
At the most basic and deep level, TCM treatment seeks to balance Yin and Yang in each person.

The theory of Yin and Yang is fundamental to the practice of TCM in terms of understanding, diagnosing, and treating health issues. This is precisely the state TCM seeks to create that of balance.

Your body, mind, emotions, and spirit can adjust and readjust to the circumstances in your life. In terms of your personal health, if you think of how you feel when you feel really well, you might realize you don’t think of wellness at all! Everything in your life just flows and moves seamlessly-in harmony. You can also see this perpetual balancing at work in a shorter time frame when a thunderstorm clears the air of an unusually hot and humid summer day. In the natural world this phenomenon is seen in the changing of the seasons: the cold of winter yields to the warmth of spring and summer heat, and then gradually turns cool in fall to become winter once again. This means there’s a dynamic flow happening that automatically and continuously balances and rebalances these energies. In a relationship of harmony, the two energies blend into one seamless whole, as perfectly embodied by the swirling Yin-Yang symbol. When two things are balanced, they are equal but still separate. So there is balance, but the relationship goes beyond balance to one of harmony. It can do this because Yang is present in Yin. The truth is Yin can transform into Yang under certain conditions. There is Yin, but interestingly, Yin is also Yang because it contains some Yang. In the Chinese Yin-Yang model, Yin (the black) contains a seed of Yang (in the form of a white dot). For example, day is Yang, yet within every day is a Yang part-the early morning, and a Yin part-late day, as it begins to turn to night, which is Yin. The designation of something as Yin or Yang is always relative to some other thing. No matter where you bisect the diameter of the whole circle, each half will always contain some Yin and some Yang. The small dots within each of the two energies (represented by black and white) symbolize that there is always some Yin (black) within Yang (white) and vice versa. This inseparable and interpenetrating relationship is reflected in the form of the Yin-Yang symbol. Both create a totality, a complete whole. (Night is Yin and day is Yang.) Night looks and is very different than day, yet it is impossible to have one without the other. For example, night and day form a Yin-Yang pair. Yin and Yang cannot exist without the other they are never separate.

What does this really mean? Although they are totally different-opposite-in their individual qualities and nature, they are interdependent. They are two opposite yet complementary energies. Opposite yet Complementary EnergiesĮverything contains Yin and Yang. They are literally and figuratively a world apart from Western thinking.

Yin and Yang are distinctively Chinese in terms of perception of profound fundamental principles and as an expression of a unique way of viewing the world and the greater universe. to the I Ching ( The Book of Changes, a text Universal in its understanding and representation of the dynamic balance of opposites and the processes of unfolding events and change). Unbelievably, references to Yin and Yang date back as far as 700 B.C.E. Yin and Yang, like TCM’s Five Element theory, are integral to the Chinese culture and have been so for thousands of years. Integral to Chinese Culture for Thousands of Years
