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Because we are complex biological and spiritual beings, we are subject to the effects of countless, constantly shifting inner and outer forces. Sensing the world around us with trained eyes, ears, touch, and tongue, we can everywhere see yin and yang in an intimate dance. The binary on-off position of switches is what makes our digital world possible, for example, and the gradual swap of winter and summer defines our yearly cycle. While we might be tempted to focus on the simple duality of this setup—the existence of opposites in all things and the tension between them—it is actually the way the two opposites change positions, like kings on a chess board defecting to the other player’s side, that defines this universal game. There is no yang without yin, no yin without yang, and one is constantly in the process of becoming the other. Thus, in noticing what causes us stress and what helps us relax, who supports us in our work to grow and improve and who holds us back, we can create our own balance and move ourselves forward. There is yin and yang to relaxation, see, and to rectification as well. Embracing this truth, we can create harmonious lives filled with compassion, wisdom, and awareness of resources.
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The more “real” technology makes the virtual world feel, the more it diverges from the Daoist experience. Videogame headsets shaking with the bass notes of gunshots and bombs disconnect us from each other at a time when connection is precisely what we need to heal the rifts between us and save the world. Love is the antidote to environmental Armageddon, yet we daily withdraw from nature and spend more time attached to artificial worlds. Let’s rekindle our relationship with nature instead of upping our game score. Let’s joyfully experience the natural world, the oceans, the jungles, the forests, the deserts, the salt water, the steaming vines, the tall trees, the cactus spines, the glorious sunsets, and the sand between our toes. How about we log out of the game and get back in touch with our one, true home?
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Before the dawn of agriculture, people didn’t see that much of each other, at least by today’s standards. They hunted, gathered in groups for a time, then dispersed and went their merry way. Today, people are crammed together. The result is that the tangible, biological need for solitude and quiet goes unanswered. Time spent alone in the wilderness is essential to human health and an integral part of the Daoist rectification process and lifestyle. This does not necessarily mean rigorous hiking or camping trips, nor does it require expensive travel to exotic destinations. A simple walk in the woods will do, and if no woods are available, then time spent in a park. Finding parks crowded, we may wish to venture out early in the morning or late in the evening, so long as it is safe to do so. Such restorative forays are a wonderful addition to our routine during any season of the year, and often provide the distance from our problems needed to generate fresh ideas and solutions.
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Sound is a form of energy and can affect the molecular bonds that cohere solid matter. In extreme cases, like when an opera singer shatters a champagne glass by singing a high C, sound may be disruptive. Yet sound can also be beneficial, as when ultrasound is used to penetrate tissue and treat chronic pain. Many religions utilize chanting to generate a meditative state of mind, and the idea of music as therapy is accepted widely enough to have generated a medical discipline. Kung Fu styles, notably the one originating at the famed Shaolin Temple, even incorporates loud and deliberate vocalizations into martial arts practice.
In addition to techniques such as acupuncture, herbs, meditation, and qigong, Daoist medicine uses vibrations created with our vocal cords to benefit our organs and organ systems. Such functional and energetic benefits are propounded by Daoism’s Five Element Healing System, which describes the way our body works in metaphorical terms, with wood, metal, earth, fire, and water as the currency of change.
The Six Healing Sounds comprise a simple and manageable set of prescriptive techniques to benefit the liver, heart, kidneys, lungs, spleen, and digestion. It is worth noting that, from the Chinese medical point of view, the spleen is a function rather than an organ, and the benefits of sound-making to digestion center around an organ system known as the “Triple Burner,” which has no direct analog in Western anatomy.
As is true with many Daoist healing techniques, the Six Healing Sounds take into account not only the cycles of growth, aging, and healing in the body, but also the larger natural cycles of the seasons. The sounds are quite fun to do and will produce results if practiced over a period of weeks and months. To start, practice making the sound aloud, to refine clarity and accuracy. Once mastered, try making it more quietly, letting the breath do as much of the work as the vocal cords. This means that the second set of six should be done more as a whisper than a shout. I have found it best to practice each sound six times, adding an additional six repetitions when the organ system is “in season,” or to address a particular health problem in the relevant area. The sounds are:
1.Liver. Spring Season. Wood. “Shhhhh.” Wood grows in spring and the liver is more active during that season. If the liver is weak, illnesses such as hepatitis may arise at that time.
2.Heart. Summer. Fire. “Kuhhhh.” Fire happens in summer and the heart is active during that period. Same medical logic as above.
3.Spleen. Transition between seasons. Earth. “Hoooo.” Same medical logic as above.
4.Lung. Autumn. Metal. “Sssszz.” This sound has a buzz at the end. Same medical logic as above.
5.Kidney system. Winter. Water. “Chuaay.” Same medical logic as above.
6.Triple Burner/Heater/Warmer (digestion). All seasons. “Ssss.” All elements.
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Noise pollution is an oft-overlooked culprit in the chronic, lifestyle-based diseases of modern society. Even those who are accustomed to noise, and temporarily uncomfortable with quiet, eventually experience lower heart and respiratory rates in a tranquil environment. Rectification requires some silence, for in silence, we confront our true nature and the sources of our stress, finding within ourselves creativity and spirituality, too. There are all kinds of things we can do to make our lives quieter, including the use of earplugs while flying, sleeping, and working, closing windows to reduce street noise, and reducing the volume on our speakers and headphones. We might also lobby to outlaw blowing car horns in urban areas, and levy fines on drivers who modify mufflers or don’t repair damaged ones, introduce nighttime fly-over legislation for communities near airports, enforce construction bans at night and on weekends, and encourage replacing leaf blowers with rakes. While we’re at it, let’s diminish background music in public spaces like malls and elevators, and reintroduce soft, courteous speech, too. Let’s go back to considering loud people boorish instead of encouraging them by paying them extra attention.
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A great deal is made these days about the electrical nature of our bodies. This may be a direct consequence of our obsession with digital doodads and the unfolding of virtual worlds we have created in order to escape from the dire mess we’ve made of this real one. In addition to electricity, however, there is another form of energy with which we can express ourselves, and which is an integral part of who we are. That energy is light, and its units are photons, not electrons. Photons saturate our world, originate in the sun and distant stars (long burned out, by the way, but still sending us their celestial glory), and enter our bodies through both our eyeballs and our skin. The great fabric of existence is bolstered by the ongoing exchange of these photons—the fact that every time we look at each other, every time we so much as share visible space, we share photons instantly and pervasively. We give them to each other. They are gifts that knit together space and time. What we feel, intend, and do are all part of, and are actively contributing to, a vast landscape of light. Seen this way, photons can even be considered building blocks