"When we look at beauty through the Taoist lens, the Lungs regulate the Skin, the Liver regulates the nails and the eyes, and the Kidney's regulate the hair. There's also the shining of the Heart. The Heart is the mother of Blood, the regulator of Blood, and leads the Blood". - Mason Taylor
Today on the podcast, we're talking about Beauty-in particular, beauty as it is understood and pursued through the Taoist lens.
The Taoist embodiment of beauty could simply be summed up through the understanding that internal harmony is the key to external radiant beauty, and the preservation of youth. As within, so without. Our radiance- the quality of our skin, hair, eyes, nails, and how we hold ourselves physically, is an insightful indicator of our internal organ health.
But what are the elements of this internal harmony that deliver sparkly eyes, healthy skin, glowing Shen, animated Qi, and well cultivated Jing?
In conversation with Sophia, Mason discusses the ancient practices, tonic herbs, and Taoist wisdom available to us in our pursuit of beauty through the many seasons of life. Rather than forming an unhealthy, unrealistic, obsessive relationship with beauty- this ancient ark of knowledge passed down from the Taoist immortals will keep us in an embodied, balanced, holistic pursuit of beauty- one that supports the cultivation of us evolving into graceful, wise, Shen-filled elders.
Mason also goes through the beauty-focused, single tonic herbs and tonic blends within the SuperFeast range- explaining why we love to use them and how they deliver external radiant beauty; from within.
This conversation is a beautiful Yin/Yang dialogue between Sophia and Mason, with many pearls of beauty-wisdom, both practical and esoteric. Make sure you scroll down to see the many topics discussed in this episode.
"As we go along, we need this barometer to ensure the body is being preserved enough. Do we have enough juice, enough sexual juices- enough Yin essence to ensure we can go through these graduation cycles and evolve into truly beautiful elders"?
- Mason Taylor
Mason and Sophia discuss:
- Ageless beauty.
- Blood and beauty
- Spleen and beauty.
- Fertility and beauty.
- Shen is radiant beauty.
- Preservation of Yin Jing.
- Schisandra for hair health.
- Beauty and Shen development.
- Herbs that regulate the Liver system.
- The preservation of health as beauty.
- Signs that your youth/health is deteriorating.
- Lung function, Qi cultivation and beautiful skin.
- Chi Nei Tsang for healthy organs and radiant beauty.
- SuperFeast herbs that support the embodiment of beauty.
- Why the Liver health is a critical key to embodying beauty.
Click here to listen on apple podcast
Mason Taylor
Mason Taylor is the CEO/Founder of SuperFeast and a renowned tonic herbalist. On a soul mission to bring people back to their body and nature while bursting through dogma, he shares passionately and uniquely in his workshops, podcast, and content on how to cultivate healing and potentiation through health sovereignty. An expert in Daoist tonic herbalism, Mason has helped tens of thousands of people globally discover medicinal mushrooms, adaptogenic tonic herbs, and the healing philosophy from which they emerged. Mason is also a budding comedian; bursting the bubble on the “health scene” with his antics.
Sophia Richmond-Manno
Sophia Richmond-Manno has been a part of the SuperFeast family for almost half a decade, leading the customer care team and putting her potent heart wisdom into herbal education. Sophia's passionate presence and gift with the written word are felt deeply in the essence of SuperFeast- if you’re a regular reader of SuperFeast Taoist/herbal education, you would have read some of Sophia’s beautiful articles. Sophia has studied Naturopathy, Vinyasa and yin yoga- and is deeply interested in eastern philosophy, psychology, psychotherapy, the body/mind connection, somatic healing, and astrology.
Resource guide
Guest:
Beauty Tonics:
Relevant Articles:
Schisandra And Detox Go Hand In Hand
BEAUTY BLEND: It's Amazing Health Benefits
The Incredible Health Benefits Of Tremella Mushroom
Relevant Podcasts:
The Ancient Daoist Beauty Tonics with Mason Taylor (EP#29)
Deconstructing The Beauty Industry with Jessica DeFino (EP#152)
Natural Beauty; Holistic Self Care and Dental Care with Nadine Artemis (EP#101)
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Check Out The Transcript Here:
Mason:
Welcome everybody. I'm back here with Sophia at Superfeast, HQ.
Sophia:
Hello.
Mason:
Hey, we really enjoyed our inaugural chat about Jing the other week. And we're going to keep on going with this series because Sophia and I have lots of conversations like this around the hallways anyway. It's a huge job working with the content universe that we have here at Superfeast and this allows us to, yeah, I guess this is for us a way to slowly plug through the multitude of topics and look at what these evergreen Daoist principles and just general life principles are that we always talk about here in Superfeast, just doing it a little less accidentally and just really making sure we move methodically, yeah through all the topics.
Sophia:
Yes. Fleshing it all out.
Mason:
Yeah. Well, that's a big part of what we're talking about today. We're talking about beauty through the lens of Daoism and through the lens of super face and how we approach this massive conversation and topic. And in the sense of fleshing things out, healthy flesh is a real important one in terms of that. So, we'll always have a little bit of a spleen activity there. And then as always, we're going to have to be coming back and talking about blood when we talk about beauty. The beauty and radiance and the preservation of youth, these are all things at the heart of Daoism. It's the heart of the treasures. However, we just need to constantly talk about it and refresh why through a holistic nature based lens.
Mason:
Humans are a part of nature. Part of the universe, not separate from nature because that system, there are places throughout the history, of course, in through China and other areas where this Daoist philosophy is practised, where it gets superficial and external pursuit of beauty within harmony and check and balance of course, isn't superficial. It's got a very appropriate place because our external beauty is a great indicator and barometer for what's going on with our organ health. But when you do... Living in the Western world, I feel like we do need to constantly come back and check with what the core of a beauty is because it constantly rewrites the way I'm approaching my own physical self, my own life path and entrenched into the philosophy and any ancient philosophy if you go deep enough and especially back to the classics and don't get caught up in the modernization and colonisation, sorry of an ancient system, which is hard, because then we're still living in the modern world.
Mason:
You can't completely live like an ancient, but within it are checks and balances that take you through the seasons of life and get you constantly coming back into a place where your relationship with beauty can be in harmony. And so that's what we're hoping to do today because people go off the rails in the pursuit for beauty. And it's the same in talking about ideology in any way, anything in excess. You just get stuck. It's like a looping record that we're not vain. At heart we're not vain. We want to move towards our destiny. We want to experience the depths of potential within us and the depths of feeling this unbounded love. That's what Daoism and that's what humanism is to do with, the human experiment is all about, but of course it's sometimes you go and you have your time when you go into your deep dive obsession. And that happens a lot in the health world and people find their ideology, but then you kind of know that there's going to be a phase and you got to know when you're on your way out of it.
Mason:
But that external pursuit for beauty is works the same way. And sometimes you just, you need to know what your exit's going to be in the sense of going deeper and finding out what beauty really is for you. And some people don't make it out and that's why it's nice. There is a massive movement around mass acceptance of how you look, that's great. But then there is calling a spade, a spade in that you are rapidly ageing and deteriorating and yeah, that is beautiful. But in terms of what we are talking about really graduating towards that, shen rich hard exploding elder. There is a difference and it's black and white Yin and Yan in terms of whether you have made the initiation and gone deeper and developed a relationship with what beauty is for you and then engaged with it.
Mason:
That's the difference not going, "Oh cool, I can just be..." It's the health people. "Oh cool, I just listened to my body". No, you're no longer engaged, listening. You're just saying, I'm just going to listen to my body and not actually engaging and cultivating your culture and lifestyle and your rhythm. That's it. It's ultimately, it's good for a little bit. It's good for rehab. It's good for ideology dieting rehab, and then you need to go beyond that. And it's the same with beauty you go into, I'm just going to fully accept. Yeah. Great. Good. And then what? And then what comes next? And so that's what Daoism, and quite often lays that platform for what's next? What comes next when we actually engage?
Sophia:
Yes. And I think also to speaking to how the west will sort of view beauty, it's generally, like you mentioned, it's how we sort of present on the outside. And, and often we can augment that beauty by using procedures, we can use accessories, any sort of embellishment and then we're sort of yeah manufacturing our attractiveness in inverted commerce to be, I guess, to create this idea of beauty. So, I think with the Daoism sort of philosophy, what I really enjoy about it is [inaudible] saying, it's about engaging with your own sense of self and your own idea of what beauty means to you. And then through simple practises and herbal use and inquiry, you can really start to make it up for, make up as you go along, but also know that you can change as you go along as well.
Sophia:
And it becomes a fun little exercise where yes, you might start taking some herbs, getting really good with your hydration, you sleep, your rest, all those sorts of things and see changes on the outside that appease you. Clear skin, shiny eyes, calm, grounded, aura, all those sorts of things, but then you can always go deeper and then not get attached to these outward things as well I think, yeah. So, leading into that to begin, can you explain just... You've already kind of summed it up a little bit, but can you explain how the concept of beauty is viewed through the Daosist lens?
Mason:
It's an outcome. It's one of those things as always is when it comes to when you have that [inaudible] cultivated within you, which is the... That's the ultimate intention of Daoism and the ultimate way for you to be dripping in your own beauty and dripping is a real good way to think about it because the lubrication is such a... If you're not lubricated, you don't have, again, you don't have the high quality blood permeating you and just bringing that moistening of all of those parts of your body. That's when you first start seeing beauty or your radiance deteriorating, and you can see nail health, go down, you can see rapid ageing starting to begin. And then you see what happens as above so below. Then you see within the body, you start having cracks start like starting to appear within the immune system, but that [inaudible] piece remains the most important because beauty is that cultivation of [inaudible].
Mason:
So, as we go along, as we said, we always need these barometer to make sure that the body has been preserved enough so that we, if we've got enough juice, we've got enough health got enough sexual juices. We've got enough in general, yin, which is a lot of, it's all of the fluids of the body to ensure that we can go through these graduation cycles and end up a really beautiful elder. And along the way, if you go through the path of realising, just to an extent, no matter where you live in the world, when you have a philosophy, it's why we bring altars inside because we need to remember that we're a part of nature. And so what the foundations there, what beauty is, is getting into the rhythm and harmony of nature and the universe, which that's just a way of us trying to get in rhythm with ourselves again, so that we can cultivate the potential for [inaudible] love to be expressed, fun to be expressed, joy to be expressed, libido to be expressed.
Mason:
And so when you're simmering with all that potential, when you're fertile, and that's a big thing of what beauty is, when you look at someone, it doesn't matter where if we're looking like post-menopause, it doesn't matter the fertility. And these are all things that we see as qualities of the youth. And then when we do remember that yes, youth, you could say early twenties and teen, that's the real youth in time, but a 90 year old's going to look at a 60 year old and say, that's well, there's a lot of youth and an immortal and immortal Daoist is going to look at 110 year old and go, "Oh you young scallywag". And so that is always relative. So, it's nice to remember that so we don't get stuck.
Mason:
It's what we do. We get stuck and pinned up on what we think beauty is. And of course the ancient Daoer stories they lay it on as well, because they know that is probably when you are at your most externally beautiful. And it's a good guide. And that's why [inaudible] is represented by a young woman in her twenties who's actually 200 and something years old and took [inaudible] every single day and preserved her youth because [inaudible] is a beautiful youth in tonic. Because it's a [inaudible], it's a blood tonic and it's a yin tonic. And so that's where, when we start looking at what that beauty is for Daoists, I would say the closest thing you could come is to describing that is your jing has been preserved.
Mason:
And especially the yin and the yin we do burn. There's a lot of yin deficiency within this world. And when you do preserve that yin you preserve the waters, you preserve your capacity to lubricate yourself. And when you actually have the water, the yang is heating up that water and getting it moving and vaporised and going up. But it is the yin itself that goes up and then fertilisers and then that's, and it makes it possible that we can sprout and seed and grow all new and regenerate the tissue. So, that's the first thing, it's the preservation of that Jing. And especially that yin Jing, you're going to see then there's going to be a preservation of sexual desire and vigour. Then from there, you're going to start seeing that the liver fun, a healthy and flowing liver Chi which the liver Chi...
Mason:
Although yin and yang lives within the kidneys. I think we learn the most about yin and yang when we do go and execute within that liver season, because the balance there is there's either whether we've got firmness and erectness of yang and that excessive planning and really pragmatic taking stock of what's going on in our lives and making a very solid plan going forward. And then that flexibility is the other inside go with the flow, the bending of the bamboo versus the erectness of the bamboo. So, when you bring up that using that frustration and that anger, then that becomes determination. And then having that been balanced out with extreme patience and extreme creative flexibility, it's chalk and cheese. I mean, at the moment, it's like I watch people trying to run businesses and you can see it's excessive. It's either completely over in the yin flat structure and or it's going completely over into the hierarchical, excessive planning and excessive control.
Mason:
And I watch myself in terms of my pursuit for beauty. This is my best barometer. See if my [inaudible] if I've got a long term liver Chi capacity to function. And so this is something you'd be able to engage in your life. I'm trying to find a harmony point and a balance point in a business organisation, which a lot of people are trying to do and engaging. And I don't... I'm not necessarily special in that. And there's lots of resources I'm taking on, but nothing is cookie cutter. And so I'm in and I'm engaged and I can go, wow, my gosh, here I am over here, getting too firm here. I am over here getting too loose and getting lost in the creativity. Now I want to lay down that plan, everybody follow that plan, but then there's a little bit of bend in that plan, of course.
Mason:
And it's confusing for people when you're a leader a lot of the time, but nonetheless, that's me being engaged with my liver function. And so if I'm there, what I'm ensuring just through that's through temperament, then of course, there's going to be all the other elements of liver health and taking liver herbs so on and so forth. But when that liver health is functioning and it's storing blood and nourishing blood, that's a true sign that you are on a winner when it comes to beautifying yourself. Because what happens then is the liver distributes the Chi smoothly blood follows Chi. So, then the other element that's going to be and it kind of caps out the top, I guess the top three real beauty organ systems being the kidney, especially the kidney yin, the liver function, and then the spleen. Then the spleen is... It's really the blood builder along with the yin of the kidneys and that's just the beginning stages.
Mason:
I'll go into talk about a little bit of nuance there when you are eating an inappropriateness with the seasons, when you are altering your cooking styles, when you're not going through those, you're not just doing keto and veganism all through the season, you're actually listening to the seasons. You're actually listening to your body. Because that does come into it. Even though I gave the stuff a little bit earlier, then it almost doesn't matter what you're eating to a certain extent. What's going to happen is you're eating appropriately for your spleen so that you can digest very effectively and build really solid blood. And of course, people have, yes, you can go down the route doing lots of different kind of blood tests and everything. But the regulatory cycle between kidney, liver and spleen is going to do a lot of that work for you as well.
Mason:
So, you go and get your panels and do all that kind of stuff as well. But just remembering that's not complete science yet. And there's even around iron, the whole conversation's blowing up at the moment around whether iron supplements are detrimental or if they're good, whether they're a bandaid that then gets tried to get used as something permanent. So, we like to have access to that, but then come back and look at what for us, where beauty emerges from it's those three organ systems working in harmony and making sure that the blood is working in harmony. From there, we watch that the blood is flowing correctly. So, that's going to take a strong amount of Chi and so with that dispersion of Chi and getting delivered and regulated through the gallbladder and smoothly been run out through the body, you're going to see the blood is going to start following that Chi.
Mason:
So, Chi tonics can actually be blood builders. Like astragalus a lot of people get confused when they're like, "Oh my God". So, astragalus is a blood builder as well, but it's a Chi tonic and you go, yeah, because what they found is it's such a good Chi tonic that it can just through its presence it leads the charge and then the blood follows. And then you see and kick up in blood production. And that's why you can also see that the lungs are going to be coming into it. And when we look at beauty, the lungs are regulating the skin, liver's regulating the nails and the eyes, the kidney's regulating the hair. The eye health is living in the liver, but also the shining of the heart, the heart is the mother of blood and the regulator of blood and leads the blood.
Mason:
And then what it also does is it turns a little bit of Chi into Shen as it comes through, and then that [inaudible], which is your love and just affinity for life that part you can all click in when it gets all too serious and you're like, "Why am I doing this?". And you feel as something that gratitude, you can feel an unlimitedness come over you, which if you're not going and touching that point can become overwhelming and anxiety inducing. And that's why anxiety can live in the heart a lot of the time. But if you're regularly touching on that part of yourself, your [inaudible] is building and healthy and that shines through the eyes. And that's where you can see the soul is in the eyes. and that's the Shen
Mason:
And then when the blood is nourished, it's being stored and purified by the liver it's been generated and created by the spleen, by the kidney yin that yang tonics can as well, like a deer yang tonic, not much yin, but it's a bone marrow tonic. And of course that bone marrow is having a lot to do with contributing to the blood. And so what happens then is the [inaudible] within that feeling of love, but it's also your sovereignty in your own mind. And this is probably where beauty really comes in, starts coming into it. Yes, the ultimate ability for you to be within your more infinite [inaudible] based self where you've shined the diamond and you are sharing your gifts and Your own... You've got your path nailed, but if your blood's not built, and it's not distributing that to the rest of your body, you become weak-minded essentially because your mind, your [inaudible], your personality, that's been refined, it is purely yours, and it is unique.
Mason:
And you've got the ability not to be mined like brainwashed and not have your mind bent over towards an ideology or a news outlet or some, gosh, I don't know some... Whether it's a social justice kind of thing, or a full capitalist thing, it doesn't matter. You'd like the left versus right. When your blood is strong and your [inaudible] is being distributed to all of those cells and every little bit of flesh, that's what's beautiful. When you meet someone, that's got their own mind, they've got their... And it takes a lot to develop this. And we use a lot of systems and ideologies as we go along in order to gauge who we are and what we are. But that's the essence of beauty. So, that's the thing about the Daoist, and I'm going to, I know I'm really going on this question in terms of describing what beauty is from the Daoist lens, what is beauty?
Mason:
Because if it's all about beauty, you would just do that, go into a cave and just do Qi Gong, which some people do is a part I'm just doing [inaudible]. I'm never touching a drop of anything that's not good for me or my liver. I'm obsessing over my physical health and my own expression, which is really fair enough. I feel like some people, you can feel that's their destiny, this lifetime. For the majority, it doesn't feel like it. And so what's the contradiction in the preservation of youth is we're preserving enough Jing so that then we can go into our dark nights of the souls and we can go into our extreme kidney water times of life. That could be the winter season, but you know that there are times of life when you are down and you're in the depths and you're facing your fears and it's hard.
Mason:
And so they're not very good those times for preserving youth. And so these are the times when you see cracks form, because you are at a diff... You're at a new phase of life. You're ready to face a fear or an inspiration or a new part of your wisdom and take a new direction on your journey when you're in the bottoms and the depths of these dark moments of the soul. And you want, that's the time you're using Jing, right? So, you're using it to generate the tenacity and the will, the [inaudible] to move through it and learn from it and become more of yourself. So, that's ironic because you need to take your Jing in order to do that. Now, the point here is why I'm talking about this is that's an inevitable part of life. And even though we can run away and live in monasteries and kind of escape it, maybe that way, but, or maybe take it down a path where we're not engaged with life.
Mason:
We don't have other people and things and jobs, which make it more complicated. It's not as fun. And so to do it that way, I don't think anyway, but the point is, as we go along, as we learn ourselves a little bit more, that's why we use wealth dynamics, profiling and Superfeast, which is based on ixing and five seasons, five elements, five transitions. And we just get a little bit of a gauge on ourselves and where we sit in that elemental wheel. So, we can sit in that place where the chi flows in terms of our activities and what we're putting out there and world, and get direct feedback to move towards our destiny. Put ourselves in lines of work, put ourselves in. This is the weather planning, extreme planning of liver comes in.
Mason:
It's why the liver's so important for beauty, because if you've got too much going on or not enough going on, you know essentially kind of where you want to get to in terms of your destiny, in terms of your [inaudible] being developed, then you know, you're going to have to do things and go through trials and tribulations. When you go through those times, how much Jing do you want to have to use? Because you're going to have to use some, but if you are crazy distracted, if you've got a bajillion things going on, if you've been starting things, when what you should have been doing is stopping things. When you didn't listen to the season cycle and so on and so forth and all the clues, then you are going to really see the cracks form during those phases. And it's a good... This is where people face like, holy shit, my body doesn't look the way it used to.
Mason:
And oh my God, I'm having this crisis. And, and it is a massive sign. And is it a sign that you should do things different next time maybe, or maybe you just went through a metamorphosis but you have entered into a new phase and it's happening regularly and you got to face your fear on that. And then you figure out right, when that comes about next time, I think I'll learn something so I can go through that transition phase more with more grace and therefore your ageing process is going to be more graceful. And you're going to have more wisdom to kind of know and accept that you are probably going to see some physiological changes at that time. Let's lean into it and learn about it. So, that's what beauty is from the Daoist perspective.
Sophia:
Okay. Thank you for that. And just when listening through everything you spoke about there, what was coming to me really strongly, and you mentioned it is harmony. So, we talk about health and vitality being an inside job a lot, we bang on about it all the time. We talk about the importance of our organ health. So, really listening to [inaudible] speak just then he was really illustrating that harmony, internal harmony equals external radiance beauty because it's all the organs working within harmony with each other to perform their innate functions. So, everything is flowing really smoothly. And another piece there as well is the grace piece. And this adaptability in terms of longevity. Longevity only occurs when we're able to adapt to our ever changing environment. And therefore when we've become adaptable and we're going with the way of Chi rather than bumping our head against the obstacle.
Sophia:
Yes, we might hit an obstacle, but how can we be malleable and flexible by like the bamboo and move around it and with it and gain knowledge and wisdom and do it as gracefully as possible. That's when we start to really... We're saving our Chi, we're saving our Jing, we're saving our essence. And then we're not only preserving our physiology just by saving energy. And we're not going to be generating this quickly in that way. We're also then building that Shen beauty on that other deeper level. And I think also too, when we're talking about choosing or defining your own definition of beauty for yourself, it's really when you are out there engaging with life, you're doing some of these practises. You're not in the cave then, because it is complicated. You do have to soften you always having to soften it and move and reevaluate and come back to centre and come back to harmony and develop your virtue, develop your compassion.
Sophia:
That these are all elements that really are when we're talking about ageless beauty and longevity and beauty. And when we are looking at older people who are just kind, they do things for their community, there's that care there. And they don't sweat the small stuff as much. That's really beautiful. And that's something that you can't... Doesn't matter how many wrinkles you have on your face, or whether your body works really well. That's this deep sort of resonance that you want you feel when you're in the presence of those people. So, I think pairing it back to this extreme western, some version of just outward beauty and, or using makeup and accessories and all these fun things to sort of define our identity, or define our beauty through that identity. And then we sink back because that can all be taken away.
Sophia:
What is left over? What can you control? What do you have? What's just yours that you can feel into yourself and those moments when maybe you're alone or things pour away. And you're in those dark nights, how can you retain some sense of acknowledgement that you've got something special about you? That it's not sort of... it can't be touched by outside forces. It's only uniquely yours. I think that's really, I find that really interesting. And you only start to gather those little pieces of Shen when you go through all this.
Sophia:
And then yes, we can bring in lifestyle factors and foods and herbs and practises to then preserve our physiology and our minds and work towards giving ourselves enough space. So, we can actually develop our shen. [Inaudible], but yeah, it just adds a nice dimension to it, because I think we're in the world we're living in and we spoke about this last week and things are changing so much. And what about if a flood comes and washes away, all your beautiful clothes, what's what are you left with then? You got to be left with something. And I think this is where these sort of ease and practises and philosophies really come in and they teach us something. It's a humbling really.
Mason:
Yeah, I mean it's the harmonising aspect is huge. Because you take any consideration and this way sometimes Daoism and I find playing this role sometimes can get tiring where you're constantly going, yes, that thing that you're doing and that philosophy is great, but, and I'm not going to want say, but because I'm learning in parenting books, don't say but, but nonetheless and that leads into another place. And then that leads into another place. And so it's constantly making it slippery and that's what Daoism is. And that's why a lot of people were like, look, this is hard to scale because I can't put this into a university course. And just, and so that's why it was left behind and cut out. But the specifically there, what you were talking about in terms of developing our [inaudible] there are, you'll see, there are central themes in what we're talking about that are all about just for turning in and just shining that diamond.
Mason:
And so this is where a little self inquiry process that is just about washing away the fog, little bit of meditation, that little bit of time in nature, that time sitting in yin, not being distracted when you're leading up towards sleep and when you are going to sleep. It's literally, that's what allows you to find that little light of what makes you unique and what makes you special. And quite often it's going to be a harrowing process, because you're going to have to wash away a lot of identity points as you go along. But then in terms of now going into, all right, well what about at this point there's many different considerations and many things you will be trying like, okay, cool, so, it's all on the inside. I'm going to let myself... Not let myself go, but you see quite I'm just going to wear shabby clothing.
Mason:
And I go through phases like this. I'm like, cool, I'll show up and have done nothing to my hair and just still have... It's just all sea water in there and I haven't put any oil in there and then I'll click in and I'll feel that, okay, there is an external aspect, which is proud. And that is that little yang it's like, "Hey, get up, present yourself really nicely". And but if you've been too far in that direction for too long, you are going to see that balancing, which is what happens when people leave corporate Sydney in Melbourne and come to Byron bay, they go through that rebalancing. So, finding that sweet spot of what the intention is of dressing yourself and presenting yourself in a way that is proud and beautiful and you feel is beautiful. And look what I did last night, actually.
Sophia:
Oh, Mason showing me his painted toenails. They are beautiful purple?
Mason:
They're vibrant purple. Little things like that. It was the first, I don't know, my friend suggested for some reason that we do pedicures one night and yeah, it's the first time not that for me is my ultimate expression of beauty. I just thought that was a funny little connection, but that piece, yeah, a nice balancing point there, but that is a huge part of the amount of pride that you take in keeping your space clean, keeping your car clean. Making your bed, ensuring that you're wearing clothes that are represent you to an extent, super important as well.
Sophia:
And I think listening to you speak there, it's about this sort of innate confidence. It's not about yes, okay, I'm just turning to my organs and drinking all the tea and doing all the practises and I'm just going to wear plain grub stuff. You know, it's expressing your personality that, but doing it, I think it's like with anything in life, it's what's your intention there? Express yourself in any way you want to, you can wear your bling and do your whole face off. And that's really fun, but do it... Are you... As long as it's coming from and not that there's conditions because it's up to everyone else to define their own life, but is it coming inquiring? Is it coming from a place of joy, celebration, love, confidence, you just interfacing with your expression of humanity in life or is it coming from a place of fear or if I don't look a certain way, I won't be accepted. I can't do these things because of these reasons.
Sophia:
I think that's always a big piece there and that's what we're talking about. And I guess when we're talking about the interplay with yin and yang and gathering, catching, and release, it's this beautiful dance where you go, okay, if everything was washed away, I still am me. And I have this special piece of beauty that I only understand for myself. And it's a texture people around me might feel, great, but also I'm living my life. I want to wear, for me, I'm in double velvet and purple and pink. I love that. And then no one can ever take that away from you. And I think when we talk about dogma and ideology and I know being in the yoga scene and talking to people going, "Oh no, I can't paint my nails anymore and I can't wear makeup up because I'm a Yogi now and we're all pure", and blah, blah, blah, and natural.
Sophia:
And it's just not the case. It's just because we are here just having fun with life, being a human being. So, it's just, I think we're trying to explain there's this sort of internal dialogue and that's where the engagement piece makes we're speaking to [inaudible] comes in. That's really makes things fun and interesting and always having to get around why you do things and how you do things. And that gives another layer to the [inaudible] piece because that's learning and that's evolution.
Mason:
Yeah. Showing that side.
Sophia:
Yeah. And then, okay. So, we've gotten really philosophical and whimsical, which I really love, but in terms of, we understand this large concept of beauty through the Daoist lens. So, let's look at the herbs, especially in our product range that really support us being able to hold this vast concept.
Mason:
The good thing about tonic herbalism is you're not going to be able to go far in the Superfeast range without falling upon a blood building tonic and a beautifying tonic. The beautification piece, literally every single tonic herb, you wave a stick around tonic herbalism. You're going to land on, yeah, that's got a beautifying element. But as I said, there are some that are more specialist. I've got the beauty blend was the second blend I ever made. I made it Mason's mushrooms. And then the beauty blend I created because I wanted it to be so obviously associated with the term beauty, just knowing it was going to remain in a conversation, start for conversations like this. I'm notorious for creating names for my formulas that are not marketable and not obvious. And for some reason I just couldn't not make this one really obvious.
Mason:
And I'm still quite happy and proud we went down that route. And when you look at the most revered herbs for beauty, you probably say the three that are in here, the longen is an incredible [inaudible] and spleen tonic and Chi regulating tonic. It's in there more for the function, I guess in terms of a supporting it's a secondary herb in the blend, but it's also there as a supporter to help the blend just get distributed in the body. But schisandra, goji, and pearl, they are the beauty tonics of Daoism. And the biggest thing you've got in common, especially with schisandra and goji, is that they are yin tonics. And so they are preserving and cultivating the yin and that they are Liver tonics.
Mason:
And of course liver is something that you are going to have to... Everyone's going to really have to start associating. That's one of my favourite thing. If you want to make it really simply in terms of like, cool, how do I just get a little more of an application and get the beauty, see visibly. I want to see the beauty shining from me and that's going to have a lot to do with blood. It's going to have a lot to do with your nail health. It's going to have a lot to do with your eyes shining. It's going to have a lot to do with your skin. And so your liver's going to have a lot to say about those things, especially if you just look at the purifying aspect of blood, but then the regulation of blood and the regulation of compounds that are in the blood and aspects of nourishment that are in the blood.
Mason:
And you can go a little bit Western and look at the regulation of hormones that are going in there. Those herbs are so beautifully regulating to that liver system. And that liver system has such a say and effect on so many other aspects of the body that it's such a leader in the body that you see beauty start to emanate. And the beautiful thing is we hear people getting on all kinds of blends and getting all kinds of physical things. But beauty blend is the one that gets the physical things going on. And so I'm not going to say, go and have it if you've got like chronic skin things going on, but nonetheless, it's cool. We don't know what's going to happen. For some people they're like, "I've just never had my eyes open. I feel like I've had crust on my eyes for like my whole life. And I can just... Something's just happen to my eyes. And I just fee...", and that's a simple cheat, that's a simple element.
Mason:
There's physiological things going on, but that's a simple, when you bring a harmonisation of Chi the liver system, the whole liver wood system ends in the eyes. And so it's connected. It's flowing the Chi is moving there, the life's moving there, the regulation's moving there. You're opened up. Same with nails people getting on these herbs and been like, "Gosh, I've just always had brittle nails that have been discoloured. And now they're all plum", and biggest one I've had in the early days is someone they were like, "oh, you know what? I cut myself pretty badly the other day. And it's been a while since I've seen my blood, but I just couldn't believe how vibrant my blood was and thick and healthy". And they said, they put the finger in their mouth. This is at the markets. And they're like, "And I was tasting and I was like, it's just was good blood. And compared to the last time I'd done that" and they were like, "The only thing I've done is beauty blend".
Mason:
And, that's not the beauty, this beauty blend, yeah, it's a good formula. I really believe that, but it just got, it comes down schisandra and goji. And then that pearl is such a beautiful cooler to the liver and just brings such beautiful, smooth flow to the liver and then brings such a beautiful stabilisation to the mind, which is remembering that pearl, a beauty tonic or beauty formula well it can't not have a [inaudible] stabiliser, especially we don't need it aggressively going and cultivating because that once you stabilise the mind and you have that calm, graceful, beautiful deliverance of your wisdom into the world, but I just can't say enough for schisandra,
Mason:
The amount of times people have gotten onto this blend and they're like, "Whoa, my hair is lush". I'm not not saying if there's like dramatic problems that are moving along and you've got dramatic discoloration and dramatic hair falling out, don't... These are clinical, well, maybe not the discoloration, but they're they're clinical things. Or if you've gone through a very sudden huge, massive discoloration, that's probably one of those pivotal points when you're going through something initiation or a hard time, and you want to get some clinical support on that and make sure they're like, they'll come in and go, you are severely inefficient or whatever it is. And then you want to be on not just tonic herbs, but you want to be on those middle herbs those syndrome and symptom addressing herbs.
Mason:
But the amount of times people have just come and going like, "My hair has never, ever been better". And you just feel incredible that springtime energy comes in. So, here within the Southern hemisphere, now we're going to be starting getting into beauty blend season two. And I love it. Then I'm like, I have a very non spleen friendly orange juice and beauty blend heat teaspoon of beauty blend. I'd probably do it for three weeks straight when spring really clicks in. And then my body's golden. And I feel during that time, the beautifying practises, the reason it's a youthening energy and why the liver is so associated with the youthening is because it is that rising sun, right? So, it is the energy of the east and the liver draws on the Chi of the east, which is beginning anew, beginning afresh.
Mason:
So, people like me, this is why if you look at mention wealth dynamics, I'm a heavy wood person. So for me, that's a creator archetype in that system, but everyone else who's a liver person would love starting things. You love beginning things, and it's such, it feels so youthening, right? You're like, ah, I'm a kid in a candy store with life. I'm just going to start this project over here. This project over there, and anything in excess though, is going to start becoming draining. And that's kind of where I'm at with. I'm like, dude, you cannot start anything new right now. So, but for many other... But I get that little fix and it's a really appropriate time for me to be starting a bunch of things. But at that time, if my liver is in harmony, especially my yang is in Harmony's so excessive.
Mason:
And especially if I had had a really successful winter to feel, I am, even though it's busy and it's insane, I've really... I haven't committed to several things. I've paused them for three months just to give me that little bit of breathing space. So, I think that will start me off right for the year. And so with that, my planning capacity is going to be more grounded in reality. So, the things I'm going to start are going to be done with a little bit more wisdom in the eye of the general. So, that's the beauty they're the top beauty herbs, just pure beauty. The other thing about schisandra is it is our lung tonic, and so being a lung tonic, it's going to be regulating the skin. The lungs regulate the opening and closing of the pores. So, that's why they're in charge of the skin and the [inaudible] , which is the surface immunity.
Mason:
So, I mean, you can't also go very far from medicinal mushrooms when talking about beauty. And even though when you look at from what they do from a western sense, it's immunological, there is some kind of, and in mind, sometimes it's not completely like the shining of the eyes. It's really an internal one. It's just why the beauty herbs are good. Because they really get people like, whoa, these herbs bloody work. And if you work that way, that you really are externally, what's the word, not driven, but that's your barometer.
Sophia:
Externally focused.
Mason:
Yeah. But not name focused. It's just some people just, that's the way they're oriented. It's cool. That's how I gauge whether I'm on the right track or not. And so, and it might even just be something to do with being more extroverted. And that's how you relate versus someone who's introverted and it's constantly spending time internally.
Mason:
But when you start taking the mushroom something beautiful occurs because your ability to protect yourself. And then let's go into the lung function there. And the cultivation of Chi, especially that surface Chi that's your capacity to open and close the pores and then allowing that skin and your lungs to be that surface protective layer that stops pathogens and wind and hot and cold from really penetrating. Now, you don't be stupid with that. That's why beautiful people are ones that wear scarves, beautiful people wear shoes and stop the wind from coming in, right? So, there are practises, there's a [inaudible]. There's no standard it's subjective, but there are patterns that you might as well jump on board with because beauty will be cultivated if you are working in harmony with the seasons.
Mason:
So, the lungs super important, because if you are finding your... If you do find your skin is something that lacks a little bit of lustre, then a lung focus is going to be very important. Schisandra and the beauty blends are really great blend because it's got so much of that beautiful lung stuff. But that's why that the one of the ultimate beauty like stacks is getting the beauty blend and then putting Chi in there, which is full power liver herbs, and then lung herbs, and then the lungs are associated with your voice. And so if you aren't actually just even voicing to yourself a little bit of truth about like, come on mate, admit it to yourself, this isn't working, this is working so on and so forth. So, that's where that beautiful function comes in there. And then you start introducing some real beautifying breath practise, which is just within stillness and not necessarily just going yang and vigorous and do that long term, especially for you in the Northern hemisphere, you're coming into autumn.
Mason:
I'm really excited. I'm really excited for you guys because it's such a crazy opportunity when you get to long season and the amount of beauty that you will cultivate in your skin. When you honour that metal precise, let it go, cut it. And you really focus on breath and you really focus on that tissue, that lung tissue, how it moves through your body, how, and this is another thing. What about getting in there and actually touching your liver? What about actually having a go, getting your washer stones, everyone, and getting between your rib joints there and having a little rub, having a little rub, you'll be like, ow, ow, ow. And that's what's meant to happen. And you keep on getting in there, get a little tap in the morning. You get up in that lung, that lung season, or maybe you're really focused on skin right now.
Mason:
That's cool. Tap all around that lung, that lung area, all around the side, you, I said, be engaged. You're not really going to... Your beauty will run away so fast. If you are living in the theory of organ health and you aren't actually touching your organs and you aren't really looking for the signs of whether that organ system is flourishing or not. And they're physical signs, a lot of you are going to be geared to. And I find it really scary looking at physical things going on. I'm like, oh, la la la I really don't like doing it. And I just know, I don't want to judge myself too harshly there, but I'm going to, I need to set up the conditions where I will go and look for it. I need a bit of space. I need half a day. I need a meditation in there. I need time at the beach and I'll start to creatively be able to, engage with what's going on physically or emotionally is rhe other one.
Mason:
And touching your organs and feeling them, feeling whether your abdomen's getting really hard. That's going to be a sign. All right. You're not in an amazing place. You really want to just watch it and make sure it doesn't run away too much. You need to be taking some time off. You need to be dropping the stress. You need to go and find someone that does [inaudible] organ massage, and get them getting in there. Or you just need to get a bowl and put it down and just roll your organs over it. That's a big one guys in terms of being engaged. So, from we've covered the beauty, the actual kind of beauty herbs, which have kind of more or less liver herbs, the Chi, the immunological aspect of beauty, it's a bit of somewhat of a stretch of we talking about beauty in an external way.
Mason:
Chi blend is a crazy beautifying blend. It's the Chi tonics are amazing and they can be blood building, as I said. And so if you are taking blood building herbs, this is what for the women, like the Chi goes with everything. It's just the stack. And so it's the beauty blend. And then you add the Chi. Yeah, you are going to take it to that beautification to another level. If you are trying to get your brain moving and taking neural nectar, and you add in the Chi, it makes it really smooth in the way that your brain wakes up. And then likewise, let's get the blood builders now, because this is the other part that's just incredible for long term beautification that Jing is kind of like, yeah, we'd say Jing is like the money in the bank, but for for beauty, it's your ability.
Mason:
You have the organs functioning well enough so that you can have healthy blood. So, a lot of this is going to lie in for men really respecting that 24 hour organ wheel cycle, which we've got to do a bit more content on it, but I've talked to [inaudible] a lot about it. You can get posters all over the place. You can go to [inaudible] website and get an organ poster. And you just look at it, just make your own little adjustments. You'll learn what's good for your body, because your body has a unique expression. And maybe certain periods aren't just two hours in for you. That's a little bit longer. Others are a little bit shorter. That's going to change throughout the seasons, but for them it's going to be that 24 hour.
Mason:
And for women, it's going to be the moon cycle. And if you get in tune with that, then your Chi is in rhythm with nature. Therefore, it's in harmony, it's been respected and you're going to have healthy blood and healthy Chi. So, however the I am Gaia blend. And then I'll talk about [inaudible] stack of the Chi on top of this, it just goes to an absolute, another level. It's got probably the most famous blood building, herb [inaudible], this Angelica route. This is so, and we use the... It's the root it's the tip that is more of a Chi tonic where that the base of the root is more of the blood building. And we use both because although the primary function of this blend is to, is to build blood and that's one of our... It's a TGA product.
Mason:
That's officially what the studies that we had to find to get this, to find nourish strength and replenish the blood. That's what we've got there on this TGA product. And that's what this herb does probably, yeah, probably the most famous in many ways, in many ways, because it's a yin tonic. Someone of a kidney tonic, but others do it benefit in the kidneys. But especially what the function that it's having there with the liver, especially when white peony is present with it. They've just got this beautiful relationship and the that's why women, there's why the [inaudible] piece we talk about a lot the first I learned about that from herbal context, when you can feel the aliveness of nature, and you can feel nature looking at you and calling out to interact with you and that in herbalism as well is Steven [inaudible] book, not secret teachings of plants, but it's another one. There's another one.
Sophia:
I can't remember the name either.
Mason:
We'll find that for it, but if you look up [inaudible] there's a number it's kind of like that, it's the secret teachings. Oh, no, no. It is the secret teachings of plants. It's the lost language of plants is the other one I think about. So, secret teaching of plants is the one, and I'm pretty sure there's an example at the end where he is talking about being in clinic, and this woman is going through certain issues and what's going on. And he goes through that technique of getting out of his mind and allowing his peripheral nervous system to go through sensing what's going on around him so that she can talk... Her body can talk to him.
Mason:
So, the illness can talk to him. He can be attracted to what's going on, where, or maybe through his communication with what's wrong within her also while listening and actually going through the questions and learning through just more of a diag... A cerebral diagnostics technique. So he had a few examples and I know one was where he honed in on the lung and then just had the I think swamp cabbage, just emerge out behind him. But there was another one which I just wanted to share, because it's an awesome story. And out of the [inaudible] area, I should say, just jumped forward. But another one is walking a woman around a herb garden and she just stopped. And she just started going through the bushes and found Angelica root and it's oh, Angelica.
Mason:
And it's not easy to find if you know, of course, if you don't know what herbs look like, and he was like, "Wow, you've just gone and found [inaudible]. You should dig that up and I'll go and show you how to prepare it". And she had this magnificent healing and a lot of it happens because it's so regulating. But especially to the regulation, to the organs that produce the blood, that a lot of women do have that similar feeling. So between the Angelica, we've got asparagus root in here beautiful blood builder not its primary function, but just an amazing yin tonic as it goes an incredible [inaudible] tonic, and this is where the major [inaudible] function of this formula kicks in. And that's why any beauty or women's tonic for me has got to have a [inaudible] function.
Mason:
And this is just especially such an angelic herb. And if you're meditating with [inaudible] so if you, if you've got I am Gaia and you're having meditation to them, Gaia, try out that feature where you can, you feel like you can fly and fly and get a bigger, get a bird's eye view of your life. The other one that is really needs to be spoken about in terms of blood building and beautification is [inaudible] the yin that's the yin tonic, the kidneys' own food. Kidneys are the brutal life. If you feed them, you feed them by respecting the yin times in your life. And things we've talked about it in the nausea, but things like [inaudible], that's why I love having it in the Jing tonic. The Jing tonic's incredibly blood building and beautifying in its own way. But within the I am Gaia the [inaudible] is a primary herb.
Mason:
And you can feel... I know, I feel quite, I'm just so comfortable knowing how many women are taking this and I take it every now and then, because I like having... I need a bit of yin and blood building at times. It can't just all come from yang tonics. Although as I said, [inaudible] good yang kidney tonic [inaudible] is a better blood builder because it works on bone marrow so much you can only use the yang to develop the blood that substance of yin to a certain extent. [inaudible] it's a lot of the time it is its transformational blood building benefits in yin that just light people. It restores faith in people because of just how profoundly it does that. And then you start, if you are someone who's cold and a little bit sluggish, and then you put it with like a nice strong cinnamon tea or something like that, a high quality cinnamon and it can be the ginger, but cinnamon's a great blood builder.
Mason:
Cinnamon's one of the best blood builders that you can possibly have and just burns through. If you've got hot, if you've got symptoms of heat, you stay away from cinnamon or just go light on it. But if you don't and you get onto the cinnamon, especially during winter, it is a beautiful blood builder. And how do you know if you've got good blood? Well, first of all, you can go to an acupuncturist and they can tell you and they can read it and you can do your tongue diagnosis and see whether you're going pale. And it might be stale. There's lots of things. It could be stasis. It could be a blood deficiency. There's many different... It could be, liver Chi, blockages or whatever. Might be the fact that your liver's not storing enough blood.
Mason:
There's so many ways. It's why tonic herbs are regulating. And they're not really just jumping to conclusions. We're not trying to self diagnose. We're using our instinct. We're using very surface symptomology and jumping ahead. But in terms of, if you're having a poor menstrual health or cycle, you can pretty much, there's something going on with your chain blood, and you can know your blood's more or less going to be deficient and getting onto these blood tonics, especially after you have a bleed and you're getting onto like I am Gaia or this formulas, I think the most famous blood building formula is called four things, which is [inaudible] prepared [inaudible] white peony and [inaudible] rise zone. And that's you can see this 3 of those I wanted to bring into the I am Gaia formula.
Mason:
So in terms of, and many we've gone, we've gone through a number of herbs here. I mean, I think everyone can see that beauty, oh gosh, we really went philosophical in the beginning and I feel like that's the only way you can approach beauty because, and we are trying to walk a line because we've got... We're aware of having a beautiful and having pride in a beauty aesthetic. And we want to, we want to do that. We're aware of just the acceptance of all and everyone and everything, but then is discernment not beautiful is learning and getting direct feedback and getting for you. Maybe some people don't care about the preservation of health. So, they are going to have a different opinion of beauty than I am. I will go in and join them in their conversation of full acceptance of beauty.
Mason:
But when I come into my world, I do not have to take on their opinion of beauty. But the other thing about here is beauty doesn't have any kind of physiological determinator. I won't look at someone and and say, well, that's obviously not beautiful, because that's impossible for me to do, it is the most beautiful thing about the approach that we're taking to beauty here. And I love these tonic herbs so much. And I love because it opens up that conversation and the amount of people that do have those really transformational breakthroughs around it's like you get enough G going, you get enough feedback, you can start engaging with yourself. And all of a sudden, all of the brainwashing around beauty just starts washing away. These herbs are incredible.
Sophia:
And I think even though what this listening to you speak there, the point that you made in terms of you can't sort of make a call on this is beautiful and that's not beautiful because everything has its own beauty. And I think even having that access to that ability to hold that awareness is really the crux of all this and the herbal practise and movement and breath work and diet. These are just tools that we use to allow ourselves more space to hold these concepts. I just wanted to quickly wanted do to quickly touch on because I know we've been talking about blood a whole bunch. And do you want to just speak to what blood actually is? Is it a yin Jing sort of thing?
Mason:
Yeah. Let me figure out how I want talk about... What yeah...
Sophia:
I think that's important. Because I mean, I know with Gaia, it's yin, so [crosstalk].
Sophia:
The yin Jing it's like liver blood yinging or something, but that's sort of like the... In terms of what blood is at its core, it's the yin expression, kidney essence or Jing in a way there's the young element that it's actually that foundational, we're talking about the-
Mason:
You're right.
Sophia:
But I think that's important to explain because it helps. And then in terms of like men using this in for a hair tonic and blah, blah, blah, it's from that deep yin sort of what is it? It's like a... It's the mass, there's another word for it, but I can't think of it at the moment. Substance, it's that substance.
Mason:
Yeah. How important it is to actually just go in and we're not going to go into the biochemistry and looking at like what the makeup and blood is necessarily. You will look from a Daoist lens and just... And making it very accessible. It is highly responsible for going into the tissue and delivering nourishment and taking waste. And that's a very black and white. Everyone knows that and can agree upon that, which is the epitome of yin and yang function. So bringing nourishment and then the body going through a waste and excretion through its activity and burning out a couple of substances. That's what its beautiful. It maintains the harmony of yin and yang in the body. But the blood itself is the purer yin. I mean, there is yang within it, but it is the four [inaudible] and it is that yin, which is... Why do we call women yin beings and yin organisms?
Mason:
It's because they are dominated by and regulated by blood. And so the way you can look at it as it is just that yin lives in the kidneys and yin is substance within itself. But that substance then actually been manifest in the body and actually take just the way that Chi is that yang manifestation in the body that goes and creates animation and men are governed by Chi and that's why they have a particular evolutionary path it's pure yin. And it is that. That's why when you have herbs, like [inaudible] in vegan kidneys, own food, that's just why the yin that's there within the kidneys, that's the potential for yin to then be generated and expressed within the body. And that's what we get when we talk about blood.
Sophia:
Thank you for clearing that up. I also, we've forgotten to talk about [inaudible].
Mason:
[inaudible].
Sophia:
It's rolling beauty and law, her law and tradition around the use of that.
Mason:
It just came. Traditionally it's always been there, but it just came just stamp heating into the beauty gosh sector. There are I can't believe how quickly massive makeup companies started putting [inaudible] into their face creams and all that kind of stuff. It's in Daoism it's always been there as a lung tonic and a lung lubricator and a stomach lubricator. It's a pure yin tonic, it's the most yin, one of the most yin medicinal mushrooms you'll find. And then when you see it's a gelatinous, translucent mushroom, it's pure, it's pure yin and it's beautiful. And it's got all kinds of... I haven't looked at the science around it, but I don't know where they're at with it, but it's ability to... What was the... I can't remember the function it's hyaluronic acid that it's got the same function of which holds like a bajillion times its molecular weight of water.
Mason:
And so when you do see that there's dryness and that's going to be due to the fact that the lungs are too dry. And so you bring in something like [inaudible] and you're going to start seeing a lubrication and a unifying of the lungs. And therefore you're going to start seeing that in the skin and good thing it's tonic. So yeah, if you are really yin and stagnant and wet and you can see for you, if it's like fungal problems on your skin, you don't necessarily have a yin problem, but it's a regulating beautifying tonic as it is. It's little bit of a Jing tonic as well within itself. That mushroom the amount of people as well. That how often because it's so easy to... Because herb the... Remember herbalism tonic herbalism is all about how much you can stick to it.
Mason:
I was just on Instagram today. I haven't been on super active on Instagram. I just, just going back to a few people who are old friends and quite... I guess they've got notoriety and I just jumped in there a bit in their video mess, sent them a video message and just kind of more or less was just like, "Hey, here I am. I'm the annoying tonic herb guy to see if you're taking your herbs. I don't want you to be getting swept up in all the [inaudible] new things and all the product collaborations for me, I just want to see you on your herbs, taking them regularly, taking them consistently".
Mason:
And [inaudible] is one of those ones. So easy for people to do that. And how many people buy kilos are [inaudible]. And then it's scooping it into your mouth is something that happens a lot. It's not just a funny thing that we say, a lot of people do it and because of that, people take it a lot. And because of that, people, the amount of people that come back to. My skin has never been more lush and vibrant. And why is that? Beca.Use your organs are healthy. That's the only reason.
Sophia:
And they're hydrated as well. And I guess when you were speaking, then I was just thinking of [inaudible] the health of the [inaudible] and that's sort of being the highway for Chi and making sure the body's holding fluid in the correct way and all that sort of stuff. So, that all leads into it.
Mason:
Yeah. You got, you got to be wet for life. I think that's that is when you come down to those key aspects of beauty, it's nice nourish blood and it's about having enough water in the tank. So little things, if you don't have a sex drive, I mean, I'm not saying not... What I didn't say was having sex all the time. That if you don't have a sex drive and a capacity for sexual attraction like even to yourself arousal, then you go down a path where your beauty will start to leak. Likewise, if you are going against the grain of going down at night and not appreciating yin and not appreciating sleep, if you are increasingly getting sick, these are things to show that. If you're increasingly getting agitated, if you're increasingly doubling down on those emotions, that don't work for you and they go against the grain of your family flow, your workplace flow, all those kinds of things.
Mason:
You going down a path where you will start to leak your beauty at some point. And that's something I always want to end on. It's not just all like, oh, whatever, it's just always good. And it's always fine. It's not always fine, we're not here. That's not our message, not why we're doing this tonic herb thing so hard, but it's with the leaking of Jing you find it. Are you going to leak it? Of course, the whole life is leaking it. Excessively? No. Not moving, ignoring all signs that I use the word moving towards your destiny. I feel like that works for me. And that's what it is from a Daoist lens. If it's going to work, there's somewhere you're heading. And if it's not that it's you need to be willing to put in the hard work, but if you can really start to feel at some point that you have your diamond, your [inaudible] has become so fogged up that you don't have the capacity to feel love and inspiration at all ever you are going to really age with not as much grace that is possible.
Mason:
And you really want to start looking yourself in the mirror as we were talking about before, actually just looking at those signs and those symptoms and stop lying to yourself. You really got to listen. You really got to listen. And that's where the vagueness of beauty is really good at times, if you can go and say, all right, what are you trying to tell me? And because if you can watch it early, you can stop disease states from coming up as well, because you don't just like, oh, well, I had beauty in my youth and that's all good. No, that's a complete throwaway. Maybe you need to reevaluate and come into a new way of relating to your beauty.
Mason:
Sure. That's completely that's com completely viable, but if you just go, oh, well, that's it, my beauty's gone then, yeah, you're probably going to see degeneration start to occur because a rapid degeneration of external beauty is showing that organ based hormonally based nervous system based immunologically. That you are going to be deteriorating rapidly in some way as well. And a huge part of Daoism is dissolving conflictions or dissolving or preventing disease. And so it's a simple thing of just having the willingness, which is kidney essence will to actually look yourself in the mirror. And it's day by day. You don't have to have big cathartic changing moments every single it's a long life, but you need to be able to consistently have that touch point. And that's where beauty isn't we're not just giving you a whole pass here. If you start engaging with your beauty, that's going to take you into dark nights and you're going to have to face your fears. So, that's the piece I want to end on with our sighting beauty chat.
Sophia:
Okay. Good one, mase. Thank you. We'll just end it there I think.
Mason:
Yeah. Thank you so much. That was really fun.
Sophia:
Yes. It was fun. And I hope that really helped everyone to get a wide, a very wide lens of how you can exist within the beauty space and within yourself in life.
Mason:
And if you know yep. Get in touch with us and if you know anyone who's working within the beauty space and align with this, maybe they want to get me on a podcast or maybe, you know someone who's I don't know, a beauty product reviewer or something like that. And we want to get them onto beauty blend. Please email us. We love... We are on an infiltration mission when it comes to this beauty space and there's never been a better time because it's such a... It picking up so much momentum. But I think we can also bring in that actual accountability piece a little bit with a little bit more ferocity than other people are doing. So, we love you. Thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next time.
Sophia:
See you next time.
