Upper Dan Tian Breathing

• Get in a comfortable seated position and relax your body and face. Soften the belly.
• Gently place your tongue on the roof of your mouth where the teeth meet the gums
• Bring your awareness to the point of light and stillness in the center of your skull
• Begin breathing through your nose, long soft full breaths, connecting the breath with this point of light. Expanding into the light on the inhale and basking in the light on the exhale.
• Continue for up to 108 breaths

Inner Smile - Nourishing the Organs

SPLEEN

Polar Energetics: Receptivity, relaxation (capacity to digest) | Anxiety, tension (looping thoughts)

Color: Gold / yellow

Sound : Huuuu (a strong whisper)

• Rub your palms together to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your spleen, located to the left side of lower rib cage
• Take a moment to attune to the spleen, bathing it with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation.
• Imagine permeating your spleen with golden yellow sunlight - use your inner eye to connect. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the spleen and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of calm relaxation while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the spleen.
• Exhale out the mouth making the "huuuu" sound while releasing any feelings of anxiety and worry.
• Maintain the essence of the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

KIDNEYS

Energetics: deep wisdom, connection, serenity, trust, gentleness | fear, anxiety
Color: Deep blue
Sound: Tchwaay (a strong whisper)

• Rub your palms together to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your kidneys, located on either side of the lower ribcage/the small of the back.
• Take a moment to attune to the kidneys, bathing them with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation. It helps to understand how they serve your body.
• Imagine permeating your kidneys with a serene blue light - use your inner eye to connect with them. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the kidneys and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of wisdom and tranquility, while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the kidneys.
• Exhale out the mouth making the "Tchwaay" sound, while releasing feelings of fear and worry.
• Maintain the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

HEART

Energetics: compassion, kindness, patience, warmth | cruelty, callousness, spite
Color: Soft flame
Sound : Haaah (a strong whisper)

• Rub your palms together to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your heart, located slightly to the left side of center sternum
• Take a moment to attune to the heart, bathing it with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation - attuning with the heartbeat.
• Imagine permeating your heart with a soft flame - use your inner eye to connect. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the heart and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of kindness, gratitude and compassion while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the heart. Cultivating the essence of these words and flood that energy into the heart.
• Exhale out the mouth making the "haaaah" sound, while releasing any feelings of cruelty, jealousy, spite, etc.
• Maintain the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

WOMB

Energetics: somatic presence, deep stillness, rhythmic connection | disembodied, numb, out of sync
Color: Blood Red
Sound : Hmmm (a deep vibratory hum you feel in the womb)

• Rub your palms together to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your womb, located a couple inches below the belly button in the center of the hips.
• Take a moment to attune to the womb, bathing it with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation.
• Imagine permeating your womb with a deep blood red light (there may be hues of gold) - use your inner eye to connect. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the womb and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of stillness, wisdom, depth and soft power while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the womb.
• Exhale out the nose making the "hmmm" sound in the throat, while releasing any feelings of uprootedness, numbness, confusion, insecurity, etc.
• Maintain the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

LIVER

Energetics: growth, benevolence, expansion, generosity, full potential | anger, frustration, irritability
Color: Green
Sound : Tshoo

• Rub your palms together to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your liver, located to the right side of lower rib cage
• Take a moment to attune to the liver, bathing it with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation.
• Imagine permeating your liver with green light - use your inner eye to connect. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the liver and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of benevolence, expansion, and generosity while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the liver.
• Exhale out the mouth making the "tshoo" sound, while releasing any feelings of anger, frustration and irritability.
• Maintain the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

LUNGS

Energetics: Courage, confidence, healthy sense of pride | Sadness, grief
Color: White Light
Sound : Sssss

• Rub your palms together quickly to generate heat.
• Place your palms over your lungs, located to the both sides of the chest
• Take a moment to attune to the lungs and your breathe, bathing them with an inner smile of acknowledgment and appreciation.
• Imagine permeating your lungs with pure white light - use your inner eye to connect. Follow your energy as it moves deeper into the lungs and keep your awareness there.
• Breathe in through your nose, taking in the essence of courage and confidence while channeling that feeling through your hands and into the lungs.
• Exhale out the mouth making the "Ssss" sound, while releasing any feelings of grief and sadness.
• Maintain the inner smile for the whole practice.
• Repeat a few cycles until you feel complete.

Coffee Substitutes

• Dandelion Root
• Chicory Root
• Carob

Elimination

• Caffeine
• Sugar
• Alcohol
• Cold beverages (only room temp or warm)
• Dairy - butter and ghee is ok, good for high heat cooking
• Nut and rice milks
• Soy
• Raw vegetables unless mixed with a warm meal (i.e. greens like arugula, etc)
• Bananas
• Seed oils - stick to cold-pressed oils such as olive and avocado
• Extra spicy foods
• Processed salt (go with real sea salt - should look a little dirty)
• Synthetic ingredients/chemicals of any kind including chewing gum, skincare, toothpaste and cleaning products.
• Guar gum or Xanthan gum
• "Citric acid" or "natural flavoring" on ingredients labels. These are either gmo black mold or chemicals.

Food for Clearing Dampness in the Spleen

• Light, lean proteins (chicken, fish, turkey)
• Barley
• Millet
• Rice (wild, black, basmati, red, brown)
• Quinoa
• Steamed vegetables: pumpkin, carrots, parsnips, green beans, fennel, leaks, beets, daikon radish, etc
• Warming spices: Ginger (fresh, not powdered - powdered is too hot for the liver), cinnamon, cardamom, rosemary, thyme, oregano) *go easy on spices in general*.
• Legumes: lentils, aduki beans, sprouted mung beans, black beans
• Experiment with fermented foods after 2 weeks (miso and sauerkraut are good, avoid overly greasy or salty fermented foods)

Foods to Tonify Spleen Qi

• Sweet potatoes
• Buckwheat
• Chicken
• Bone Broth
• Eggs (better prepared without fats, soft boiled or poached)

Foods to Tonify Kidney Qi

• Black beans
• Black sesame seeds
• Miso
• Seafood
• Seaweed
• Trace minerals
• Blackstrap molasses (moderation)
• Figs
• Purple and black foods
• Nettles (as in stinging nettles, they are great in soups and tea)

Foods to Cool Tonify Liver Qi

• Leafy and bitter greens in combination with a warm meal: Dandelion greens, mustard greens, arugula, steamed greens such as swiss chard, beet greens, spinach, kale, etc
• Beets
• Citrus fruits in moderation
• Peppermint tea
• Cruciferous veggies: Broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, cabbage
• Chlorella
• Seaweed (only fresh - no additives, it's good in soup and full of minerals for the kidneys)

Foods to Tonify Heart Qi

• Quinoa
• Berries (all types)
• Apples
• Hawthorn Berry
• Chinese Dates and Goji Berries (great in broths, teas and stews - must be organic, gotta be selective with anything from China)
• Red foods in general
• Lean beef in moderation
• Chicken liver
• Dark leafy greens
• Beets
• Black beans
• Olive oil
• Walnuts
• Avocado (in moderation and paired with warming foods)

Getting to Know an Herb 
(from the teachings of Sajah Popham)

1. Taste: What is the primary taste of the herb: bitter, sweet, salty, pungent, sour or astringent? Many herbs are a combination of tastes, so just list all that come to mind. If you can, it’s best to actually taste the plant yourself, rather than just look it up. 

2. Actions: List out all of the herbal actions for this plant that you can find in your reference materials - look up the plant in multiple books and resources as not every book will say the same thing. Write down everything you find listed under “herbal actions.” From there, pull out anything that is specifically referring to 1) what the plant is used for (i.e. something that says “anti”), 2) an organ affinity “action” and 3) a pharmacological quality. Note: if you don’t know what a particular action is, take this time to look it up and learn.

3. Affinities: Write down all of the organs, systems, and tissues that the plant will have an effect on. This can be derived through your research, or through assumption based on the actions of the plant. 

4. Energetics: Determine or research whether the plant is warming, cooling, moistening or drying. You can also note it’s effects upon the doshas or the tissue states. Also think, what kind of conditions or constitutions is this remedy like going to be contraindicated in? 


Herbal Actions 
This is an area of herbalism that requires further refining and defining in order to get clear on what an herbal action is and what an herbal action is not. Below are a few lists of examples of true herbal actions. Keep in mind something with the word "anti" in front is not a true action, yet you see this used everywhere from an allopathic perspective.

Vitalist Herbal Actions 
Adaptogen
Alterative
Antiseptic
Astringent
Bitter tonic
Carminative
Cholagogue
Choleretic
Demulcent
Diaphoretic
Diffusive
Diuretic
Emetic
Emmenagogue
Emollient
Expectorant
Hemostatic
Galactagogue
Laxative
Lymphagogue
Nervine
Relaxant (antispasmodic)
Rubefacient 
Stimulant
Tonic
Trophorestorative 


Herbal Affinities 
Where actions will tell us how the plant shifts our physiology, the affinity will tell us where specifically that plant will act within the body anatomically. In general this can be divided into the 3 primary sections: organs, systems and tissues. Below are a few examples of how you might differentiate these categories: 

Organs/Areas 
Stomach
Small Intestine 
Large Intestine 
Gall Bladder 
Liver
Pancreas 
Heart
Lungs
Spleen 
Kidneys 
Bladder
Brain 

Systems 
Digestive  
Respiratory  
Hepato-biliary  
Lymphatic  
Cardiovascular  
Genitourinary  
Reproductive 
Endocrine 
Nervous 
Immune 

Tissues 
Muscle
Bone
Blood
Lymph
Fat
Nerve
Mucosa 

Herbal Energetics 
One of the most important categories of classifying and understanding plants that is likely the most overlooked. With actions and affinities we see the effect of a plant on the anatomical structures and physiological processes of the body, but with the energetics we see how it’s working on the total global system of the organism, which is the constitution. Below are some of the primary models of energetics from different traditions- essentially they are all the same, just slightly different in their language and what pattern they focus on (i.e the 5 Elements or the 3 Principles). In essence, all patterns of energetics look at the herbs effect on temperature, moisture, and the tone of the tissues. 

Greek/Arabic 
Heating 
Cooling 
Moistening 
Drying

Ayurveda 
Decreases pitta 
Decreases vata 
Decreases kapha 

Physiomedicalists 
Stimulant
Relaxant  
Tonic/Astringent 

Chinese* 
Chi
Blood 
Yin 
Yang
Organ systems 

*Typically they are looking at whether an herb is tonic to these regions. 


Tastes 

It is through the taste that you are really able to determine the action, affinity and energetics- not always, but a lot of the time you can get a pretty good sense of the plant simply by tasting it. Now, this requires refining your palate and getting to a good understanding of exactly what these tastes are on their own, and how they combine. Below is a small chart of how certain tastes relate to a few actions, affinities, and energetics