Spirited Heart

心平氣和*

A peaceful heart for harmonised vapours

藏所藏：心藏神，肺藏魄，肝藏魂，脾藏意，腎藏志，是謂五藏所藏**

What storages store: the heart stores the spirit, the lungs store the corporeal soul, the liver stores the immortal soul, the spleen stores the intention, the kidneys store the will, this is what is called "what the five storages store".

Training differentiates the spirit methods, 神法, from the heart methods, 心法.

Spirit is linked to mobilising the organs while heart to steady heartbeats through proper breathing.

Mobilising the organs quickens the vitality flow while deep and regular breathing calms the heart down.

A calm heart frees one's spirit, the same goes for all the organs.

A free spirit, away from one's body desires and sensations, calms down one's heartbeats.

Spirit shines in the eyes, heart is in one's breath.

Hitting towards a faraway target is more a spirit training, not sweating in an overheated room is more a heart one.

Moving extremely slow is more a spirit training, postures are more a heart one.

Solving the oxymoron of calm but hyperactive organs is one of the centrepieces of internal training.

*心平氣和 is normally translated as "tranquil and even-tempered" or "calmly and without stress". This quite common idiom can also reflect the practices that believe that the body and the soul/spirit are so intertwined that there is always a physical noticeable impact on one's body of one's emotional and/or spiritual state. Hence, heart will be taken in this instance as a the physical organ, the heartbeats being what will be watched over, whether by their impact on the blood flow or breathing. 心平 could then be taken in the meaning of a "heart that flattens", 平 also meaning flat. Indeed, motionless relax trainings such as the lotus posture or just lying work on one's breathing to make it as slow and deep as possible, reducing the heartbeats to an almost but never reaching flatline. And the slower and steadier one's breathing is, the less emotions he/she undergoes.

** Explaining the Five Vapours, Plain Questions, The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon, 宣明五氣, 素問, 黃帝內經