Bloody Mary - we often dry out

Bloody mary – “our work dries out our blood”

Too much screen work can cause Liver Blood deficiency and weakens Lung YIN. An “excess” of Yang tends to dry us out and drain our own fluids. Since we should be especially aware of these signals in an intense time like the present, it’s good to align your daily diet and lifestyle with how you feel mentally and physically.

Now that our yoga practice is often tied to a screen as well, I thought I’d bring back an old post and write about Liver Blood deficiency in TCM. The main signs of Liver Blood deficiency are exhaustion and anaemia/iron deficiency, with paleness, brittle fingernails, dry eyes, chronic fatigue, menstrual problems and more.

To counteract this, it helps to build blood with the following foods:

• red dates
• pomegranate
• parsley leaves
• pears
• mulberries
• beetroot
• parsley root

Good options for the workplace are beetroot juice and dried wolfberries (fructus lycii), also known as “goji berries”, or a pear compote.

Fruit soup: Simmer 3–4 pears, a few longan fruits, a handful of Go Qi wolfberries and a vanilla pod in water for 30 min. (builds Liver Blood).

To nourish Yin, you should

keep a bowl of nuts on your desk when you do a lot of screen work.

• walnuts
• almonds
• cashews
• pine nuts

(instead of coffee or black tea 🙁 )

The liver loves rhythm! So it does us good to have regularity in our lives. Especially when it comes to meals and sleep!

If it gets late…

…this puts exceptional strain on the body and the digestive system. Food has to be digested at a time when the body’s functions are actually running on low. Meals should therefore be light and easy to digest. No fatty, rich meals (so no pizza or overly fatty sweet food), and as little raw food and salad as possible;

…better are warm meals like soups, stews and curries, ideally with vegetables, millet, rice or soups, or an apple compote with nuts for dessert.

This drives away tiredness and improves concentration.

In general, night work damages Kidney YIN in the long run.

Main signs of Kidney YIN deficiency:

• back pain that gets worse with movement
• dizziness, forgetfulness, numbness
• dark circles under the eyes, fatigue, hair loss
• night sweats

For those affected, it’s important to replenish Kidney YIN:

• moist cooking methods, high-quality oils (e.g. linseed oil, poppy seed oil), seeds and nuts, sesame, tofu, poppy seeds
• make sure to avoid spicy, overly drying (bitter) and hot foods

Photo credits Pascale Neuens — great TCM recipes on her website