I. Concept and Development of Vitality The mental activities refers to the reflection of the external objective world in the brain of human beings, including consciousness, thinking, emotions, wit and cognition etc.. They belong to the functional activities of the brain. But in TCM,they are divided into two categories: one is the mental activities such as mind,etherial soul,soul,intention, will, pensiveness, consideration and wit ; the other is the emotional reflection,including joy, anger, worry, pensiveness, grief, fear and fright, which are also called the seven emotions". The mental activities of human beings are related closely to the functional activities of five zang-viscera. They correspond to the five zang-viscera respectively to form the system of viscera and mental activities. TCM believes that the life essence(ding)is the original substance of life. It makes up the human body. The coitus of the parental life essence produces the life, and then the mental activities are shown. Vitality(Shen)is the highly condensation for all life activities as well. The life essence is the material basis of the vitality. One has the life essence first and then vitality. Usually, they are called "Jing Shen"in Chinese. Spirit Pivot says : "Vitality comes from the essence of drink and food". Though the vitality originates from the congenital essence, it depends on the nourishing of acquired essence. If the essence of drink and food is sufficiency, and the viscera coordinate well, there will be full of vitality. The vitality is very important to human body. It places in the chief of the body, and acts as the important sign of the life and health. That's why the book of Spirit Pivot says:"One lost the vitality will die,while one with it will live. " The superior form of mental activities is thought, which relates to the heart. The book of Spirit Pivot says : "It is the heart that can reflect the matters", It is the physiological activities of the heart. Pensiveness, consideration, and wits refer to the process of thought activities in human beings. "Pensiveness" is to consider repeatly. Although one has made up his mind to do something,he still needs to think it over. "Consideration'is to think carefully, to analyze all-sidedly. Practically, pensiveness and consideration are called "Si Lu" in Chinese. When dealing with various matters,one would think it overland deliberate seriously to the special conditions, so as to make his thoughts in accordance with the objective law of the developing of the matters and reach his expected aims. "To handle the matters in this way is "wit" ,that is "clever or intelligent". II.Mental Activities and Their Relation to Five Zang-Viscera Mental activities, including mind, etherial soul, soul, intention and will. They belong to the five zang-viscera respectively,but they are controlled by the heart. As the book of Plain Questions says: "Those stored in five zang-viscera are that: mind is stored in the heart,soul in the lung,etherial soul in the liver,intention in the spleen and the will in the kidney. Therefore,the mind here refers to the thought activities mentioned above. It belongs to the physiological activities of the heart. The etherial soul is a part of mental activities, which is more active in mental activities. It is controlled by the mind. The ancients believed that "The liver stores the blood where the etherial soul stays". So the etherial soul has a close relation with the liver. Since the etherial soul acts with the mind,health of the heart lead to the health of the mind,and the abnormal of mind will result in the disorder of etherial soul. The pathological changes of the etherial soul are manifested as sleepingwalking,night terror,nightmare etc. The soul is a part of mental activeties, it is related to the lung. As it is said in Chapter 8 in Spirit Pivot "the lung stores qi where soul stays. So "Qi Po" is the mental activities of the soul. Soul is the instinctive sensation and action.After the birth,men's perception of ears,eyes,the movements of the feet, the cry and suck are attributable to the range of soul,It belongs to the instinctive activities. One with the soul will" be agile and has keen perception. The weakened soul will result in the slowness both in action and perception. The activities of"intention'and "will"are the peculiar functions of the human beings. It is the thought activities developing gradually after the birth. "intention'is an opinion, memory ,thought in the mind. "will" refers to the mental activities of which one makes a decision and resolves it into an intention,and put this intention into effect. According to the TCM theory , "intention" relates to the functional activities of the spleen,and "will" to the kidney function. III. Emotional Activities and Their Relation to Five Zang-viscera Emotional activities refer to the emotional changes. It is the reason of the brain to environmental stimuli. It is also a part of mental activities. TCM sums up the emotional activities as joy, anger, worry, pensiveness, grief, fear and frigth, which are also called"seven emotions". Under the normal condition ,the emotional activities belong to normal psychological activities. They are the psychic reactions to the external matters. The internal feeling is expressed by the facial expression ,words and voice. Happiness will lead to joy ,unhappiness to anger ;severe problems but difficult to solve induces worry ;complicate problem causes pensiveness, the sad news makes grief ,sudden frighten and terrible matter induce real and fright. TCM holds that emotional activities is closely related to the five zang-viscera. This is because that emotional reaction is the manifestations of the visceral physiological functions;and the essence of the viscera is the material basis for emotional activities. The liver relates to anger,the heart to joy,the spleen to pensiveness ,the lung to worry, the kidney to fright. So there is an saying of "five spirit zang-viscera". Moreover ,emotional activities will influence the viscera to induce a series physiological changes of the viscera. Abnormal mental activities will result in the disturbance in the visceral functions and illness will occur. The theory of "emotionai activities relating to the viscera" in TCM science is summed up through the experience in the long-term clinical observation. So it has important practical significance.
