🌿 Folk Prescriptions

A white-collar worker’s day always begins and ends in busyness. While earning high salaries, they are not rich in time. To maintain health amidst fast-paced life, one must start with small daily details.
Before Work: Eat Fruit with the Morning Sun
Japanese scholars believe morning fruit is gold, midday silver, and evening copper. Fruits are rich in essential carbohydrates, trace elements, vitamins, organic acids, fiber, and pectin. They not only improve constipation but also enhance digestion, soften blood vessels, improve heart function, and help treat hypertension and high cholesterol.
During Work: Guard Against Computer Syndrome
Computers are white-collar workers’ closest companions, but long-term use may lead to computer syndrome—main symptoms include dizziness, fatigue, eye strain, limb soreness, and insomnia. Women may also experience prolonged menstrual periods. To avoid this, frequent computer users should:
1. Avoid excessive forward head tilt while using the computer;
2. Choose an adjustable chair with back support to maintain optimal posture;
3. Take simple physical breaks during work, especially for arms and neck. Since white-collar workers receive little sunlight and exercise, they often lack vitamin D, increasing risk of osteomalacia. They should eat more foods rich in vitamin D, such as fish liver oil and eggs;
4. Consume more foods rich in vitamin A and beta-carotene to protect vision, which tends to decline in this group.
After Work: No Night Snacks with Porridge
Heavy workloads often require overtime or late-night socializing. Eating a late-night snack is necessary. Choose easily digestible, low-calorie snacks rich in vitamins and protein. Most people prefer porridge, believing it’s easy to digest—but this is misleading. Chewing thoroughly stimulates saliva secretion, and salivary enzymes are crucial for digestion. People eating porridge usually don’t chew carefully, so insufficient enzymes are produced. Moreover, porridge is consumed in large quantities, causing stomach distension and slowed motility, increasing risk of gastric ptosis. Thus, porridge is unsuitable for white-collar workers with a history of or predisposition to gastric issues. Also, by volume, porridge provides far fewer calories than dry rice—eating porridge fails to satisfy hunger and long-term consumption may lead to malnutrition.
Daily Exercise Schedule
White-collar workers understand the importance of exercise, yet claim they “have no time.”
Observations show that younger professionals (20–30 years old) have weaker exercise awareness than those aged 30–40. Men aged 30–40 mostly opt for “card-based indoor workouts” (especially swimming), occasionally outdoor activities like golf.
Female white-collar workers generally have stronger exercise awareness, but often driven by desire for slimming. Women over 30 begin feeling physically strained and realize exercise matters—but still find it hard to commit.
Here’s a suggested “exercise schedule” for reference.
If we assume seven days a week, 24 hours per day, and at least 3–4 hours of weekly aerobic exercise, ideally, every evening after 6 PM should belong to you. We urge white-collar workers not to overwork voluntarily for money or promotion. This way, at least 2–3 evenings per week can be dedicated to exercise. If exercising, do it before meals. Even if you eat afterward, avoid overeating. If you feel guilty about skipping meals, compensate the next day at lunch—not breakfast!
Those who travel or attend meetings frequently have the greatest flexibility. As long as they act independently rather than alongside bosses, solutions are easy: 30 minutes before radio broadcast, after checking into a hotel at night, or 30 minutes before meetings…
Weekends: Cut sleep by one hour, reduce TV and internet use by one hour—those two hours become exercise time. A European white-collar worker, truly lacking time, yet deeply valuing exercise, started walking his British bulldog every dinner time. Conveniently, his apartment complex had a large lawn—dog runs, he runs; dog walks, he walks—great benefits.
“Exercise = Eating, Exercise = Sleeping”—we urge white-collar workers to adopt this mindset. Prioritize exercise over meals. For example, on weekends, skip one meal—“clear out old intestinal buildup”—then use that meal time for exercise.
Emphasize: Outdoor exercise is better. Natural oxygen, vitamin D, and UV rays in sunlight are irreplaceable by indoor gym workouts. Though our income may not be humble, let’s not make exercise overly “luxurious.” Running, hiking, calisthenics, Tai Chi—choose what fits your environment. Nothing beats adapting to local conditions.