In religious Daoism and traditional Chinese medicine, yangsheng refers to a range of self-cultivation practices designed to promote health and longevity. These techniques include calisthenics, self-massage, breathing exercises, meditation, internal and external Daoist alchemy, sexual practices, and dietary regimens.
Most yangsheng practices are intended to promote health and longevity, while a few are aimed at achieving "immortality" in the Daoist sense—referring to transformation into a ("transcendent"), a being who typically lives for several centuries before dying. While common longevity practices, such as maintaining a healthy diet and exercising, contribute to an extended lifespan and overall well-being, some esoteric methods of transcendence can be extreme or even hazardous. These include "grain avoidance" diets, in which practitioners consume only qi (breath) instead of solid food, and the ingestion of Daoist alchemical elixirs of life, which were often poisonous and could be fatally toxic.
Terminology The term yangsheng is a linguistic compound consisting of two common Chinese words. carries multiple meanings, including: To nurture, rear, raise, foster, nourish, or tend; to care for and look after. To support by providing basic necessities; to maintain, preserve, or keep in good condition. To train, educate, or cultivate in the proper way of fulfilling one's responsibilities. To nurse or treat in a manner that aids recuperation. In addition to its common third-tone pronunciation (), the character has a less frequent fourth-tone reading (), meaning "to support and take care of," particularly in reference to one's parents. This usage appears in the Mengzi (late 4th century BCE), which states:
"Keeping one's parents when they are alive is not worth being described as of major importance; it is treating them decently when they die that is worth such a description."
The standard and seal script forms of incorporate the phonetic component , originally depicted as a ram’s head, and the radical , indicating "to feed animals." In contrast, the ancient oracle bone and bronze script forms (e.g., ) combine with , suggesting the meaning "to shepherd" or "to tend sheep."
The character has multiple meanings, including: To live, be alive, or exist; life itself; a living being; the act of living; a lifetime or lifespan. To cause life, bring into existence; to give birth, bear, originate; to come forth, appear; to grow or develop. Fresh, green, or unripe; raw or uncooked; unfamiliar or unacquainted; unskillful, clumsy, inept, or awkward; unrefined. Nature, natural instinct, inherent character, or intrinsic quality. Ancient forms of the character were pictographs depicting a plant emerging from the earth (), symbolizing growth and vitality.
The (Comprehensive Chinese Word Dictionary), a lexicographical work comparable to the Oxford English Dictionary, provides five definitions for : – To take good care of one’s health and preserve one’s lifespan. – To nourish the body and mind for longevity. – To raise animals. – To be stationed in a location with abundant natural resources and a favorable living environment. – To give birth or raise offspring. The specialized fourth definition is illustrated by Zhang Yu’s () commentary on The Art of War, which states:
"An army ordinarily prefers heights over low-lying areas, values brightness over darkness, nourishes itself with vitality, and positions itself on solid ground. In this way, it avoids numerous ailments and may be considered ‘invincible’."
Additionally, the provides a definition for in its alternate pronunciation, as seen in Mencius: – To support and take care of one’s parents. The concept of holds a central place in Chinese thought. It forms a broad semantic field that includes various related terms: – "Nourish life" – "Nourish the body" – "Nourish the whole person" – "Nourish the inner nature" – "Nourish the will" – "Nourish the mind"
Translations "Nourishing life" is the most common English translation of . Other translations include: "Keep in good health; nourish one's vital principle." "Nurturing vitality." "Nourishing the vitality." "Longevity techniques." "Nurturing life." "Cultivating life."
Some sinologists translate and as "macrobiotic", using the English term in its original sense of "inclined or tending to prolong life; relating to the prolongation of life," rather than its more familiar macrobiotic diet meaning related to the Zen Buddhist dietary system intended to prolong life, which includes pure vegetable foods, brown rice, and similar foods (Oxford English Dictionary, 2009). The first example of this translation appears in Alfred Forke's 1907 rendering of Wang Chong's (circa 80 CE), as discussed below. In his autobiography, Wang Chong mentions that, near the end of his life, "he wrote a book on Macrobiotics in sixteen chapters. To keep himself alive, he cherished the vital fluid ." Joseph Needham and Lu Gwei-djen further elaborate on this concept. Macrobiotics is a convenient term for the belief that it is possible to prepare, with the aid of botanical, zoological, mineralogical and above all chemical, knowledge, drugs or elixirs which will prolong human life beyond old age , rejuvenating the body and its spiritual parts so that the adept can endure through centuries of longevity , finally attaining the status of eternal life and arising with etherealised body a true Immortal . Donald Harper translates and in the Mawangdui Silk Texts as "macrobiotic hygiene".Harper (2009) In these medical manuscripts, refers to "a somatic form of hygiene centered primarily on controlled breathing in conjunction with yogic exercises," a practice comparable to the classical Greek gymnosophists.
Historical developments Information about ("nourishing life") health cultivation was traditionally confined to received texts, including the Chinese classics, until the discovery of second-century BCE medical manuscripts in the 1970s, which expanded this corpus.
Han manuscripts
During the Western Han dynasty (202 BCE – 9 CE), Chinese archaeologists excavated manuscript copies of ancient texts, some previously unknown, from tombs. Among these were several historically significant medical books, which later became known as the "medical manuals." Scribes occasionally copied texts onto valuable silk, but more commonly used bamboo and wooden slips, the standard medium for writing documents in China before the widespread introduction of paper during the Eastern Han period (25 BCE–220 CE).
In 1973, fifteen medical manuscripts, part of the Mawangdui Silk Texts, were excavated at the Mawangdui archaeological site in modern Changsha, Hunan. Additionally, two medical manuscripts from the Zhangjiashan Han bamboo texts were discovered in 1983 at Mount Zhangjia () in Jiangling County, Hubei. Both sites were located in the Han-era Changsha Kingdom (202 BCE–33 CE).
The Mawangdui manuscripts were found in a tomb dated to 168 BCE, while Harper places their redaction in the third century BCE. Six of the fifteen texts can be directly related to the medical tradition of nourishing life. Two of these, and , primarily focus on techniques of sexual cultivation and essence preservation.
Two other texts, and , similarly contain sections on sexology, but also discuss breathing techniques, food therapies, and medicines. The focuses mainly on techniques for eliminating grains and ordinary foodstuffs from the diet, replacing them with medicinal herbs and , through special exercises. The text repeatedly contrasts "those who eat qi" with "those who eat grain," explaining this in cosmological terms: "Those who eat grain eat what is square; those who eat eat what is round. Round is heaven; square is earth."
The includes color illustrations of human figures performing therapeutic gymnastics. Some captions refer to the names of exercises, such as and , which are also mentioned in the and other texts.
The cache of manuscripts, written on bamboo slips, was excavated from a tomb dated to 186 BCE and contained two significant medical books. The comprises several texts listing ailments and describing the eleven meridians before the addition of the pericardium channel. The collection is closely related to the meridian texts and both briefly describe practices of nourishing life.
The outlines a daily and seasonal health regimen, including hygiene, dietetics, sleep, and recovery. It then details fifty-seven preventative and curative gymnastic exercises, along with massage techniques, and concludes with the etiology and prevention of diseases. The text recommends various therapies, such as breathing exercises, bodily stretches, and careful treatment of the interior . It states: "If you can pattern your properly and maintain your energy in fullness, then the whole person will benefit."
The manuscript considers longevity techniques to be limited to the aristocracy and upper classes, distinguishing between "upper class people," who fall ill due to uncontrolled emotions like extreme joy or rage, and less-fortunate individuals, whose diseases tend to be caused by excessive labor, hunger, thirst, and poor or evil (air). The latter group, lacking the opportunity to learn essential breathing exercises, consequently becomes sick and dies at an early age.
The manuscript is considered the "earliest known systematized description of therapeutic exercise in China, and possibly anywhere in the world."
Han texts
Classics from the Han dynasty (202 BCE–220 CE) first mention techniques. The Daoist includes early descriptions of , notably in Chapter 3, titled , which is part of the pre-Han "Inner Chapters" attributed to Zhuang Zhou (c. 369–286 BCE). In the fable about Lord Wenhui () coming to understand the Dao while watching Cook Ding () cut up an ox, he exclaims how wonderful it is "that skill can attain such heights!" The cook replies, "What your servant loves is the Way, which goes beyond mere skill. When I first began to cut oxen, what I saw was nothing but whole oxen. After three years, I no longer saw whole oxen. Today, I meet the ox with my spirit rather than looking at it with my eyes. My sense organs stop functioning and my spirit moves as it pleases. In accord with the natural grain , I slice at the great crevices, lead the blade through the great cavities. Following its inherent structure, I never encounter the slightest obstacle even where the veins and arteries come together or where the ligaments and tendons join, much less from obvious big bones." ... " "Wonderful!" said Lord Wenhui. "From hearing the words of the cook, I have learned how to nourish life ."
Two other chapters of the mention . In one instance, Duke Wei (), the younger brother of King Kao of Zhou (r. 440–426 BCE), asks Tian Kaizhi () what he had learned from his master Zhu Shen (). Tian replies, "I have heard my master say, 'He who is good at nurturing life is like a shepherd . If he sees one of his sheep lagging behind, he whips it forward.'"
To explain this, Tian contrasts two figures: a frugal Daoist hermit named Solitary Leopard (), who lived in the cliffs, drank only water, and remained healthy until the age of seventy when a tiger killed him, with a wealthy businessman named Chang Yi (), who rushed about in search of profits but died of typhoid fever at the age of forty. Tian explains: "Leopard nourished his inner being and the tiger ate his outer person. Yi nourished his outer person and sickness attacked his inner being. Both of them failed to whip their laggards forward."
This shepherding metaphor recalls the ancient characters for , such as , which combine and , denoting "shepherd; tend sheep," as discussed above.