitter, pungent, and sour foods is helpful to weight loss. Western medicine teaches that sweet, fatty, and salty foods lead to weight gain and TCM agrees with this. Alcohol is another substance we take in which leads to imbalance.
When it comes to nutrition from a TCM perspective, it’s not just the flavors of the food that are considered but the temperature and movement. There are five temperature categories in TCM and they are cold, cool, hot, warm, and neutral. There are also four movements and they are outward, inward, upwards, and downward.
Each person has a different biological makeup which means that certain foods and supplements will work better for one person than another. Nutritional counseling teaches people how to work with food instead of against it to achieve good health.
Exercise: Yoga, Tai chi, and stretch therapy
The way you move your body affects the amount of weight you carry or lose. TCM practices such as yoga, Tai chi, and stretch therapy combine movement with breath and in a physically healing activity.
Physical movement is seen as a tool to help people lose weight in both the Western and TCM approach. The addition of breathing techniques and mindfulness helps to balance the body's energies and flow of qi. Practices such as stretch therapy and yoga help to increase flexibility, lower heart rate, and reduce tension – all things that will increase weight loss.
Healthy lifestyle changes: Acupuncture, cupping, and manual therapy
When Western doctors talk about healthy lifestyle changes to lose weight, it usually means to stop drinking alcohol, eating fatty foods, and live a more active life. These are all true approaches in TCM philosophies as well but TCM also includes an element of personal growth.
TCM focuses on specific ways to achieve a healthy lifestyle that also balances the body's qi and helps get to the root of the weight gain. Working on yourself and the way you live exposes old ideas and thought processes that aren't working anymore.
Acupuncture, manual therapy, cupping, and similar Chinese medicine treatments have been used successfully for centuries to help people live healthier lives by aligning the energies along the body's chakras. There is a feeling of overall well-being and contentedness when the body is aligned correctly.
Both TCM and Western medicine seek to treat illnesses and ailments but TCM takes a whole-body approach that includes the spirit and mind, helping patients find the root causes of many of their issues. Practices such as yoga and acupuncture combined with sound nutritional knowledge are the cornerstone of weight loss.
Get professional weight loss help with a TCM approach
Eacuwell is a well-being and longevity center that takes a functional, holistic approach to your physical and physiological state. Our physicians utilize an effective combination of Eastern and Western medicinal practices. Reach out for a complimentary consultation of holistic weight loss therapies.
