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It was George Ohsawa who first came up with the phrase, Magic Spectacles of Yin and Yang. It is such an apt phrase. Learning about yin and yang is, really, like putting on a pair of magic spectacles. You begin to see the world differently; you begin to understand the world differently. This new way of seeing, this new understanding, applies to just about everything - yourself and your health, your work, activities and lifestyle, your emotions and attitudes, your relationships, your environment, the climate, the cosmos... This book will help you with this understanding. Before I proceed, I like to say, "Thank You George Ohsawa" - not just for providing such an apt expression, but more for simplifying the concept of yin and yang in a way that modern, western-educated people like me - and you - can easily understand. If not for the teachings of George Ohsawa, we would still be struggling with abstract, philosophical concepts such as: Yin is female / Yang is male Yin is cold / Yang is hot Yin is the shady side of the mountain / Yang is the sunny side of the mountain It is hard, really, to apply these concepts to daily life. George Ohsawa has made it so simple that, in less than a minute, you can understand what yin and yang is all about. I will come to this in the next chapter. For now, let me just say a bit more about this man and his teachings. Great Life George Ohsawa called his teachings MACROBIOTICS. The teachings are actually not his. He had learnt from another teacher before him, who had learnt from ancient Chinese and Japanese texts. What Ohsawa had done, however, was to modify some of the teaching and present them in a way that is easy to understand. And since he coined the term "macrobiotics", he is often regarded as "the father of modern macrobiotics". Macro is a Greek word that means "big" or "great". Bios is another Greek word that means "life". Macrobiotics can therefore be taken to mean "The art of living a great life". Today, macrobiotics is widely associated with a diet plan to help people recover from cancer and other serious illnesses. It is very much more than this. In fact, Ohsawa - who was most active teaching during and after World War II - was more concerned with world peace than with health. His approach, however, was that world peace must begin with peace and harmony within the individual. It begins with personal health. If there is a "war" going on inside your body, there is not much you can do to bring about peace in the world at large. Macrobiotics is the art of health, healing and happiness. It is a lifelong learning. While the basics can be grasped in a minute or two, mastery of this art takes a lifetime. How to be healthy and happy? By understanding what life in this universe is all about. How to understand this complex universe? By reducing everything into yin and yang. Doing so gives us a framework, a point of reference. This can be extremely useful. And fascinating. So let's get started... |
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