Anshen Zhumian Fang
One-third of a person's life is spent in sleep. Sleep is a physiological need of the human body and also an important means to maintain health. Its health benefits are roughly fourfold: promoting growth and development; protecting the brain; eliminating fatigue and restoring physical strength; enhancing immunity. However, some people often suffer from insomnia, difficulty falling asleep, or waking easily during sleep, often accompanied by symptoms such as dizziness, headache, forgetfulness, and fatigue, seriously affecting work and study.
Insomnia usually results from dysfunction of the five zang organs, especially the heart, liver, and kidney. Due to different causes, it can be classified as deficiency or excess. Deficiency fire disturbing internally, with disharmony between heart and kidney, manifests as palpitations, fatigue, forgetfulness, and restless insomnia—commonly seen in deficiency patterns. If external fright, liver qi stagnation transforming into fire, lung heat disturbing the heart, or unrested heart spirit occurs, symptoms include irritability, fear, anger, and inability to sleep at night—typically seen in excess patterns. For the former, nourishing and calming agents should be used; for the latter, clearing lung heat and soothing the liver are recommended.
Traditional Anshen Zhumian health-preserving formulas mainly focus on tonification. Commonly used foods include lotus seeds, jujube, sour jujube, lily bulbs, longan, yam, quail, oyster meat, yellow croaker, and animal hearts. Improved sleep helps restore brain fatigue and benefits learning and memory. From this perspective, tranquilizing herbs also have certain cognitive-enhancing effects.
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