A Canon of Chinese Health Regimens (English-Chinese Edition): The Culture, Philosophy & Practice of Chinese Wellness

This is not a recipe book for health foods, and it is not a manual of acupuncture points. It is a bilingual guide to the whole system of Chinese health preservation—the ideas about nature, balance, and daily rhythm that sit underneath the practices most people have heard of. You start with the basics: what health actually means in the Chinese tradition, and why the body is understood as part of a larger natural order. Then the book walks through the three great philosophical streams that shaped Chinese wellness—Daoism’s “follow nature,” Confucianism’s “seek harmony,” and Buddhism’s “cultivate the mind”—before moving into concrete practices: eating with the seasons and the five flavours, exercises like the Five-Animal Frolics and Tai Chi, sleep and daily routine, and the health-preserving effects of tea. The text is in Chinese and English, and the book is illustrated throughout. If you want to understand not just what Chinese people do to stay healthy, but why those practices make sense within a whole way of thinking—rather than read a list of tips or a dense academic study—this is it.