What Happens When a Person Is About to Die? — Doctor Luo Dalun Presents Doctor Ni Haixia’s Twenty-First Lecture on the Huang Di Nei Jing: the Ending of the Twelve Primary Channels
Patient search terms: what are the signs before death? / symptoms before death / sweating before death / face suddenly turns pale / eyes rolling up / back arching backward (opisthotonos) / deafness / hands and feet losing strength / constipation / kidney-deficiency constipation / drinking water in the morning / how to take Liu Wei Di Huang Wan / how to take the pulse / what does Chinese pulse diagnosis look at?
Corresponding medical names: Ling Shu · the Meridian chapter (Jing Mai) · the ending of the twelve primary channels (shi er jing mai zhi zhong) · the ending of the Tai Yang meridian: dai yan (eyes rolling upward) · fan zhe (arching backward) · se bai (white complexion) · jue han nai chu (terminal sweating) · the ending of the Shao Yang meridian: er long (deafness) · bai jie jie zong (all joints going loose) · mu huan jue xi (the eyes turning fixed and losing their anchorage) · yi ri ban si (death in a day and a half) · the ending of the Yang Ming meridian: kou mu dong zuo (mouth and eyes twitching) · shan jing wang yan (easy startle and rambling speech) · se huang (yellow complexion) · hui guang fan zhao (the last radiance, the final rally before death) · the ending of the Shao Yin meridian: mian hei chi chang er gou (black face, long and encrusted teeth) · fu zhang bi (abdominal distension and blockage) · the kidney governs urination and defecation · the ending of the Tai Yin meridian: fu zhang bi bu de xi (distension, blockage, difficult breathing) · shan yi shan ou (frequent belching and vomiting) · mian se li hei (dark lusterless complexion) · the ending of the Jue Yin meridian: zhong re ai gan (heat in the middle, dry throat) · shan niao xin fan (frequent urination, vexation) · she juan luan shang suo (the tongue curling up and the testicles retracting) · tong qi xiang qiu (like qi seeking like qi) · the three methods: han fa (sweating) · tu fa (vomiting) · xia fa (purging) · he jie (harmonizing) · the five colors matching the five organs (qing chi huang bai hei; green, red, yellow, white, black) · the twelve needling methods (shi er ci fa): ou ci (paired needling) and duan ci (short needling) · dao zhen (knife needle) · duan jian can pian (broken slips and scattered fragments) · ping dan (dawn) pulse-taking: yin qi wei dong, yang qi wei san (the yin qi has not stirred, the yang qi has not scattered) · yang qi scattering to the four limbs during sleep · cold water in the early morning · Liu Wei Di Huang Wan (Six-Ingredient Rehmannia Pill): san bu san xie (three tonify, three drain) · mai shi xue zhi fu (the pulse is the mansion of the blood) · chang ze qi zhi, duan ze qi bing, shu ze fan xin, da ze bing jin (long means the qi is governed, short means the qi is diseased, rapid means vexation, large means the disease advances) · shang sheng ze qi gao, xia sheng ze qi zhang (full above, the qi is high; full below, the qi is distended) · Cun-Guan-Chi · the high bone (gao gu) · Cun mouth nine fen, Chi one cun · the Three Sovereigns points (San Huang Xue): Yinlingquan SP9 · Diji SP8 · Sanyinjiao SP6 · shaking the needle (yao zhen)
Opening scene: the feet are swollen — needle the Three Sovereigns points and give the needle a shake
This lecture begins where the needle techniques of the last one left off. Doctor Ni first went through the famous “Heaven-Earth-Man Three Sovereigns” point group for edema once more: on the inner side of the knee is Yinlingquan (SP9, the Yin Mound Spring); three cun below it is Diji (SP8, the Earth Pivot); and three cun above the inner ankle is Sanyinjiao (SP6, the Meeting of the Three Yin). These three needles are the renowned Three Sovereigns points, and their specialty is draining water.
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Why do we call them the Heaven-Earth-Man Three Sovereigns? Because the spleen governs water. When the water arrives and settles, and the feet swell, you insert the needle and shake it as you withdraw — for edema you can always use the shaking method. After you shake it out, because you are needling on the water channel, there is no bleeding — water comes out. Just let the water drip and drain, it does not matter. The moment you shake the needle out, the water pressure is released, and the swollen, tight, painful feeling disperses. And it is not only that water can be drained from this spot — after the needle goes in, the urine output increases too. That is why for edema you shake the needle. Apart from that, when we work on the meridians and the lower limbs, we do not shake the needle wildly.
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: So the entire Huang Di Nei Jing and acupuncture are completely, tightly woven together.
The Yellow Emperor asks a heavy question: when the qi of the twelve meridians is gone, what happens to a person?
Then comes today’s main subject. On page 1117, the Yellow Emperor asks: among the twelve primary meridians, when the meridian qi is completely cut off, what symptoms arise?
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: The twelve primary meridians — the Lung meridian, the Large Intestine meridian, the Stomach meridian, the Spleen meridian… when the meridian qi of each one is completely cut off, what symptoms arise? This is what we call “the ending” (zhong) — the meridian is finished, the qi is gone, and what phenomena does the patient show? From now on, when you see a patient in such a state, you know which meridian’s qi has run out.
Qi Bo answers them one by one. First, the Tai Yang meridian (the Bladder channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: The Tai Yang meridian is the Bladder channel, our largest meridian. It runs from the back all the way up to the head, to Jingming (BL1, the Bright Eyes point) at the inner corner of the eye, circling the whole head, coming up one and a half cun beside the Du meridian. If the qi of the entire Tai Yang meridian is severed and completely lost, the patient shows dai yan (eyes rolling upward), fan zhe (arching backward), se bai (a white complexion), and jue han nai chu (terminal sweating) — and the moment that appears, death comes. What is dai yan? The eyes roll upward, the eyeballs turn up, and the whites show. Because the essence of the Bladder meridian reaches Jingming, when that essence is lost, this phenomenon appears. Fan zhe is the whole body arching backward. Normally a person bends forward; this person bends the other way, arching backward — the Du meridian normally carries us forward, but here the body only arches backward, because the essence is gone, there is no longer the loose-and-tight force, everything contracts and tightens, and the whole body reverses — this is opisthotonos, the arching of the back like a drawn bow.
So what do “white complexion” and “terminal sweating” mean?
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Se bai means the face turns extremely pale. The human head is the meeting of the six yang (liu yang zhi hui) — the yang qi there is very strong. Where does that yang come from? From the spleen and stomach. The essence of the spleen and stomach rises to the head. When the whole face turns pale, it means the stomach-qi and spleen-qi are both gone. Jue han means oil — oil comes out on the face. Our bodies have oil. Every morning when you get up you touch your nose and there is oil on it; sometimes you complain that the nose is so oily — that is qi. When the oil has all seeped out, and you touch the face and it feels like an oil lamp at the end of its fuel — you cannot feel any oil at all, the skin is completely dry — the qi is gone. When the Tai Yang meridian ends, the patient dies on the spot.
The Shao Yang meridian ends: deafness, every joint in the body going loose — but deafness must first be separated into two kinds
Second, the Shao Yang meridian (the Gallbladder channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: When the Shao Yang ends: deafness; all hundred joints going loose (bai jie jie zong); the eyes turn and lose their anchorage (mu huan jue xi) — once the anchorage is lost, death comes in about a day and a half, and at death the color first turns greenish-white. The liver and gallbladder are interior-exterior paired; every joint has meridians passing through it; the liver governs the sinews; all the sinews of the body loosen completely and can no longer hold — because the meridian qi is gone. As for the eyes, mu huan jue xi — the eyes cannot turn, both eyes stare straight ahead, looking dazed. When liver disease appears, we often see patients with cirrhosis or liver cancer at the very end: both eyes are straight and cannot move — because the meridian qi is gone. You take his hand, and the leg drops down; ask him to raise his foot, and when you let go it drops; the eyes do not move, both eyes stare straight and fixed inside — this is mu huan jue qi, and clinically you really can see this state. Such a person dies within a day and a half.
Speaking of deafness, Doctor Ni stopped to sort it into two kinds — do not confuse them:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Deafness is common, and one kind is external. You go to a concert and sit right beside the giant speaker — a speaker fifty inches big, and you sit there foolishly without moving away; when the music starts, your ears go deaf. That is replete (shi) deafness, and it has nothing to do with the Shao Yang. Or shooting — when we shoot indoors in America we all wear ear protection, otherwise the ears ring and the echo is huge. All of that is replete, and it has nothing to do with the gallbladder. The deafness spoken of here is the deafness that arises from internal deficiency (xu) — issued from within.
How do you treat external, traumatic deafness? Doctor Ni offered a wonderful method based on “like qi seeking like qi” (tong qi xiang qiu):
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Tong qi xiang qiu — like qi seeks like qi. If you went deaf because of a sound system, curing this replete deafness is simple: go back to the scene, and then slowly, slowly leave. The moment the ear is injured on the spot, you must leave very, very gradually. Take indoor shooting: a gun goes off, the ear cannot hear clearly, the eardrum is shaken violently. Now put the ear protection on, let a tiny bit of sound leak through, fire one more round — with the same gun, the same ammunition. Bullets come in many kinds — lead shot, explosive rounds — and the sounds are all different. Let the ear slowly get used to it and it heals. The same with the speaker: play the same music, and slowly, slowly move away, separate yourself, get farther from it, let the ear gradually grow accustomed to it. Like qi seeking like qi — and the deafness is cured.
The Yang Ming meridian ends: rambling speech and a yellow face — the “last radiance” before death
Third, the Yang Ming meridian (the Stomach channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: The Yang Ming meridian runs through Chengqi (ST1, Receiving Tears), Sibai (ST2, Four Whites), up to Touwei (ST8, Head Corner), Xiaguan (ST7, Below the Joint), Jiache (ST6, Jaw Chariot), and down to Dicang (ST4, Earth Granary) — all of these are places on the Yang Ming meridian. When the Yang Ming ends: kou mu dong zuo — the mouth and eyes start twitching; the patient startles easily and talks nonsense; the face turns yellow. When the pulse is about to end, there is a moment of fullness — the pulse surges. When the meridian qi is leaving, it is like a candle: the candle is about to go out, the oil is nearly gone, only a wick is left inside; just before it burns out it suddenly flares up bigger, then “pfft” — gone. That is hui guang fan zhao, the last radiance. The human body does the same thing: it suddenly has one good spell. When the hands and feet go numb, death arrives — the hands and feet are governed by the Yang Ming, because of the spleen and stomach.
Shao Yin, Tai Yin, Jue Yin: black face and long teeth, vomiting and distension, curled tongue and retracted testicles
Fourth, the Shao Yin meridian (the Kidney channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Shao Yin is the kidney, and it governs black. The proper black should be stored inside the kidney, inside the kidney meridian — that is normal nourishment, the normal organ color. Now the essence is gone, and the black scatters outward — mian hei chi chang er gou: the face turns black, and the teeth look long and encrusted. Why do the teeth look long? Because the gums have shrunk back. Then fu zhang bi — abdominal distension and blockage — and death comes from being blocked above and below. The kidney governs urination and defecation, and so both stop.
Fifth, the Tai Yin meridian (the Spleen channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: When the Tai Yin ends: fu zhang bi bu de xi — the abdomen distends and blocks, and breathing becomes difficult. Also shan yi shan ou — the patient belches often and vomits. When the vomiting is severe, the qi rises upward, and the patient’s face turns red. After vomiting for a long time, the turbid matter of food still stays inside the body, and it too causes urination and defecation to stop, until finally the face turns dark and lusterless (mian se li hei). This kind also leads to death.
Sixth, the Jue Yin meridian (the Liver channel) ends:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: When the Jue Yin ends: the middle burner runs hot, the throat is bitterly dry, there is frequent urination and a restless, vexed mind; in severe cases the tongue curls upward (she juan), and the testicles retract upward (luan shang suo). These are the phenomena that appear when the qi of the twelve primary meridians is defeated and gone. Why do the testicles retract? Because only the liver meridian passes through the testicles. When the meridian qi ends, things contract rather than relax — when the Bladder meridian qi ended, the body arched backward; when the Jue Yin meridian qi ends, the testicles pull upward. When you cut fresh meat open, the fresh piece is large; once it dries in the wind it becomes very small. So when the meridian qi ends, everything contracts.
Sweating, vomiting, purging, harmonizing — the general outline of the laws of treatment
Having finished the endings of the six meridians, Doctor Ni said: from all this we can know the laws of treatment.
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: What we call han, tu, xia — sweating, vomiting, purging: one is the sweating method, one is the vomiting method, one is the purging method. If urination and defecation are blocked, we find a way to communicate them. If the disease sits too high — whether in the head and face, the nose, the throat, or the upper part of the lung — we use the vomiting method. If it is on the surface of the skin, we use the sweating method. If it lies between the viscera, or between the meridians, or between the muscles and the meridians, we use the harmonizing method. All of these lay down the laws of treatment for us in the future. Because the cause of the disease is in there, certain laws of treatment arise from it.
Constipation does not always call for attacking — first read the face to find the cause
Right after that, Doctor Ni took “constipation” as an example and put the principle to work plainly:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Suppose we know this person’s stool is not moving. We look at him and see the kidney is black — the face is black — and we realize that the kidney function has weakened, and that is why the stool cannot come out. In this case you must restore the kidney function and let the stool come out by itself; you cannot attack it out. If you attack it out, the kidney grows even weaker. So we must find the cause of the disease and then decide. If, on the other hand, the kidney is perfectly fine and it is only the Large Intestine that is constipated — too dry inside — the patient will not look black; the face will be bright red, very shiny and glossy. Why? Because the Yang Ming qi is flowing backward: what should go downward goes upward instead, and the face becomes bright red and glossy. This kind also causes constipation. So with constipation you must always find the cause before acting. Never see constipation and simply attack it.
Five colors matching five organs, plus a metaphor about showing a banana to a man from the Arctic
With the endings of the twelve meridians complete, Doctor Ni gave a concluding mental key:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Basically, as long as you remember green, red, yellow, white, black — and that the liver governs the sinews, the heart governs the blood vessels, the spleen governs the muscles, the lung governs the skin and body hair, the kidney governs the bones — plus whether the pulse floats or sinks, you can judge all of these. When the meridian qi ends, everything contracts — just like meat drying in the wind.
As for how to really remember these symptoms, he told a very amusing metaphor:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: First get a rough concept. Once you have truly seen it once in the clinic, you will remember it. If you have never seen the real thing and someone only describes it to you — it is like telling a man from the Arctic what a banana looks like. Ten people could describe it; everyone understands the same language, but ten people will use ten different sets of words to explain what a banana looks like. They talk and talk, and the Arctic man still cannot pick out the banana. The best way is to bring him a banana and show him. So clinical experience is extremely important! I have seen many people fall ill and die. Because I have seen so much, the moment we see it we can judge immediately.
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: How did Qi Bo know all this? He stood beside the sickbed, watching each patient, and recorded the symptoms one by one — it must have been exactly that way. Otherwise, how could he have known?
Correction: last lecture, one of the twelve needling methods was stated wrong
After the main content, Doctor Ni first made a correction. In the previous lecture, when teaching the twelve needling methods, he had stated the first one incorrectly:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: In the ancient acupuncture texts, all the needling methods — this book is divided into three volumes; volume two is split into an upper and a lower part; in the section on the theory and principles of acupuncture there are the twelve needling methods. The first is called ou ci, paired needling — what I discussed yesterday: needling the front on the front, the back on the back, specially for treating heart and spleen, heart pain. Yesterday I mistakenly called it duan ci, short needling. Short needling is actually the ninth method; short needling treats bone bi — diseases of the bone, such as rheumatism and bone pain. Why is it called short? Because beside the bone is shallow — the moment you insert, you touch the bone; you rub the needle on the painful spot, on the surface of the bone. That is short needling. On the mainland there is a needle technique they call the knife needle (dao zhen): the knife needle is very thick, like a knife, and when inserted it performs short needling — but it hurts a lot. Personally I think it injures the meridians and the sinews too easily — because right beside the bone are the sinews. When you do short needling, a fine filiform needle is enough: insert straight in and straight out, rub on the bone surface; it hurts a little, but you needle right there on the bone. Those are the twelve needling methods.
Then he spoke about an essential attitude for reading the Huang Di Nei Jing:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: The Huang Di Nei Jing has been passed down for so long that much has been lost and scattered in the middle. Because of wars, broken bamboo slips and scattered fragments (duan jian can pian) are inevitable. So when you read this book, you will often suddenly run into a passage that has nothing whatsoever to do with its surroundings — that is normal. If it were written in a perfectly systematic way, that would be a modern book. The ancient transmission always contains broken slips and scattered fragments; the missing middle sections we cannot trace, and we do not want to insert our own pieces. Only by gaining insights from clinical practice, finding out some very special methods, and getting good results for patients, do we supplement them for you. As long as you can distinguish yin and yang — once yin and yang can be told apart, you are a doctor who can cure disease. From the very first chapter until now, everything spoken of is yin and yang. It is divided into so many different chapters, and it is all yin and yang.
How do you tell yin and yang apart simply? He gave the most direct way:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: For example, here is the skin, here is your muscle. If the disease grows on the outside, it is yang — yang is outside, yin is inside. If you grow a lump, a pimple, an abscess, that is yang — easy to treat. If it does not grow like that, if it grows sunken inward — that is yin, and it is hard to treat. Yin disease is hard, yang disease is easy; a simple look tells you apart. A patient comes in and talks to you in a loud, ringing voice — that disease is easy to treat. One comes in pale, has not even spoken, no qi at all — that is all yin disease, harder to treat. Diagnosis distinguishes yin and yang; medicines are also divided into yin and yang.
Taking the pulse at dawn: theoretically the most accurate — in practice only family members enjoy it
Moving on, page 120, on the method of pulse diagnosis. The Yellow Emperor asks: what is the method of taking the pulse? Qi Bo says:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: “Always at dawn (ping dan), when the yin qi has not yet stirred and the yang qi has not yet scattered, before food and drink have been taken, when the meridians are not yet full and the collateral vessels are even and calm, when the qi and blood are not yet in disorder” — this is the time before disorder, when nothing has been disturbed, that you can diagnose a pulse with excess. “Observe the movement and stillness of the pulse, examine the brightness of the spirit, inspect the five colors, observe the excess and deficiency of the five organs, the strength and weakness of the six bowels, the vigor and decline of the body — and by combining all of these, determine the division between life and death.” Theoretically, this means one patient a day — impossible! Who can do it? Flying by plane in the morning to several homes to feel pulses, just to examine at dawn — very hard to do. Only our own family members, the people around you, can be seen this way. Also you can teach your patient: go home and show me tomorrow morning. The patient does not know how to feel a pulse, so you have him look at his own complexion and tell you about it.
But out of this passage grows a wonderful method of health preservation — the care of the early morning:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: In the early morning, the yin qi has not stirred, the yang qi has not scattered, and nothing has been eaten or drunk. What does this mean in the Chinese medical view? When a person sleeps, the yang qi scatters to the four limbs — which is why our head, hands and feet all stick out, and the body stays covered by the blanket. That is the normal state. Some people are born with a habit: the first thing they do when they get up is drink a glass of cold water, and they find it very comfortable — and this is correct. Why? Cold water is cold in nature — you would not use ice water, just cold water. When the cold arrives, what happens to the yang of the four limbs? How could cold come in? The yang immediately turns back, instantly returns! The human body is extremely sensitive; the moment something touches it, there is a reaction. If you walk down the street and poke someone and he has no reaction, that person is nearly finished. So when cold comes in, the yang of the four limbs returns to the stomach in an instant — because the water goes down into the stomach, returns to the stomach at once, and churns inside the stomach. That is why, for a thousand years, anyone who drinks a glass of cold water in the morning has never had stomach disease!
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: And conversely, a person with a healthy stomach will naturally have that kind of preference. Ask a person with stomach disease: “Do you drink water when you get up in the morning?” — “No. What would be the point of drinking water?” That is stomach disease! You do not want to drink water!
Bonus: the dawn method of taking Liu Wei Di Huang Wan
Speaking of that morning glass of water, Doctor Ni took the opportunity to teach the health-preserving way to take Liu Wei Di Huang Wan (the Six-Ingredient Rehmannia Pill):
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: Liu Wei Di Huang Wan contains Shan Yao (Chinese yam), Shan Zhu Yu (cornel fruit), Shu Di Huang (prepared rehmannia), Ze Xie (water plantain), Fu Ling (poria), and Mu Dan Pi (moutan bark) — three tonify, three drain (san bu san xie). It is a very gentle method of tonifying and draining; when we reach the Jin Gui I will explain it in detail. When you get up in the morning, put a glass of cold water beside your bed — put hot water there at night and by morning it has cooled, right? Cover it, or a cockroach might climb in; in the morning, half asleep, not knowing what is inside, you pick it up and drink — and you have swallowed the cockroach too. Put the Liu Wei Di Huang Wan nearby. The moment your eyes open in the morning, do not move — because your body still has its yang spread out in the hands and feet. Lying there, open the cover, and slowly sit up. When you sit up, take the pill quickly — do not be too slow, do not wait until the yang has returned before taking it. Use the cold water to wash the pill down: put the pill in your mouth, and the cold water flushes it into the stomach. Cold water can strengthen the stomach (jian wei), keeping the stomach churning; the yang qi turns back and returns to the stomach to massage it. When it is massaged at that moment, everything is digested — this is the best thing.
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: You can also take a tiny pinch of salt in one hand — no need for much; too much salt harms the blood. Take a bottle, pinch some sea salt into the cold water. Is this good for health? If you are going to be a doctor, you must take care of yourself. You cannot be treating patients with a decent complexion while your own face is dark and gloomy — that will not do! So a doctor must have very good presence and keep his mood happy. From here we can see how to regulate yin and yang. As long as you keep this habit, you will not get stomach disease for years — a very simple move, very useful. Of course, if you say you do not want to take the pill, you can just drink the water — at least it is good for the stomach.
Closing: the first lesson in pulse-taking — the pulse is the mansion of the blood
Finally, page 121, Doctor Ni begins to lead everyone through the gate of pulse diagnosis:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: The pulse is the mansion of the blood (mai shi xue zhi fu) — the pulse is the surface expression of the blood. On the pulse mansion: “Long means the qi is well governed (chang ze qi zhi); short means the qi is diseased (duan ze qi bing); rapid means vexation of the heart (shu ze fan xin); large means the disease is advancing (da ze bing jin); full above means the qi is high (shang sheng ze qi gao); full below means the qi is distended (xia sheng ze qi zhang).” This is where we enter pulse diagnosis. I will draw you two pulses: seen from above, it is like this — this is the Guan bar. Above it is the Cun, which is yang; below it is the Chi, which is yin. Above is nine fen; below is one cun. Watch me write it every day, and I guarantee you will not need to memorize it — it will surface naturally. Stretch out your arm and rest it on the pulse pillow. The fatter a man’s hand, the more wealth he will gather (just joking); women should not have plump hands. Looking at the pulse on the body, the pulse on the hand, from the front: this is the Guan, this is the Cun, this is the Chi — at the yang pulse place it is more superficial; at the yin pulse place it is a bit deeper. The pulse runs on a slant like this. This is the normal pulse appearance.
How do you set the length of Cun, Guan and Chi? He gave a rough-and-ready method that needs no ruler:
💬 Note from Doctor Ni: When we speak of “long pulse,” we mean exactly this length of one cun and nine fen. The easiest way to compute: the high bone (gao gu) is here; from the high bone to the crease line of the palm — the pulse does not reach the crease, it stops a little below it — is exactly nine fen, measured upward from the center of the high bone. Count to nine fen; then, using that crease line as the nine-fen mark, fold it back with a little extra — that is one cun. Just think of it this way in your mind. Everyone’s Cun and Chi are different — short people, tall people, children all differ. Basically, this is how you count; imagine it in your mind, you do not need to take a ruler to measure each person. A pulse of standard length — this is the standard length of the pulse, and it represents the qi of the five organs being very well balanced.
From the end-of-life signals of the twelve meridians’ qi to the general outline of treatment by sweating, vomiting and purging; from the secret of a glass of cold water at dawn to the first lesson in pulse-taking — this lecture carries an enormous amount of information, yet it keeps turning around the two characters “yin and yang.” Just as Doctor Ni himself said: as long as you can distinguish yin and yang, you are a doctor who can cure disease. The next lecture enters the Mai Yao Jing Wei Lun (On the Essentials of the Pulse) and radically simplifies pulse method — the floating, rough, slippery, deep, wiry, surging and hollow pulses, how from the pulse you know where the visceral disease is and where the bowel disease is, even the very source of the disease; then one finger will be enough to feel the pulse — there is no rule that you must use three fingers.
Compiled from Doctor Ni Haixia’s Ren Ji (Human Records) lecture series on the Huang Di Nei Jing (lecture 21), presented by Doctor Luo Dalun