Lord Lao's Scripture of the Western Ascension (Xisheng Jing) says: “The false way nourishes the body; the true way nourishes the spirit. One who comprehends this way can both vanish and remain. The spirit can make the body fly and can even move mountains; but when the body has become ashes and dust, what can it know?”
It also says: “To pity others is not as good as to pity oneself; to pity oneself is not as good as to love the spirit; to love the spirit is not as good as to let go of the spirit; to let go of the spirit is not as good as to guard the body; guarding the body, one lasts long and endures long. For the spirit is born from the body, and the body is completed by the spirit. Without the spirit, the body cannot live by itself; without the body, the spirit cannot be completed by itself. When body and spirit unite, they give life to each other and complete each other. The spirit always loves people, but people do not love the spirit. Therefore, cut off sageliness and discard cleverness, and return to non-action (wuwei).”
The Luoshu, in the section “Baoyuming,” says: “The ancients' method of treating illness was to harmonize with sweet spring water and moisten with qi-restoring medicines—neither pungent nor bitter, but sweet and rich in flavor. If one can take them regularly, their fluids flow into the five zang organs and are bound up in the heart and lungs, and one is free of illness all one's life.”
The Dayou Jing says: Someone in doubt asked: “We all begin alike from nothingness, and in the end receive qi from yin and yang; we carry body and soul between heaven and earth, and depend on food and breath to live and grow. Yet some are foolish and some wise, some strong and some weak, some long-lived and some short-lived. Is this due to heaven, or to people?” The one who explained said: “Whether one is born foolish or wise is due to heaven; whether one is strong or weak, long-lived or short-lived, is due to people. The way of heaven is what is so of itself; the way of humans depends on oneself. One whose fetal qi was full at the beginning, who had ample milk and nursing at birth, who had modest rich food while growing up, and who was restrained in sensual pleasure in the prime of life, will be strong and long-lived. One whose fetal qi was depleted at the beginning, who lacked milk and nursing at birth, who had too much rich food while growing up, and who gave free rein to sensual pleasure in the prime of life, will be weak and die young. If one's birth and growth are in due measure, and one adds nurture through the Tao, one's years cannot be measured.”
Hu Zhao of Yingchuan, styled Kongming, said: Ordinary people cannot be without desires, nor can they be without affairs. They should simply harmonize the heart and restrain their thoughts, quiet the body and reduce their dealings with things, and first remove whatever disturbs the spirit and offends one's nature. This is one art of conserving the spirit.
The Yellow Emperor's Central Classic (Huangdi Zhongjing) says: Those endowed with the qi of the five constants may be calm or restless; their nature, hard or soft, cannot be changed. The calm cannot be made restless, and the restless cannot be made calm. Calm and restless each have their own nature; to go against it is to lose one's proper share, and to indulge it is to harm one's life. So the flaw of calmness lies in not being open, and the flaw of restlessness lies in not being careful. The way of managing life is to be mindful of one's nature and share. By restraining or drawing it out as fits, and reducing or adding gradually, each will find what suits him. Still, the calm live long and the restless die young; the calm who cannot nurture themselves shorten their lives, while the restless who can nurture themselves extend their years. Yet the calm are easy to manage and the restless hard to hold; for one who takes full care to nurture fittingly, the calm can be nurtured and the restless can be nurtured too.
Those who prize power and position, even if not struck by evil influences, are injured inwardly in essence and spirit, and their bodies will surely die. (It is not that demonic calamity comes from outside; ice and burning coals simply knot together within, bringing only hemorrhage and vomiting of blood.) Those first rich and later poor, even if not harmed by evil influences, find their skin scorched and sinews protruding, and suffer withering and inner cramping. Wealth and poverty weigh less on a person, for good or ill, than power and position, so the illness stops at the body alone.
Nurturing one's nature means letting practice become nature, so that nature becomes good of itself and, without further practice, nothing goes amiss. Once nature is good of itself, then outwardly none of the hundred illnesses arise and no calamity or disorder occurs. This is the great principle of nurturing nature. Those who are good at nurturing nature treat illness before it becomes illness. So nurturing nature is not merely a matter of taking drugs and dining on the rosy clouds of dawn; it lies in having all five constants complete and all the hundred conducts fully in order. Then, even without drugs, one will have ample long years. If one's virtue and conduct are lacking, even jade wine and the Golden Elixir cannot lengthen life.
Thus when Lord Lao says, “Traveling by land, one need not avoid tigers and rhinoceroses,” this is the protection of the Tao and its Virtue. How could one rely on taking drugs to pray for long years! The reason sages compounded medicines was to rescue the ignorant. So those who never meet the Tao bear their illness for years without cultivating a single good practice, and linger on to the end of their days without ever repenting. There is good reason why the healers Qibo and He have wandered off forever, and Peng and Fu have gone never to return.
Ji Kang said: Nurturing life has five difficulties. Not giving up fame and gain is the first difficulty; not removing joy and anger is the second; not giving up music and sensual pleasure is the third; not cutting off rich flavors is the fourth; letting the spirit and thoughts, essence and energies disperse is the fifth. If these five are not removed, then even though one's heart longs not to grow old, one's mouth recites the highest words, one savors the essence of flowers and breathes in the great yang of the sun, one cannot hold to one's practice and cannot avoid dying young. If these five are absent from one's breast, then trust and compliance advance daily and the Tao and its Virtue become more complete daily; without praying for joy one has blessings, and without seeking longevity one's years are prolonged. This too is a great principle of nurturing life. Yet one who embraces humaneness and righteousness and is free from the burden of excess—is he not the next best!
Qibo said: When a person reaches forty and begins to nurture life, his yin qi is already half gone and his vigor in daily life has declined. At fifty the body feels heavy and the ears and eyes are no longer sharp. At sixty come impotence and a great decline of qi; the nine orifices do not function well, the lower body is depleted while the upper body is congested, and tears and mucus flow together. Hence it is said: know this and you will be strong; do not know it and you will grow old. It is also said: they come from the same source but have different names. The wise see what is the same; the foolish see what is different. The foolish fall short; the wise have a surplus. With a surplus, the ears and eyes are sharp, the body is light and strong, the old become vigorous again, and the vigorous are further strengthened. Therefore the sage acts through non-action, engages in no-affairs, delights in calm contentment, does not indulge desires or gratify his whims, and holds to emptiness and nothingness; so his life is endless and lasts as long as heaven and earth. This is how the sage cares for his body.
The Perfected said: Even if one takes drugs, without knowing the art of nurturing one's nature it is hard to live long. In the way of nurturing nature, one should not lie down right after a full meal, nor sit all day long, for these all shorten life. One should work a little, but never to great fatigue, and never force oneself beyond what one can bear. After eating, it is pleasant to walk about leisurely and follow some path. Flowing water does not grow stale, and a door hinge is not eaten by worms, because they are in motion. One should not eat at night; after eating one should simply walk, going back and forth ten li or more. Lying down right after a full meal gives rise to a hundred illnesses.
As for those who wish to follow their pleasure and indulge their hearts, who call themselves enlightened and resigned to fate, who do not cling to right or wrong, who spend their passions and strength to the utmost and care nothing for lasting—when they hear these words, even wind passing the ear or lightning flashing before the eyes cannot compare with how little they heed. So they let their bodies wither in dissipation and their qi expire amid silks and satins, and they do so willingly. How can one speak to them of nurturing nature! Not only will they not accept it, they will call it witchcraft and nonsense. To hope that they will believe it is like offering a bright mirror to the blind, or entertaining the deaf with strings and flutes.
The Baopuzi says: A person's body is an image of a state. The position of the chest and abdomen is like its palaces; the arrangement of the four limbs is like its outlying borders; the divisions of bones and joints are like its hundred officials; the spirit is like the ruler; the blood is like the ministers; qi is like the people. So one who can govern the people can govern the state. One cherishes the people in order to keep the state secure; one cherishes qi in order to keep the body whole. When the people scatter the state perishes; when qi is exhausted the person dies. The dead cannot be brought back to life, and what has perished cannot be preserved. Therefore the perfected person dispels trouble before it arises, treats illness before it becomes illness, and applies medicine before anything is wrong, rather than chasing after what is already gone. The people are hard to nurture and easily endangered; qi is hard to keep clear and easily muddied. So one weighs authority and kindness to protect the altars of the state, and cuts off cravings and desires to secure blood and qi. Only then is the True One preserved, the three hun and seven po guarded, the hundred harms repelled, and one's years extended. From fifty to a hundred years of age, never let good medicine leave your hand, never let good words leave your mouth, and never take wild thoughts lightly. Always, with a deep heart and utmost sincerity, be respectful toward all things. Take care never to feign goodness to please others.
(Excerpted from Seven Slips from the Cloudy Satchel (Yunji Qiqian), chapter 35)