 Have you ever experienced weird cravings for salty or sour or bitter or obviously sweet? Well in Chinese medicine, these cravings are related to certain organ systems and the functioning of not only healthy organs, but also the pathological functioning or pathology in certain organs. Now of course, certain cravings eaten in excess, like for example, sweets are a big one in modern times, will produce pathology, i.e. they will create illness. In this video, I thought I would share the link between certain cravings, specifically the flavors, not for example, peanut butter, but the flavors and what organ systems they're related to, because people often find it interesting. Hey guys, I'm Dr. Alex Hein, author of the health book, Master of the Day, and doctor of acupuncture and Chinese medicine. So before we jump into this video, two very important links right below. The first is if you'd like to become a patient of mine locally in Los Angeles or virtually via telemedicine, you can contact my private practice right below this video. And the second is that there's a free download for you, five daily rituals that could potentially help you add years to your life with Chinese medicine. So that is right below this video as well. So when we revisit one of our most ancient texts, the Huangdian aging, it specifically says what these cravings are related to in terms of organ systems. So let's look at that passage really quick. It said therefore, the heart desires bitter, the lung desires spicy, the liver desires sour, the spleen dash pancreas desires sweet, and the kidney desires salty. So let's start with if you're craving salty. We just read the kidney desires salty. So salt cravings for many people are often associated with quote adrenals and also people who are hypotensive. So they have low blood pressure. Now I remember when I was in grad school, I was not only working 60 plus hours a week in school, I was also working 20 hours a week to put myself through school and not graduate with crippling debt. And I found myself confused by the extreme degree of salty that I was craving. I mean, I could get a whole salty bag of tortilla chips, eat the whole thing, no problem. Of course, salty tastes good, right? Sugar, fat, and salt all play on the reward system of the brain. But I was very shocked to see that my salt cravings have become so intense. And I see this in a lot of my patients anecdotally as well, where they'll say, yeah, salty is definitely the thing I crave the most. And that is often a quote unquote, adrenal issue from our perspective. And we often treat the adrenals from the kidney as one of the organ systems. Now, are you craving sweet? Let's go back to that passage. The spleen pancreas craves sweet. So sweet cravings are very tricky in this era of obesity, right? Because many of us may not even crave sweet, but sugar is putting everything additionally from pasta sauce, bread. Every liquid you could possibly drink basically has added sugar in a supermarket. When we say the spleen pancreas craves sweet, what we are in a culture of is massive obesity from too much sweet, most likely. Too many calories and too much sweet. I mean, the health conditions related to being overweight and obese from the medical perspective are probably our top five killers today are within the top three, right? Cardiovascular disease, there's some metabolic links to development of cancer as well, strokes, dementia. All of that can be very related as well. So true sweet cravings are a little bit difficult to understand here in the context of our modern culture with way too much availability of sweet and sugar. But in ancient times, for example, someone who was emaciated and was literally starving was underweight. We would often use sweet things like maltose, basically sugar, right? To help build the person up and help them regain weight, basically. So we have a whole category of formulas called deficiency taxation. Basically, they're formulas you utilize for people that have overworked themselves into these nervous exhaustion type patterns. And one of the formulas called Xiaojian Zhongtang is used with a high degree of maltose actually in the formula. So you can imagine how sweet it was. So sweet really builds. But building is not usually an issue in the modern world, developed world, where we have too much sweet. We need more movement to get all this junk and all this sweet out of there. Now for craving sour, which I don't hear very often, there's sour patch kids. Let's revisit this passage. The liver desires sour. I'm gonna leave that because I don't hear very many people craving sour. If we go to craving bitter, there's one example I hear of this often. And let's revisit the heart desires bitter. Now what I would say is the people who tend to crave bitters are people who usually have acid reflux and indigestion or burping and feel full a lot. So it's interesting because we use bitters for the stomach, right? But the stomach and the heart of an intimate link in Chinese medicine and also biomedically, I mean, when we talk about acid reflux, right? It's also called heart burn. So the stomach and the heart have this kind of close relationship in some ways. And even within Chinese medicine, we have what's called the alarm point of the stomach, which is Ren 12, kind of in the upper part of your belly. And then Ren 14 is the alarm part of the heart. And it's just about this much above in the upper epigastrium. So even those two points are very, very close. So stomach pathology and heart pathology have this sort of intimate link. But bitters related to the heart, I'm not too sure. But certainly you see this with heart burn, no doubt about it. And if you're craving spicy, it says the lung craves spicy. Now we say that the nose is related to the functioning of the lung, right? So think about when you can't smell anything or you have a lot of sinus pressure, a post nasal drip. Having something spicy will help often with the mucus in the throat. But what's very interesting is that a lot of warm climates in the world, ironically have very pungent and spicy foods. I know in Southwestern China or in the Chengdu, Sichuan province, you have these incredibly spicy foods which are so humid. And I think a lot of it is just that when there's that much heat, it tends to kill your appetite. And that pungent, accurate spice brings back some of that appetite and some of that fragrance, that ability to smell. It's also a lot of people who crave spices because effectively they can't taste much anymore. So they crave that spiciness because the palate can actually recognize it because it's a strong flavor, right? If you're having peppercorn versus sugar, the peppercorn really stands out. Even though the sugar has a strong taste to it, that's sweet. Pepper corn is really clear as a nostril. So think of when you're having a stuffy nose, you have some wasabi in your sushi. Wow, what it does to the sinuses in the nose, right? That's the function of the lung from our perspective. These are five of the flavors and what they mean, the organs they affect. Don't forget, excess consumption of them will lead to pathology as well and will lead to illness. So we know the effect of excess salt on the cardiovascular system. We know the effect of excess sweet on all the organs related to diabetes, all the physiological pathways related to diabetes, right? So blood sugar, keep that in mind. You don't want to over consume these flavors. They're used therapeutically as well in ancient times. But I thought it was interesting because so many patients ask me, what do these cravings mean and are they useful and truthful? So sometimes they are, and sometimes they aren't, you know? A diabetic person that craves sugar is obviously, that is not the body recognizing it needs more sugar, right? So there's a dark side as well. We'll talk about it in future videos. But those are five common cravings and what organs they relate to. Again, if you want to look more about being a patient, reach out down below, contact my private practice. There's a free guide for you there and I will see you in the next videos here.