If you’ve seen Blog 1 and 2, then you’re getting the picture that everything is connected and the digestion is the measure as to how well we are doing.
Eating habits, activity and meal portion
Food stagnation occurs when the Stomach cannot properly ripen food and when the Spleen cannot effectively transform and transport the nutrients. This may be caused by irregular eating (or meal skipping), talking or working while eating, being emotionally upset when eating or overeating past a point of initial fullness.
An empty or overfull Stomach and Spleen may lead to bloating, belching, nausea, fatigue, sluggish bowels, thick tongue coating or a feeling of heaviness.
Prevent food stagnation (the build-up on new food on top of undigested old food)
Prevention is easy and the outcomes outweigh the change in eating habits. It all comes down to being mindful when eating and seeing your Stomach as the guardian to your overall health. If it is burdened with clumps of unchewed food; it must work twice as hard as a ‘food processor’ to break down the large clumps to sludge. If it is burdened with more food (comfort eating or eating when you are not truly hungry), the Stomach will have unfinished business from the previous meal to work with as well as the new, resulting in overwhelm and the build-up of stagnant food.
When you eat
If you eat in sync with the Chinese body clock, you find that the Stomach time to nourish is 7-9am followed by the Spleen time of 9-11am. Here is the critical morning relationship of the Stomach and Spleen for healthy digestion. This means that meal skipping or irregular eating will follow though the clock to the other organs and push them out of their best time or compromise their efficiency.
Eating smaller meals, regularly helps maintain something in ‘the pot’ for you to draw from rather than creating something like an internal compost heap that decomposes slowly, creates heat that may contribute to chronic disease and metabolic issues.